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does OEM or BULK SAPPHIRE ATI RADEON 9800 ATLANTIS 128MB have slower ram than retal?

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R

RaymondCarver

Member
The fast memory is crucial. It's made all the difference in the past, and in searching pricwatch.com SAPPHIRE ATI RADEON 9800 128MB OEM's/Bulk's are $138 compared to retail at $206.




Are the OEM's safe? In that, do they have the same high-quality memory? I should hope so.

Link: http://bestbargainpc.com/saatira98vic.html

stats in the link:
Controller ATi RADEON 9800
Bus Type AGP 8X/4X
Memory 128MB 128-bit DDR
RAMDAC Dual 400 MHz
Memory Clock 580 MHz
Engine Clock 325 Mhz
Monitors Supported Dual
Max Resolution 2048 x 1536 @ 85Hz
Click to expand...
 
R

RaymondCarver

Member
from Sapphire:

Available in both FULL Retail and Lite Retail Versions

Full retail indicates that the package contains the entire bundle including the Game software bundle and utilities. The Lite retail versions do not come bundled with the software bundle and are packaged with the neccessities needed to enjoy the pinnacle in performance from Sapphire alone.

General Card Specifications are subject to change dependent upon region purchased in and subject to component availability. Sapphire has enjoyed a commitment to excellence and to its customers so please do not hesitate to inquire about specific products at your regional Sapphire office.
Click to expand...
 
C

CueTheMusic

Member
Usually there is not a speed difference between OEM and Retail.

That said, I think you are comparing prices between the 9800 and the 9800 Pro. There usually isn't that big of a difference between OEM and Retail. You can get Saphire 9800 for right around $130 - $160, but the Pro's are usually around or above $200. There is a speed difference between the two.
 
H

Hooker

Member
Like MrPing already said. Sapphire is pumping out 2 versions. 1 with a 128-bit data bus, and one with a 256-bit data bus. (not to be mistaken for the amount of RAM!!!)


The 128-bit one is very crippled and should never be bought by anyone. Get the 256-bit one (for close to $200) or get nothing at all
 
L

Lhadatt

Member
If you have the money, go with the Pro version.

And CTM is right, there is typically no difference between OEM and retail, other than what the card comes with.
 
L

Lhadatt

Member
Hooker said:
Like MrPing already said. Sapphire is pumping out 2 versions. 1 with a 128-bit data bus, and one with a 256-bit data bus. (not to be mistaken for the amount of RAM!!!)

The 128-bit one is very crippled and should never be bought by anyone. Get the 256-bit one (for close to $200) or get nothing at all
Click to expand...
No, they're not. The vanilla 9800 Atlantis is a 128-bit bus. The 9800 Pro Atlantis is the one with the 256-bit bus. They're different chips.

ATI is the company making the distinction, not Sapphire. Regardless, go with the Pro, like I already said.
 
A

ArcadeStickMonk

Member
9800 Pro? Sapphire? OEM?

Sounds like the POS that I ripped out a month back after I was tired of it overheating itself. Most people will tell you that the card is a sweet spot in regards to bang for your buck, I think it is amazing that I actually put up with it for a year. Don't play Doom3 with it.
 
H

Hooker

Member
Lhadatt said:
No, they're not. The vanilla 9800 Atlantis is a 128-bit bus. The 9800 Pro Atlantis is the one with the 256-bit bus. They're different chips.

ATI is the company making the distinction, not Sapphire. Regardless, go with the Pro, like I already said.
Click to expand...
Erm.. besides the vanilla and pro flavours, Sapphire (along with other manufacturers) ARE making 128-bit bus 9800 Pro's.

ArcadeStickMonk said:
9800 Pro? Sapphire? OEM?

