AMD's next generation of DirectX 11 GPUs could be rolling up as soon as the fourth quarter of this year, according to a representative from AMD board partner HIS.

Speaking to Funky Kit, the graphics card maker's senior marketing officer in Hong Kong, Kenny Chow, opened the proverbial can of beans. Sadly, the full interview requires registration to read, and we're guessing AMD's legal eagles have already swooped in, as even registered users are now presented with an error message reading: "You are not authorised to view this resource" if you try to access it.

Luckily, the guys at Xbit Labs managed to retrieve the magic quote before it disappeared. "We are expecting the new ATI Radeon HD 6000-series to be announced later this year, around Q4 2010," said Chow." According to the site, he then added "after which, we will be releasing our own Radeon HD 6000-series early next year."

The news corresponds with earlier rumours about the launch of the Radeon HD 6000-series, codenamed Southern Islands, although it now looks as though AMD might announce the chip a little while before graphics cards start shipping.

Little is known about the specifications of the Radeon HD 6000-series yet, but it's widely expected to be more of a refresh of the Radeon HD 5000-series, as opposed to an architectural overhaul, while sticking with a 40nm fabrication process.

Rather than packing in even more stream processors, which would be a tough job without a die-shrink, the new GPUs are expected to offer efficiency improvements, along with reduced power consumption and heat output.

AMD had a similar strategy when it stepped from the Radeon HD 2000-series to the 3000-series, retaining the same number of stream processors, but reducing the power consumption and heat output enough to cool the Radeon HD 3850 with a single-slot cooler.

Of course, AMD hasn't confirmed any of this yet, and Chow's use of the word "expect" is still pretty vague. Nonetheless, with Nvidia's GeForce top-end GF100-based Fermi chips consuming large amounts of power and pumping out the heat, a streamlined and power-efficient DirectX 11 architecture could be a real winner for AMD.

来自香港的显卡厂商HIS(基恩资讯)透露，他们预计AMD下一代桌面显卡Radeon HD 6000系列将会在今年第四季度开始发布。

HIS高级市场经理Kenny Chow在接受媒体采访时说：“下一步，我们认为新的ATI Radeon HD 6000系列会在今年晚些时候宣布，大概也就是2010年第四季度。在那之后，我们会于明年初推出我们自己的Radeon HD 6000系列产品。”

AMD高层已经多次明确表示会在今年下半年更新显卡产品线，但从来没有确认过“Radeon HD 6000”系列的型号命名方式，开发代号“南方群岛”(Southern Islands)也从未出现在过官方渠道中。六月初的台北电脑展Computex 2010本来是个演示或者展示的好机会，但AMD却丝毫没有提及，表明新一代显卡有可能会略有推迟，而且之前也确实有消息说发布时间被定在今年秋天，现在所谓的第四季度显然更晚了一些。

HIS所说的话也存在很大的不确定性，不过我们完全可以认为，AMD已经向其合作伙伴通报了未来显卡产品的规划，只是还没有任何实质性的进展。当然了，GeForce GTX 460刚刚上市并赢得一致赞赏，AMD方面也有可能是借此吸引对手注意，释放烟雾弹。

根据此前传闻，南方群岛系列仍会采用台积电40nm工艺制造，在现有Evergreen Radeon HD 5000系列的基础上融入下一代全新架构“北方群岛”(Northern Islands)的部分特性，重点提升性能效率，功能特性方面则不会有太大变化。

产品编号上是否会按惯例使用“Radeon HD 6000系列”，AMD还没有做出最终定论，不过AMD此前曾经暗示说Radeon HD 5000系列的命名方式太过于老实了。