Ati Radeon 9600XT or 9800SE?

Originally posted by -=KD=-@Feb 15 2004, 05:52 PM
hmmm....wait a min
256 gives me worse performance?! how come ? =O
the new 9800xt are 256mb so they would work better if tehy had 128mb ?!

I think the 9800Xt would take advantage of having 256mb, but with the 9600Xt it just isnt needed... god knows how it could perform worse though :Oo:

sy is right, sort of. the reason might have to do with the timing used in the video card's ram. like, the 256mb video cards might have higher timings than 128mb versions, and we all want low timings.

a lot of ram can useful especially on high resolutions, when antialiasing is used, and when dynamic shadows are used. unfortunately that's not really the case with the 9600xt cards, but it is when you get to cards like the 9800xt / 5900-5950, etc.

so u mean that if I go for 9600XT I better go for 128MB instead of 256mb?

Originally posted by interman@Feb 15 2004, 06:00 PM
sy is right, sort of. the reason might have to do with the timing used in the video card's ram. like, the 256mb video cards might have higher timings than 128mb versions, and we all want low timings.

a lot of ram can useful especially on high resolutions, when antialiasing is used, and when dynamic shadows are used. unfortunately that's not really the case with the 9600xt cards, but it is when you get to cards like the 9800xt / 5900-5950, etc.

that's not really the case with the 9600xt cards

and another question...why ont?

The 9600XT is better than 9800SE ''SE'' means spasial edision and is a downgraded version of 9800.
Go for the 9600XT

Originally posted by -=KD=-+Feb 15 2004, 09:52 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (-=KD=- @ Feb 15 2004, 09:52 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin--interman@Feb 15 2004, 06:00 PM
sy is right, sort of. the reason might have to do with the timing used in the video card's ram. like, the 256mb video cards might have higher timings than 128mb versions, and we all want low timings.

a lot of ram can useful especially on high resolutions, when antialiasing is used, and when dynamic shadows are used. unfortunately that's not really the case with the 9600xt cards, but it is when you get to cards like the 9800xt / 5900-5950, etc.

that's not really the case with the 9600xt cards

and another question...why ont? [/b][/quote]
Well I didn't make the cards, but I'm guessing it has to do with the pipeline architecture. Like when you have the number of pipelines (and whatever else) the card makes better use of the extra ram.

i take back what i said about the 9800se being faster, which looking at the specs makes sense, but if you check out http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/reviews...e_9800SE_5.html you'll see it's not so. However, you should also take the 9800 non-pro / non-se into consideration, and possibly the pro version if you can stretch your budget that far.

you can get a 9800 pro 256mb for only $317...

a 9800 pro 128mb will go for around $270... i think its worth the extra $ to have 256mb personally... check it out:

http://thetechlounge.dealtime.com/xPO-ATI_...256MB_AGP_Video

Ok folks im back, first of all syanide i must say thank you for putting the smack down on the guy that think the 9600xt "looks good" what a maroon...anyway i have the 9800 pro 256. first off i doesnt decrases perfromance...duh how does that make since my computer has a gig of ram but that diesnt mean windows and apps run slower. its just unoccupied. the only proggys that use 256mb are cad, 3d development software, and half-life 2,possibly doom3 but i doubt it. it more of a looking to the future upgrade. as far as the 9600xt it is a mid range card so unless you really want it dont buy it its beyond obsolete as soon as you take it home. at least get the 9800 se. watered down 9800 pro it may be but definately better and more stable than the hyer clocked bandwidth choked 9600 and it has double the pixel and vertex pipelines. clockspeed and memory busses are important but dont look over the very features you want it for in the process

well you can think about why 3dmark benchmarkers ALWAYS used radeon 9800 pro's with 128mb instead of 256mb - because the 128mb versions used faster ram.

i don't think you should talk about how the 9600xt is obsolete if you don't own one, and obviously have no clue as to how they perform. they do perform very well, especially the low price taken into consideration. they're not just overclocked cards, because if they were then you wouldn't be able to have them run much faster than the stock speed - and i did.

i assume you mentioned doom 3 and half-life 2 because of the heavy usage of dynamic lighting/shadows and pixel shader 2.0 programs. extra ram is said to be especially useful for rendering stuff like stencil buffered shadows, but that's not the case when the 128mb (low latency regular ddr) and 256mb (high latency ddr 2) versions use different kinds of ram, with different latencies. right now ddr 2 can't run at very low latencies at all, but can go faster in terms of frequency, which essentially makes a card look faster than it is.

a 9800se may look good on paper, but as you can see in the benchmark it's not fast at all. do you homework next time

Originally posted by interman@Feb 20 2004, 11:18 AM
well you can think about why 3dmark benchmarkers ALWAYS used radeon 9800 pro's with 128mb instead of 256mb - because the 128mb versions used faster ram.

i don't think you should talk about how the 9600xt is obsolete if you don't own one, and obviously have no clue as to how they perform. they do perform very well, especially the low price taken into consideration. they're not just overclocked cards, because if they were then you wouldn't be able to have them run much faster than the stock speed - and i did.

i assume you mentioned doom 3 and half-life 2 because of the heavy usage of dynamic lighting/shadows and pixel shader 2.0 programs. extra ram is said to be especially useful for rendering stuff like stencil buffered shadows, but that's not the case when the 128mb (low latency regular ddr) and 256mb (high latency ddr 2) versions use different kinds of ram, with different latencies. right now ddr 2 can't run at very low latencies at all, but can go faster in terms of frequency, which essentially makes a card look faster than it is.

a 9800se may look good on paper, but as you can see in the benchmark it's not fast at all. do you homework next time

3dmark is a piece of crap... synthetic benches mean absolutely nothing

oh and i agree about the 9800se, its a turd.