Sounds like the POS that I ripped out a month back after I was tired of it overheating itself. Most people will tell you that the card is a sweet spot in regards to bang for your buck, I think it is amazing that I actually put up with it for a year. Don't play Doom3 with it.
Click to expand...
Then there is something wrong with the airflow in your case. I am lucky enough to own a 9800 Pro with a r360 chip (9800 XT)

It's been flashed with the XT bios so I esentially have a 9800 XT with 128 MB ram. Which is pretty cool with the new overdrive functions (which I don't use btw) and much higher clockspeeds. And I've NEVER had problems with overheating
 
L

Lhadatt

Member
Hooker said:
Erm.. besides the vanilla and pro flavours, Sapphire (along with other manufacturers) ARE making 128-bit bus 9800 Pro's.
Click to expand...
I'll go with that, though their website says different. It's a third-party ATI maker, no one knows what sort of crack they're on.

I recommend this card. Don't get squeamish about the cost on ATI cards, just be a smart shopper and buy ATI directly.
 
A

ArcadeStickMonk

Member
Hooker said:
Then there is something wrong with the airflow in your case.
Click to expand...
Nope, I got medieval and put a P4 3.4 and 6800GT in there, ok? I put a hotter CPU and a hotter GPU in the same case and I haven't had even one issue since.

Does no one else recall the abundance of threads in other forums about white snow artifacts while playing Doom3 with a 9800 Pro? They pushed the 9800 Pro beyond safe parameters, it's as simple as that. Not everybody had a problem but many did; and when Doom3 hit plenty did.

You could always put a better cooler on it, but I found it detestable that the hardware had issues running 100% stock.
 
N

Nerevar

they call me "Man Gravy".
Hooker said:
Then there is something wrong with the airflow in your case. I am lucky enough to own a 9800 Pro with a r360 chip (9800 XT)

It's been flashed with the XT bios so I esentially have a 9800 XT with 128 MB ram. Which is pretty cool with the new overdrive functions (which I don't use btw) and much higher clockspeeds. And I've NEVER had problems with overheating
Click to expand...

It's been well-documented that the Sapphire cards struggle and overheat in many of the new, top-line games like Doom 3. Considering that it's only been reported on the Sapphire cards, I'm willing to bet Sapphire is cutting costs on the heatsink / fan or some other heat-dissipating component to get a couple extra bucks at the expense of card stability. This only confirms that they're willing to do anything to get the price down and fool consumers they're buying a fully-compliant ATi card.
 
H

Hooker

Member
Strange that they don't have it in the product line, this is one of those cards. Not made by Sapphire though. (and maybe it's an Europe only thing)

About the overheating problems. I've never heard of it when clocked at stock speeds. (then again, I haven't looked). I know of the problems with overclocked cards and people who replaced the stock cooling with a beefier one, not never like this. I never had any problems with Sapphire products so far, nor do I know anyone who has. I just found it odd...
 
R

RaymondCarver

Member
Crap. I thought there was more to it.

I was really trying to get away with a little under a hundred $$ because I'm building this machine for my sister and brother in law and putting the whole parts list on my mom's AMX.

If the 9600 Pro is only about GEforce 4600 level performance.....


Then maybe we'll just go with that for now for $76. I guess he doens't have to play Doom3 or Farcry just yet, and they can get a faster card in the future. For QuakeIII and Unreal2003 Level games, I guess the 9600 will do.

It's just going to be my brother in law's Birthday in November, and I know he'd be impressed with a 9800. I guess the choice comes down to whatever my parents think: because they're paying for all this. It's just that the 256-bit memory 9800 Pro's are more than twice the cost of 9600 PRo's. Is there really a difference in twice the performance between the two?
 
R

RaymondCarver

Member
14-102-303-04.JPG



Where does the 256-bit memory Radeon 9800-SE fit into this? It is around $130 to $140.












The Sapphire 9800SE is equipped with Infineon 3.3ns memory chips, which can run up to 300MHz. Sapphire has these chips clocked at 270MHz on a 128-bit memory bus, unlike the 9800 Pro's 256-bit bus.
Click to expand...


Well, that about says it. It's going to factor down to the cost. I'm going to start a different FPS thread so yo guys can tell me your favorite FPS games. ...... the clincher for this card decision, however, may be Halflife2. I'll eventually get a card to run it--no question. But for buying something right now, I want my brother in law (I'll just say brother because he's a brother to be, by marriage to my sister, and he's also one of my best friends) to be able to play Halflife2 eventually. Will the $200 level 256-bit memory 9800Pro work for HL2, are will the card hickup?

