Advanced Micro Devices on Wednesday announced the availability of its 690 chip set, the company's first integrated chip set for AMD processors that includes the ATI Radeon X1250 graphics processor.

Integrating the Radeon X1250 graphics processor into the 690 chip set means PCs based on the chip set will not require an add-in graphics card. And by building the chip set itself instead of relying on partner companies, AMD will gain competitive leverage against Intel, said Chris Evenden, director of public relations for visual and media business at AMD.

PC vendors such as Dell or Hewlett-Packard want chip sets made by a single company so they can offer more stable platforms to their enterprise customers. That is one reason that Intel makes its own chip sets. AMD has been at a disadvantage because it once built a chip set model, but in recent years has relied on chip sets made by ATI and Nvidia, Evenden said.

AMD acquired ATI Technologies last year and has worked quickly to harness the company's graphics expertise with its own processor lineup, including chip sets -- the PC component that connects a processor with other components, including memory and peripherals.

The 690 chip set is compatible with AMD's desktop processor lineup and offers several high-end features, including integrated DVI (digital visual interface) and HDMI (high-definition multimedia interface) outputs for high-definition video. The chip set also includes hardware decoding for MPEG2, the video compression technology used with DVDs -- which means less CPU power is required when playing DVDs on a computer.

Together, that makes the 690 chip set powerful enough to support PCs running Microsoft's new Windows Vista OS, as well as home computers designed as media center PCs, he said.

The new chip set is available on motherboards from more than 10 companies, including Asustek Computer and Elitegroup Computer Systems Co., AMD said.