Radeon 9800 Pro

Hi,

I am considering buying a Radeon 9800 Pro. It appears that several versions
are available. What is the difference between the standard ATI made version
and the cards that are made by Sapphire etc. ?
Is there any? Or is it just marketing hype?

TIA,
Steve

"Fred Bloggs" wrote in message
...
Hi,

I am considering buying a Radeon 9800 Pro. It appears that several
versions
are available. What is the difference between the standard ATI made
version
and the cards that are made by Sapphire etc. ?
Is there any? Or is it just marketing hype?

TIA,
Steve


Personally I do not like the cards from Sapphire. MSI, Gigabyte and Crucial
all make good cards based on ATI chipsets. Just my opinion and others will
post theirs. Also, I would stay away from the 256mb version as it is
overpriced and was created solely to compete with Nvidia's 256mb card. The
performance increases are slim to none and the card costs about $100 USD
more than the 128mb version. HTH.
nECrO

I am considering buying a Radeon 9800 Pro. It appears that several
versions
are available. What is the difference between the standard ATI made
version
and the cards that are made by Sapphire etc. ?
Is there any? Or is it just marketing hype?

TIA,
Steve


Personally I do not like the cards from Sapphire. MSI, Gigabyte and
Crucial
all make good cards based on ATI chipsets. Just my opinion and others will
post theirs. Also, I would stay away from the 256mb version as it is
overpriced and was created solely to compete with Nvidia's 256mb card. The
performance increases are slim to none and the card costs about $100 USD
more than the 128mb version. HTH.

why don't you just get a radeon 9700 (no pro), they are fast and inexpensive

They are all the same, to a major degree. The reason other companies now
make them, is that ATI decided to sell the graphics chip to other companies,
and let them create their own card. The majority of them are the same,
except for some PCB color differences, software bundles will be different,
etc.

I think the ATI Radeon 9700 Pro is a bargain, it's over $100 less than the
9800 yet it's slightly slower than the 9800 in the benchmarks. That $100
can used for something else you may want to buy.

~ Adrian ~

Correction below...

9800 yet it's slightly slower than the 9700 in the benchmarks. That $100

9700, not 9800...

~ Adrian ~

Good points. I only disagree in the case of Sapphire. Just because they
use
ATI's chip doesn't mean they use quality components(PCB etc.). Just my 2
cents.......
nECrO

Oh really? Wow. I only buy ATI's own cards, as I've found them to be very
good quality. The problem you speak of, is one I used to find with GeForce
cards, before I switched to ATI. Thanks for the information.

~ Adrian ~