Radeon 9700 pro vs. 9800

[Scott C. Smith]

I'm going to finally replace the GeForce 3 card in my aging gaming rig with
a Radeon. My system is a P3-933 with 512 MBs PC-133 RAM, so right from the
start I'll have a huge CPU bottleneck to deal with.

Price is not an issue. What card would offer the best performance for my
rig, the Radeon 9700 Pro or the 9800? I've looked at the technical specs
for both cards and there doesn't seem to be a huge difference between them.
Any thoughts on which card I should get, to squeeze out the most performance
I can?

Thanks.

 

[Chris Warner]

So where did you get that freakin` wrong info from, pasquale?
The Radeon 9700 is absolutely compliant with directX 9, though I also
couldn`t tell the speed difference between the radeon 9800 and 9700pro.

 

[laila]

the 9700 is to a directx 9 card
same with the 9500
and the 9600
buy a 9600 pro and use the extra $$ to get a new mainboard and cpu
i would say get a 9500 pro but they don't sell make it anymore

 

[aep]

I'm going to finally replace the GeForce 3 card in my aging gaming rig with
a Radeon. My system is a P3-933 with 512 MBs PC-133 RAM, so right from the
start I'll have a huge CPU bottleneck to deal with.

Price is not an issue. What card would offer the best performance for my
rig, the Radeon 9700 Pro or the 9800? I've looked at the technical specs
for both cards and there doesn't seem to be a huge difference between them.
Any thoughts on which card I should get, to squeeze out the most performance
I can?

Your PC probably doesn't even stress the GF3, a 9800 would be total
overkill for that processor and slow memory.

Andrew.

 

[aep]

Hi, my english is very little, but i think to help you:
- Radeon 9700 is DirectX 8.1 compliant;
- Radeon 9800 is DirectX 9.0 compliant.
The test use directx 8.1 engine, and the future features of 9800 does not
tested.

*cough*Bullshit!*cough*

Andrew.

 

[Mike P]

I upgraded a celeron 900 from a TNT2U to an 8500 and got a good boost. But
even the 8500 doesn't do what it should in that, it works FAR better in an
AMD xp1800 system at stock speeds. It's not worth anything upgrading the
video card in that rig, you're far better off to replacew the board, cpu and
ram. Then do the video card later unless $ is still no object.
Putting one of those cards in that system will be a total waste of cash,
upgrade the weaker part for the same or less money and you'll get a far
better boost.

Mike

 

[Usenetter]

Save a few quid and overclock the 9700 Pro - the only major difference
appears to be clock speed.
I've got my (default 325/310) Gigabyte 9700 up to 393/371 - with the simple
application of a 60mm Slim Volcano Cu/Al heatsink and 92mm 52CFM Globe fan.
And fairly respectable 3DMk scores : -

3DMk03 - 5,953
3DMk01 - 18,123

---------
Epox 8RDA3+ (227 FSB : Northbridge 2.0 v-dd with Slim Volcano + 19CFM)
XP1700 DUT3C (10.0 - 2270 MHz stable : 1.93 v-core - Volcano 9 + 75CFM)
2 x OCZ 256MB PC3700 (454 - 7-3-3 / 2.0 dual : 2.9 v-dimm)
Gigabyte Radeon 9700 Pro (393/371 : 1.6 v-agp - Slim Volcano + 52CFM)
Maxtor DM 9+ (8MB) - 52CFM
Vantec 4-channel Fan Control
Air - 41/55C

 

[GTD]

I'm going to finally replace the GeForce 3 card in my aging gaming rig with
a Radeon. My system is a P3-933 with 512 MBs PC-133 RAM, so right from the
start I'll have a huge CPU bottleneck to deal with.

Price is not an issue. What card would offer the best performance for my
rig, the Radeon 9700 Pro or the 9800? I've looked at the technical specs
for both cards and there doesn't seem to be a huge difference between them.
Any thoughts on which card I should get, to squeeze out the most performance
I can?

Thanks.

http://www.insightcomponents.com/ic/apps/mbbundles/mbbundles.php

I'd start looking at one of these before i upped the video card (and
of course, you'll have to get ram also). The vidoe card you have will
do OK there.

 

[J.Clarke]

I'm going to finally replace the GeForce 3 card in my aging gaming rig
with a Radeon. My system is a P3-933 with 512 MBs PC-133 RAM, so
right from the start I'll have a huge CPU bottleneck to deal with.

Price is not an issue. What card would offer the best performance for
my rig, the Radeon 9700 Pro or the 9800? I've looked at the technical
specs for both cards and there doesn't seem to be a huge difference
between them. Any thoughts on which card I should get, to squeeze out
the most performance I can?

For about the same money as a 9700 pro or 9800 you can replace your
motherboard, RAM, and processor with an Athlon 2400 (or maybe a wee bit
faster--I haven't checked the prices in a while)--if price is no
object go with a 3000+ or a 3 GHz P4 or wait for the Athlon 64 (Yes,
lurkers, I know the Opteron is shipping, now when you can tell me where
to buy a board with an AGP slot . . .). Once you've done that if you're
not satisfied with the performance it's time to look at a an upgraded
video board.

As things stand if you are determined to go with a 9700 pro or a 9800
just go with whichever is cheaper, either will move the bottleneck from
the video board to the memory and CPU.

 

[grrrpoop]

Where did you see that load of crap? The 9700 does NOT bench faster than
the 9800. How's your crack habit?

So instead of providing evidence to the contrary you just flame me? Nice..

http://firingsquad.gamers.com/hardware/ut2003perf/page3.asp

Can't find any other benchmarks of the 9700Pro vs the 9800 non-pro.

 

[b p]

In benchmarks the 9800 (stock) comes out slightly slower, but if you OC the
core and mem it will exceed the 9700Pro.

Not if you OC the Pro. sheeeez

 

[grrrpoop]

and where on that page does the 9700 bench faster than the 9800 ?

*sigh*

9700 PRO, and every single UT2K3 bench at EVERY resolution with or without
AA/AF the 9700Pro wins it.

At least read the previous posts before jumping to conclusions :-\

And re: your other post about the 9700pro OC more, I'm not arguing the 9800
as clocking HIGHER than the 9700pro, I'm just sayng that in the Uk it's a
cheaper card and can easily reach the same level as the more expensive card.

And don't forget to consider the improved stencil shadow support in the R350
core, I'm sure that will be of some benefit in Doom3 engined games.



G.

 

[ELVIS2000]

Not if you OC the Pro. sheeeez

Can't overclock my 9700 Pro even by 10% without artifacting.