Our sincere apologies if we just spoiled the ending to Old Yeller, but c'mon, you had since 1956 to read the children's novel and nearly as long to watch the original flick. So, are we good? Alright then, moving on.

AMD, the world's second largest chip maker, is taking the ATI brand out behind the shed, and that shotgun isn't just for show. By the end of the year, ATI will be nothing more than a footnote, save for whatever older generation products are still in the wild.

Apparently this wasn't an easy decision for AMD, which sent out surveys to several thousand "discrete graphics aware" respondents in the U.S., U.K., Germany, China, Japan, Brazil, and Russia. What they found was that the "AMD brand [is] stronger than ATI vs. graphics competitors," while the "Radeon and Fire Pro brand awareness" ranks as "very high." The conclusion?

"Results indicated 'permission' to consolidate under the AMD brand," the survey says.

AMD purchased ATI back in 2006 for $5.4 billion, a price tag that had many analysts scratching their heads at the time, particularly as AMD continued to post losses quarter after quarter. Now four years later, the acquisition is looking like one of the smartest moves AMD ever made.

For the most part, AMD's 5xxx series of GPUs have stood up well against the competition,and that includes Nvidia's Fermi architecture. If the Sunnyvale graphics chip maker wanted to, it could probably sit on the sidelines for the rest of the year and still remain competitive.

That isn't in AMD's cards, so to speak. Citing "sources from graphics card players," Digitimes says you can expect AMD to start shipping videocards built around its next-gen GPU -- codenamed Southern Islands -- in November, with an official announcement preceding the launch a month ahead of time. This new GPU will come manufactured on a 28nm process. The original plan was to make these upcoming chips using a 32nm manufacturing process (and called Northern Islands by AMD), but Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) ended up skipping its 32nm R&D and jumped straight to 28nm.

Around the same time, and perhaps even earlier, AMD is said to be cutting prices for its ATI Radeon HD 5000-series graphics cards, both in preparation for the upcoming 6xxx series, and to fend off Fermi from chewing into its market share.

PowerColor today announced its LCS HD 5870 V2, an upgraded version of the original LCS HD 5870 that now "features unprecedented factory overclocked settings."

Calling it "unprecedented" might be stretching things a tad, but not by much. With the GPU factory overclocked to 950MHz, the LCS HD 5870 V2 matches Gigabyte's GV-R587SO Edition card, the only other HD 5870 GPU we spotted on Newegg clocked higher than 900MHz. More surprising, however, is PowerColor's decision not to goose the memory, which comes clocked at 4,800MHz, or 200MHz slower than the original LCS.

Like the previous version, only water cooling gurus need apply. The LCS HD 5870 V2 comes equipped with high-flow 3/8-inch and 1/2-inch fittings with captured o-rings to help prevent leakage.

"We got very positive feedback from the first version of the LCS HD 5870," said Ted Chen, CEO of TUL Corporation. "Now we released an upgraded version with factory overclocked settings and offer a cool working environment. We're sure that it will exceed expectations from gamers."

As with most of PowerColor's HD 5870 line, this newest release will come bundled with a Dirt 2 coupon, though the company didn't say when this will hit retail or for how much.