My good old 9700 Pro...

  • Thread starter Thread starter D. Sutton
  • Start date Start date
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D. Sutton

I'm new to the videocard world, except to say that I thought it would
be a good idea to upgrade my Dell PC last year to the 9700 Pro card,
since I do a lot of gaming.

So now with all the new stuff coming out, and the almost new stuff
still available, i'm wondering what, if anything to do with my 9700
pro. Is it still a good card? Should I bother upgrading? Should I
overclock it? How does it compare with the ATI Radeon 9600? The Nvidea
cards? I'm so lost.

I play a lot of Far Cry and Painkiller lately, and things look pretty
good to me - nothing runs too slow. I have most of the details turned
on i think. I also do flight sim 2004 and it runs at a good framerate.
It's not that things are too slow now, it's just that i'm so curious
about how much better it can be.

I'm running a P4 2.66 with 533 FSB, and 1gig of ram. I just ran
3dMark2003 and got a score of about 4200. I guess that's pretty slow.

Any thoughts? I'd appreciate some feedback, so I can figure out what
to do.

Thanks.

D
 
I'm curious about what you say. I get the impression
that the 9700 is older?? than the 9600 ? I don't understand. However, I'm
running the same games
on an AMD 2000+ clocked at 1669 I think, and the
video is an ATI Radeon 9000 Pro. Far Cry looks
great, and the frame rate is fine. Your system is
much faster than mine. I don't think you should upgrade
unless you just want to tinker for the heck of it. I
don't think you would gain anything right now in terms
of running what is out there any better at all. I'm steering
my system in the direction of every form of multimedia
I can think of, just to evaluate it. Right now, I have
cable TV, video capture, DVD, cdrw, hellofa 3d Logitec
joystick ( cost $35 wowee! ), several levels of hacker
defense, disk image recovery, WinXP, and I'm running
MBSA ( Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer ) ..
which I highly recommend, McAffee 8.0. I'm learning
a lot about the hype out there ... specifically about the
ATI Catalyst drivers and just how sorry they use to be,
but now how well they are performing for me. I'm
going to take what I have and optimize it for a while
more before I start looking at upgrades. I've actually
been able to produce a first rate gaming computer,
and network computer, by evaluating the software
and configuring it properly. I read a lot of posts here
that clearly tell me that users with really good systems
are screwing them up by misconfiguring them. I've done
the same thing, but I can recover quickly thanks to
disk imaging. My system is rock stable, fast, runs 3d
games very well, virtually hacker proof, monitor is
AOC 19" .22 dot pitch flat ( $189 ). I probably have
a total of $750 in it spread out over 4 years, and it
will kick the crap out of most other home systems I've
seen .. because it is configured right. And, that takes
a lot of study, but is worth it by the time you really need
to upgrade.

johns
 
Your 3dMark03 score seems pretty low to me (4200?). I'm thinking your rig
is handicapped somewhere - you should be getting more.
I've got a P4 2.4 (no HT) on a 400mhz AGP4x (only) Dell (Intel) board,
768mb RdRam (PC800), ATI 9800pro, CAT 4.6 - everything
stock-clocked and the CAT's at default settings (quality). My system
doesn't care whether Fast Writes is on or off, so I keep it off.

3dMark03 (v340) 5455
Aquamark 3 35,815
3dMark01SE (latest) 13,805 (these have always been extra lame on this
system)

I had a (PowerColor) 9700pro in the above box for two weeks (it died so I
opted to replace with the ATI 9800pro). Everything was the
same except I used CAT 4.2 :

3dMark03 5315
Aquamark 3 34,220
3dMark01 13,670

I run FarCry at medium across the board except for High/environment and
High/special effects. Runs really well - no hitches. Makes a nice
difference running High/environ versus medium = a LOT more weeds,
vegetation, bugs, birds, jungle sounds etc., big ambience improvement. If
I crank everything up to High and then VeryHigh/enrironment (always on
1024x768) it still plays good but I start seeing some slight hitching
when the action cranks up. This is with CAT defaults (quality settings).
Running FarCry and UT2003 (max settings), Painkiller, Call of Duty etc.,
I could not tell any difference whether the 9700 or the 9800 was in the box.

Overclocking the 9800pro has never given me more than 150 points increase in
either of the 3dmark benches and the AquaMark actually went
down 200 points. I'm confident my case and card cooling is good. Even at
the max overclocks I've seen posted for the 9800pro I've seen no
signs of problems but the performance gain seems neglible. My 9800pro would
probably appreciate more CPU speed. Since I'm running FarCry
well on this rig I'm thinking it should hold its own on Doom 3 and Half-Life
2. Seems to me your rig should be beating mine.
 
