14 DAY TRIAL // Recently announced by AMD, the Radeon HD 6990M graphics card will be used by Dell in the Alienware M18x gaming notebook, making it one of the first laptops, if not the first, to receive AMD's flagship mobile GPU.
Just like the Radeon HD 6970M it is meant to replace, AMD's new graphics card for the mobile market is powered by the Barts GPU, which is also used in the Radeon HD 6800-series desktop solutions.
This time, however, AMD has opted for using the full implementation of Barts, also known as Barts XT, which includes 1120 stream processors, 56 texture units, 32 ROP units and a 256-bit wide memory bus.
In addition, the Sunnyvale-based company has also increased the clock speed of the GPU, from 680MHz to 715MHz, as well as the amount of video memory installed to 2GB.
One of the first laptops to get the Radeon HD 6990M will be Alienware's current mobile flagship, the M18x, and the card will be available in both single and dual-GPU configurations.
Users can opt to pair the HD 6990M with a series of Intel Sandy Bridge processors, going all the way up to a 4GHz overclocked Core i7 2920XM, up to 32GB of system memory and with dual SSD or HDD drives.
The Alienware notebook also includes eSATA and USB 3.0 connectivity, dual HDMI and mini-DisplayPort video outputs, a 3MP webcam, a 12-cell Lithium Ion battery pack, 2.1 audio and a Full HD 18.4-inch display.
"At its core, the Alienware brand is about pushing the limits and finding new extremes in gaming performance," said Arthur Lewis, vice president and general manager for Alienware.
"By offering two AMD Radeon HD 6990M graphics processors in our flagship M18x laptop, Alienware and AMD have come together to provide gamers the ultimate mobile experience," concluded the company's rep.
Alienware hasn't provided any information regarding the price of the Radeon HD 6990M upgrade.