Apple System Profiler: Identifies Video Card as ATY Instead of ATI

When Apple System Profiler (ASP) is run on any Macintosh with an ATI video card installed, the vendor of the card will be identified as ATY rather than ATI and the card name may not be identical to the product name.
Apple System Profiler is properly displaying the information located in the ROM (Read Only Memory) on the ATI card, or ATI video chipset itself. This is because ATI chose to identify themselves as ATY in the ROM. It is not an issue with ASP nor does it indicate a different vendor.

You will notice this discrepancy after performing the following steps:


The picture below illustrates how the ATI RAGE 128 Pro chipset, used in some Power Macintosh G3 and G4 computers, appears in the ASP Devices and Volumes tab under Mac OS X. The card name and model will vary depending upon what card or chipset is installed. See below for some examples.



ASP Devices and Volumes tab under Mac OS X

Apple System Profiler Identifiers
Display Card Name and Apple System Profiler Data
RAGE 128 ProRadeon 7500Radeon 8500
Card type:displayATY,DDParent ATY,DDParent
Card name:ATY,Rage128PdATY,BlueStoneParent ATY,R200Parent
Card model:ATY,Rage128ProATY,RV200 ATY,R200
Card ROM #:113-72701-125113-91701-222 113-85710-123
Card revision:00 0
Card vendor ID:10021002 1002

Table 1 Examples ASP data of some recent display cards

ATI video cards were used in a number of products, including, but not limited to:


Note: In some models, an alternate video card could be substituted for the ATI card.

Published Date: Feb 20, 2012