The rumour of a new AMD Radeon 6950 graphics card has it not only shedding some excess memory, but also being lighter on the wallet.

[Update [01/18/2010] As a result of some miscommunication, the original report by online sources claiming that AMD would be launching a 6970 1GB at $279 are in fact, false. In our contact with AMD, the company confirmed the product it actually intends to release, will be a Radeon HD 6950 1GB, priced at $279.

The card is said to retain all of the same technical specs, including 1408 stream processor and stock speeds of 800MHz / 5000MHz. The only change will be halving the memory to 1GB of GDDR5, which will have an effect on frame rates, though only more noticeable at high resolutions. Manufacturers such as HIS, have already begun listing the card under their current products.

As a result of the reduced memory, AMD will be offering the HD 6950 1GB at a rather inconsequential $20-$30 less, but the company hopes it will better target the incoming NVIDIA GTX 560 Ti, expected to arrive late January

As with every good mid-range card, one can expect to see factory overclocked variants debuting shortly afterwards, with PowerColor, Sappphire & XFX supposedly queued up for the card’s official launch sometime in February.