ATI 9500 PRO vs Saphire 9700 PRO

[Alex]

Hi y'all...

im lookin to buy a radeon within the next month but cant seem to make up my mind...

the saphire 9700 pro looks better but is only clocked at 275/270 (significantly lower than the built by ati cards).... im not sure what the built by ati 9500 pro is clocked at...

so basically which will perform better, assuming price isnt a worry (theyre only like 20 bucks apart)

thx!

 

[Looney]

Heck, this is easy. Sapphire 9700 Pro.

 

[Alex]

i heard that the sapphire cards have poor 2d quality... anyone know anything about this?

 

[FearoftheNight]

The performance question is a no brainer. And I had a Sapph 9500 Pro. No visual differences I noticed.

 

[Looney]

Aren't Sapphire and ATI the same company? Just Sapphire manufactuer the OEM products, while ATI manufactuers the retail?

 

[deepinya]

Originally posted by: Moralpanic
Aren't Sapphire and ATI the same company? Just Sapphire manufactuer the OEM products, while ATI manufactuers the retail?

Thats what I thought too


Those sppeds seem too low to me.

 

[DClark]

The Sapphiretech Radeon 9700 is clocked at 275/270; the Sapphiretech Radeon 9700 Pro is clocked at 325/310 just like the other Radeon 9700 Pros.

The difference between the Radeon 9700 (non-Pro) and Radeon 9500 Pro is that the 9500 Pro has a 128-bit memory interface, while the 9700 has a 256-bit memory interface; they're both clocked at 275/270. The 9700 is faster that the 9500 Pro in most every instance.

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: franguinho
i heard that the sapphire cards have poor 2d quality... anyone know anything about this?

Sapphire make the "built by ATI" cards so everything is the same quality wise.
Its not a pro card bty. at 275/270, its near a non pro. Still better than the 9500pro though.

 

[sash1]

10::0

I think you're decision is pretty clear. Get the saphire

~Aunix

 

[AgaBoogaBoo]

Yup, just like boomam said, Saphire manufactures ATI's cards and so they probably order the things they need together to save money. This way, you'll probably have the exact same components, brands, etc. of things like the memory on it so don't worry about getting worse parts. Oh yeah, Saphire in the past has put in better RAM so it leaves more headroom for overclocking.

 

[Alex]

hmmm ya i double checked and the saph card turned out to be the non-pro...

i heard it can be easily flashed to pro tho...

 

[EdipisReks]

Originally posted by: franguinho
hmmm ya i double checked and the saph card turned out to be the non-pro...

i heard it can be easily flashed to pro tho...

you heard correctly.

 

[Alex]

on a completely different topic:

where can i download new ati bioses?
theres no link that i could find on their website...

 

[sash1]

Originally posted by: franguinho
on a completely different topic:

where can i download new ati bioses?
theres no link that i could find on their website...

everything you could ever want for your video card (The bios files are there)

~Aunix

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: franguinho
on a completely different topic:

where can i download new ati bioses?
theres no link that i could find on their website...

http://www.3dchipset.com/bios/index.php