If all your games run at a brisk pace, including the much-feared FarCry,
then what's the problem? Do you need a synthetic benchmark to tell you your
card is slow?

The 9600 is significantly slower than the 9700 Pro, especially at above
1280x1024 with FSAA enabled.
 
D. Sutton said:
3dMark2003 and got a score of about 4200. I guess that's pretty slow.

Any thoughts? I'd appreciate some feedback, so I can figure out what
to do.
Click to expand...

A 9700 Pro is not slow....it's in the 9800 Pro league. What was your screen
resolution when you ran that '03 benchmark. 1024x768 or 1280x1024?
 
D. Sutton said:
I'm new to the videocard world, except to say that I thought it would
be a good idea to upgrade my Dell PC last year to the 9700 Pro card,
since I do a lot of gaming.

So now with all the new stuff coming out, and the almost new stuff
still available, i'm wondering what, if anything to do with my 9700
pro. Is it still a good card?
Yes.

Should I bother upgrading?
Click to expand...

Not to any of the "almost new stuff still available".
Should I overclock it?
Click to expand...

If you have to ask the answer is probably "no". It's like asking "should I
hot-rod my car". If you're not into hot-rodding and don't want to be then
the answer is "no". If you are into it or want to be then you shouldn't
need to ask.
How does it compare with the ATI Radeon 9600?
Click to expand...

Walks all over it. The 9600 replaces the 9500 in the ATI lineup. The
reason they replaced the 9500 was that it used ths same chip as the 9700
and could often be modded into a full 9700. The 9600 uses a new chip
that's permanently crippled and can't be modded to that performance level.
The 9800 is a very slightly improved 9700 with the later versions running
at a somewhat higher clock speed.
The Nvidea cards? I'm so lost.
Click to expand...

No reason to go from a 9700 to any nvidia that could be classified as
"almost new stuff".
I play a lot of Far Cry and Painkiller lately, and things look pretty
good to me - nothing runs too slow. I have most of the details turned
on i think. I also do flight sim 2004 and it runs at a good framerate.
It's not that things are too slow now, it's just that i'm so curious
about how much better it can be.
Click to expand...

Not much unless you go to the X800.
I'm running a P4 2.66 with 533 FSB, and 1gig of ram. I just ran
3dMark2003 and got a score of about 4200. I guess that's pretty slow.

Any thoughts? I'd appreciate some feedback, so I can figure out what
to do.
Click to expand...

Breathe. Relax.
 
Ive got a 2600xp chip , 1 gig ram and a saphire 9700pro and i can score upto
5500 ish in 3dmark03. Not bad as far as im concerned.


doughy
 
Especially for Far Cry, the 9700pro is totally inadequate.
I'd go for either the nvidia 6800u or the x800xt, both will be
out within a few days.
Of the two, I'd go for the x800xt for one reason, the 3DC map
technology which the 6800u doesn't have. This is going to
be huge in about 2 months.

Jeff B
 
Well, my frame rate was 1280x1024 the first time i ran the test, but i
just reduced it to 1024x768, with very similar results.

Being new to all this, I think i was mistaken - i don't think my
videocard is the 9700 pro version, just the standard 9700. Is there a
big difference?

I checked out the online results browser and it seems that my scores
are definitely in the lower end for my class of equipment. I'm
wondering if the new catalyst drivers I just installed have anything
to do with it?

D
 
D. Sutton said:
Well, my frame rate was 1280x1024 the first time i ran the test, but i
just reduced it to 1024x768, with very similar results.

Being new to all this, I think i was mistaken - i don't think my
videocard is the 9700 pro version, just the standard 9700. Is there a
big difference?
Click to expand...

Radeon 9700.....275 core /275(550)mem Radeon 9700 Pro 325 core / 310 (620)
mem....so yes, it's a pretty substantial difference. Haven't owned a 9700
Pro, but I've read they typically can be clocked close to 9800 Pro spec.
 
Especially for Far Cry, the 9700pro is totally inadequate.


Jeff B
Click to expand...
That's a pretty sweeping statement - you must have had a pretty bad
experience of running one on this game to come up with that opinion.
 
Simon Hutchins said:
That's a pretty sweeping statement - you must have had a pretty bad
experience of running one on this game to come up with that opinion.
Click to expand...

Or just be full of shit...
 
Simon Hutchins said:
Yes - I think that is a fair assesment of the situation.
Click to expand...

All this time I've been playing Far Cry on a 9700 non-pro .... suppose I
should stop then?
 
