9600Pro to 9800Pro

[Andy Pandy]

I currently have a Sapphire 9600Pro Fireblade - haven't really tried
overclocking it much although I do try to run it at the higher mem speed
(330 instead of 300) as this card is advertised to be able to do easily.

I have seen what I believe to be an excellent deal (UK) for a Sapphire 9800
Pro - it claims to be a retail pack but the "Lite" version which doesn't
include any of the software - I am not worried about this.

Considering the prices of the 9800XT cards which are hugely expensive the
deal for the 9800Pro I've seen seems a good one. Not much point in
performance terms to "upgrade" to a 9600XT ie. I won't see much difference
to what I have now but I wondered realistically how much of an upgrade a
9600Pro to 9800Pro is????

I've seen a friend run the recent Farcry demo on his 9800Pro with high res
and all fsaa and details stacked up very high and it ran brilliantly. I've
tried the demo on my 9600Pro and it runs ok at 1024x768 with medium settings
but I was drooling at the 9800 Pro !!!

Anyway, here is the link for the 9800 Pro deal (Komplett) - is this really a
stock 9800 Pro? ie. no 9800SE or other cut down versions as far as I can
see...

http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?sku=122901&cks=PRL

Bugger! Stop press - I've just checked the link again and the card is now
priced at £164.50 - the other day this was at £135 which seemed a superb
price for a 9800 Pro. I am going to keep monitoring this link as they show
out of stock currently anyway so no good to anyone!!!

Andy

 

[Julian Richards]

This looks the biz.

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/prod...2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=55198
--

Julian Richards
julian-richards "at" ntlworld.com

XP Home
L7S7A2 motherboard
Powercolor 9800 SE 8 pipelines with Omega drivers
1 GB RAM
10 GB + 80 GB HDs
CD+DVD/CDRW drives

 

[Dark Avenger]

I currently have a Sapphire 9600Pro Fireblade - haven't really tried
overclocking it much although I do try to run it at the higher mem speed
(330 instead of 300) as this card is advertised to be able to do easily.

*snip snip snip snip snip clunk.....clunk? damn it's broken*

Bugger! Stop press - I've just checked the link again and the card is now
priced at £164.50 - the other day this was at £135 which seemed a superb
price for a 9800 Pro. I am going to keep monitoring this link as they show
out of stock currently anyway so no good to anyone!!!

Andy

Well you go from 4 pipelines to 8, from 128bits to 256bits memory
buss. And it's clocked higher..and also overclocks higher.

Howmuch you go up in performance in current games..well current
games..except some demos out on the market... do not yet use the extra
offered performance. Demos like Far Cry, Unreal 2004... those hint at
what the use of the higher capabilities of the cards nowadays can mean
for gaming.

It can be, very slight things... like the quality of textures... ever
played max payne II? My god.. the textures..ouch..with a nice marinade
of bump mapping to make it just "real"

I would say the performance of the upgrade you speak about..it about
50% ... in most situations.

 

[J A Temple]

Yeah, I noticed that as well. I reckon Komplett forgot to add VAT as
Overclockers.co.uk have it at about same price now + I'm guessing that's the
approx real going rate (135 + 17.5%). Still not bad value tho about the
same as Hercules 9800SE AIW so it may be tempting to go 4 that + try to
softmod it + get the TV features?

JAT

 

[Adrian H]

Yeah, I noticed that as well. I reckon Komplett forgot to add VAT as
Overclockers.co.uk have it at about same price now + I'm guessing that's the
approx real going rate (135 + 17.5%). Still not bad value tho about the
same as Hercules 9800SE AIW so it may be tempting to go 4 that + try to
softmod it + get the TV features?

It was under the 'deal of the week' section which was scheduled to end on
Sunday. I don't think it was a mistake, just a very good deal.

JAT

 

[Danny]

"Adrian H" wrote...

It was under the 'deal of the week' section which was scheduled to end on
Sunday. I don't think it was a mistake, just a very good deal.

I just bought the Sapphire 9800 Pro, 128mb card from overclock.co.uk for
£168 inc delivery, which is pretty damn good if you ask me, and they have
them in stock!

Danny