Graphics 9600XT - New Purchase?

Hi all,

Im looking into getting a new gfx card , and have had my eye on the 9600XT for some time now. Will this be a good purchase or not? I'm looking at the 256mb option, £125 squids. Comments welcome please.

 

You titled the thread wrong - "9800XT"


The 9600XT represents a pretty darn good buy, probably the best value around at the moment (although quite close is the 5700Ultra from nvidia)

 

as above really
9600XT and 5700Ultra give nearly identical performance at nearly identical prices

for just a tiny bit more, however, you can get an FX5900 which will pwn both of them, just make sure not to get the XT, just a normal FX5900

 

My advice, get the 128 MB instead of the 256, quicker

 

lol ooops, fixed it now!

I would have thought the 256 model would have been faster than the 128. How does that figure?

 

I think companies tend to put slower ram on the 256 MB versions, so they can save a little money no doubt. So although you are getting more ram, it's slower and doesn't respond as quickly. For example, a 128MB version may have 3.3ns ram while the 256MB version has 3.8ns. BTW, I just pulled those numbers out of my butt so don't take them as gospel.

 

lol cheers for pointing that out anyway. I will bare that in mind.

 

I agree 128mb 9600xt - good buy and a wee bit faster then the 5700, a good mate of mine is in a similar predicament, he's getting the same.

 

Is he getting the 9600XT too?

 

He is either getting the 9600XT or spending the money on alcohol and food

 

9600XT first, then party hard later me thinks!

 

There's not much of a difference between the two (5900 and 5900XT)

Most 5900XT's have a stock ram speed 150mhz slower.. that's it... they're both 256-bit..

Cheapest 5900 I can find that is a true 5900 (256bit, 850mhz mem) is 220 dollars... I would rather pay an extra 5-10 dollars and get a cheaper saphire 9800PRO than to go with a normal 5900

(Note: Check newegg for a few 9800 PRO's for under 230 USD)

 

I can say that I just bought a 9600XT, I've only had it a week now. And I love it. I got the gigabyte version...so I didn't get a Half Life 2 voucher, but I did get Raven Shield, Tomb Raider something, and Will Rock. I only care about Raven Shield. But from what I hear most of the 9600XT cards do come with the HL2 vouchers. So that would be an added incentive, assuming the game ever actually gets released.

But the card is very nice. I've heard and I'm sure that the 9800, 9800Pro, or 9800XT will be a faster card. And you may be able to get a 9800 (not the SE) for just a little more than the 9600XT. Just something worth considering.

 

the difference between them stock is not a great deal, but the max overclock you can get out of most standard 5900 blows away what you can get out of most 5900XTs

you can also get a 9800SE for much less, that you *may* be able to mod to a 9800pro, if it were up to me i would get the cheapest version of the high-end cards rather than the best version of the mid-range cards

and the newegg pics you are quoting dont make a great deal of difference as this is the UK we are talking about here the cheapest 9800pro is around £30-£40 more expensive than the cheapest 5900, and the cheapest 5900 is a mere £10 more than the cheapest 9600XT or 5700U

 

5900s are $170 now on pricewatch. I bought my 5900 a couple monthes ago for 180 at newegg

edit: scratch that! they've gone back up to 182! wow

 

The Sapphire 9600XT 256Mb I got a week or so ago looked like it had 3.3ns RAM on it (I was looking at the codes on the RAM chips, but can't be bothered to pull my PC apart just to doublecheck). But TBH, I went for 256Mb over 128Mb because my system is limited to AGP4X, and so the more stuff that can be dumped on the card, the less that has to be pulled over AGP while the game is running.

Or at least that was my reasoning

Plus, it came with a HL2 voucher (and not much else, other than drivers and some cables) for about £125 inc VAT.

To me, it was the best price vs performance card I could find.

 

I love my 9600xt plus they are good overclockers. Mine is running @ 575 core and 320 memory. Orginal speed was 500/300 and this is with stock cooling.

 

.

 

uhm i think the halflife 2 action is from ati so everyone with an coupon will get the same they won't change it with other cards

 

I actually upgraded from an ATI 9600XT to an EVGA 5900se (also known as the 5900xt). It was quite an upgrade. With the 9600xt I was running Need for Speed Underground on low detail 1024 x 768 - laggy, averaging about 25 fps...dropping to 17 a few times. With the 5900se Im averaging about 38 fps and Im running at medium detail at 1024 x 768. The only other game I really play is Call of Duty. Doesnt drop a frame with all detail on. My 3dmark03 score with 9600xt was 3600ish - 5207 with the 5900se. I did overclock the 5900se just an extra 44 mhz on the GPU, nuthin on the memory - whole lot left but Im not going to bother.....rather be playing and not tweaking. EVGA bundles COD with their cards - most vendors are still handing out Half Life 2 vouchers with their cards.....if its ever released (shakes voucher in the air )