With the latest driver “update”, ATI removed support for the following graphics cards:

  • Radeon 8500/9000/9100/9200/9250
  • Mobility Radeon 9000/9100/9200
  • Radeon IGP 9000/9100/9200

This is why closed source drivers suck. My Mobility FireGL 7800 is also not supported by the official ATI driver. Well, ATI obviously only cares about new sales, not about users. (Except that users like me will not but ATI anymore, but go for e.g. Intel)

Fortunately, there are some opensource drivers for these cards. They also have 3D acceleration.

Let’s just hope ATI releases the documentation needed to support the newer cards (9600+, X300+) before they also discontinue support for these. (Or at least allows redistribution of the existant 2D drivers that have already been written for some of the newer ATI cards)

So don’t buy any newer radeon, because there is no long-term-support for them. In a few years, you won’t be able to use them anymore!