If the card's going to hickup with HL2, he's going to wonder why I bought a "high-performance" card that won't smoothly play the new crop of games, namley HL2.
 
M

MrPing1000

Member
stay away from SE's they suck as well. Memory means a lot but so does chipsets. 9800pro is where its at especially if you are lucky enuff to get a r360 core (these are for the XT's but the demand for pro's was so high they downgraded them/used them for pro's because they cudnt reach xt speeds) you can overclock it to a XT maybe
 
D

Drek

Member
Quick summary of ATi's Radeons.

Sapphires suck. Avoid them.

Any card with "SE" sucks. Avoid them.

I personally bought my Radeon 7200 (64MB vivo to some) as a complete ATi card, couldn't be happier with it, been reliable for about four years now. I'd recommend checking out ATi's website and their trade in policy where they give you $50 credit for any old junker card.
 
R

RaymondCarver

Member
...but you're still paying full retail from ATI even though you get $50 off.





I will stay away from SE's.

My brother in law is going to get something around $50 to $75 topps. He can eventualy get a $200+ card on his own. It's enough that I'm building he and my sis a computer. Their old one is about tits up and only has 64MB system memory and an Intel on-board videocard. Anything's faster n what they got. Anyway, on their mobo there's a molex power port right by the AGP slot. The happy thing for them, even if they just get a 64MB card, is that they get to have all of my games, apps, etc. Productivity + Games + smoking fast system + whatever "low end" videocard I can find. "Low end" cards nowdays'll run old games insanley fast.




I'd sink $200 on a 9800 Pro, but I, personally, am waiting for the X800 All-In-Wonders that were supposed to be out on October 15th. Financial aid, here I come. Worth it? ... My parents'll see me encode all their old VHS into DVD over the next few years after that jack-of-all-trades X800 hits the market.
 
T

teh_pwn

"Saturated fat causes heart disease as much as Brawndo is what plants crave."
Stay away from Sapphire in general.

My 9800 Pro benches slightly lower than a built by Ati on 3dmark03 and 3dmark01 and new games that I've tested (like Doom III), but it gets like half the score on 3dmark05. I don't understand it. I suspect something hardware wise that's used only in 3dmark05 isn't working correctly.

Get built by Ati.

Aren't the all in wonders slower? If so, I'd get a $50 capture on a PCI slot and a X700 XT for low budget, 6800 GT for high budget.

Personally, I'm not going to buy a new video until next year. No sense in sinking $500 in a video card if my current one handles new games decently, and if Xbox2 will absolutely rape it (and cost less than the video alone...).
 
D

Diablos

Member
...or don't. I'm completely satisfied with my Sapphire 9800 Pro. Mine even has the ATI logo on it. :p If it is worse than the official one, it's only by a little bit... nothing noticable. UT2004, Doom 3, Painkiller all look and play great. Sure it performs like crap compared to the newest cards... but so does the 9800 Pro built by ATI :D
 
T

teh_pwn

"Saturated fat causes heart disease as much as Brawndo is what plants crave."
Diablos, have you run 3dmark05?

Though, your card seems different than mine because I have a sapphire logo.
 
H

Hooker

Member
Man, all this bad words about Sapphire, I have had NO problems with them. I get 2379 3D Mark 05 points (this flashed to XT though)


Tre` said that it was a pretty good score
 
R

RaymondCarver

Member
no, X800 all in wonder, if and only if the memory is 256MB of 256-bit DDR3, if financial aid comes in. I was |this| close to going for a 9800 All-In-Wonder, but they're not exactly all the speed I want, and they've been out for a while.


I guess I'll get a capture card now, seperate, and some fast 3D card later. you guys have been very helpful so far. I've still got a lot to consider.



It's mostly still up in the air.



Basically I'm choosing ATI for their image quality, which reminds me of using Matrox. If Matrox still had the competative 3D solutions for gaming, they would be getting my business. For now, it looks to be ATI. Every monitor I see with an ATI card generating the display looks cleaner to me.









The real issue I'm having now is: buy a 9600 with 256-bit memory or a 9800 with 128-bit memory?
 
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