AMD has launched the ATI Radeon HD 5800 series graphics cards which will run one of the most powerful graphics processor ever launched by the company. The new graphics cards fully support Microsoft DirectX 11, the new gaming and compute standard shipping shortly with Microsoft Windows 7.

Boasting up to 2.72 TeraFLOPS of compute power, the ATI Radeon HD 5800 series effectively delivers twice the performance-per-dollar of previous generations of graphics products.

AMD has initially released two cards: the ATI Radeon HD 5870 and the ATI Radeon HD 5850, each with 1GB GDDR5 memory.  The new series also incorporate ATI’s Eyefinity multi-display technology, which allows users the ability to see more windows simultaneously. A DisplayPort connection is required for the third panel to be visible.

The series also features ATI’s Stream technology which claims to boost system’s performance by offloading tasks that were previously sent to the CPU to the GPU, thus resulting in faster speeds.

Additional features include ATI CrossFireX, which offers gamers better gaming performance in dual-mode; Avivo technology, which is aimed to maximize the Blu-ray movie experience with brighter whites for more vivid video playback; and PowerPlay, which keeps the power draw low when GPU activity is reduced.

Graphics card vendor, XFX has already launched the Radeon HD 5870 card in India which is available with Rashi Peripherals at an estimate street price of Rs 27,000 and comes with a 3-year warranty.