Especially for Far Cry, the 9700pro is totally inadequate.
I'd go for either the nvidia 6800u or the x800xt, both will be
out within a few days.
Of the two, I'd go for the x800xt for one reason, the 3DC map
technology which the 6800u doesn't have. This is going to
be huge in about 2 months.
Click to expand...
Jeff B
Click to expand...

Can't remember exactly how many in total. I do however clearly
remember buying 16 in one go of the 9500np, all but one pipes opened
to close to 9800 [ GrandMars Brand failed ] equal to or more than the
9700pro.

This card I'm on is one of the said 9600np's and fly's through Far Cry
on full spec and at ' full welly ', no probs.

Now then, for those who see the frequent posts quoting FarCry I've
often wondered what % of people who can't get it to play properly, or
even at a reasonable resolution / speed are running less than 1GiG of
memory at a reasonable bandwidth.

It's one hell of an engine but it seems to me that this game, a
graphical leader amongst equals, needs at least a GiG to play on any
MOBO.

BoroLad
 
D. Sutton said:
I'm new to the videocard world, except to say that I thought it would
be a good idea to upgrade my Dell PC last year to the 9700 Pro card,
since I do a lot of gaming.

So now with all the new stuff coming out, and the almost new stuff
still available, i'm wondering what, if anything to do with my 9700
pro. Is it still a good card? Should I bother upgrading? Should I
overclock it? How does it compare with the ATI Radeon 9600? The Nvidea
cards? I'm so lost.

I play a lot of Far Cry and Painkiller lately, and things look pretty
good to me - nothing runs too slow. I have most of the details turned
on i think. I also do flight sim 2004 and it runs at a good framerate.
It's not that things are too slow now, it's just that i'm so curious
about how much better it can be.

I'm running a P4 2.66 with 533 FSB, and 1gig of ram. I just ran
3dMark2003 and got a score of about 4200. I guess that's pretty slow.

Any thoughts? I'd appreciate some feedback, so I can figure out what
to do.
Click to expand...

Just bought a 9700 (non-pro), got it running at 340/305 at the moment with
no added heatsinks. I bought it for two reasons- firstly, I heard it was
about 97% of the 9800 performance for (currently) 60% of the price, and
secondly because I like the idea of turning on AA and AF with a smaller
performance hit than my Ti4600 had. So far it seems to fulfil the promise-
although the latest games i've tested have been Invisible War and Halo. IW
went from a stuttering beast on the Ti4600 to a silky smooth dream on the
9700 at anything above basic resolution... I just wish I liked the game
more.

If you are happy with the performance in Far Cry, from what I hear you
shouldn't be disappointed with the performance in any forthcoming games...
and I know I won't be upgrading- at least, not until PCI Express comes out
and the AGP X800s are approaching the bargain bin.

Oh, and try formatting your drivwe when you have some spare time- all the
gunk and stuff which you collect over the months can slow things to a crawl.
Just don't forget to back everything up, including Windows security patches
(just reformatted and forgot about Sasser... bugger the thing!)
 
Radeon 9700.....275 core /275(550)mem Radeon 9700 Pro 325 core / 310 (620)
mem....so yes, it's a pretty substantial difference. Haven't owned a 9700
Pro, but I've read they typically can be clocked close to 9800 Pro spec.
Click to expand...

I've had mine set at 378 / 330.75 with no problems. :)

Just bought a x800 PRO for $329 so its going to be up for sale soon.

Pluvious
 
Especially for Far Cry, the 9700pro is totally inadequate.
I'd go for either the nvidia 6800u or the x800xt, both will be
out within a few days.
Of the two, I'd go for the x800xt for one reason, the 3DC map
technology which the 6800u doesn't have. This is going to
be huge in about 2 months.
Click to expand...
Jeff B
Click to expand...

Can't remember exactly how many in total. I do however clearly
remember buying 16 in one go of the 9500np, all but one pipes opened
to close to 9800 [ GrandMars Brand failed ] equal to or more than the
9700pro.

This card I'm on is one of the said 9600np's and fly's through Far Cry
on full spec and at ' full welly ', no probs.

Now then, for those who see the frequent posts quoting FarCry I've
often wondered what % of people who can't get it to play properly, or
even at a reasonable resolution / speed are running less than 1GiG of
memory at a reasonable bandwidth.

It's one hell of an engine but it seems to me that this game, a
graphical leader amongst equals, needs at least a GiG to play on any
MOBO.
Click to expand...

9800 Pro, Xp 2500+, 1GB RAM. Runs nice at 1024x768 everything maxxed.
Slowed down like twice in the game, and I've nearly completed it.

Ben
 
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