Blaze a trail into the outer rim of performance with the power and flexibility offered by SAPPHIRE RADEON 9600XT ATLANTIS. Encapsulating all of your cinematic and gaming desires is... more
This review already contains more than 120 words. As a Ciao member you could earn up to £5 with this review.
A review by Notorious-Biggles on Sapphire RADEON 9600 XT Atlantis June 8th, 2004
Author's product rating:
Speed
Fast
Stability
Very stable
Ease of Installation
Good - quick to install
Picture Quality
Excellent
Value For Money
Satisfactory
Advantages:
Good performance, respected brand .
Disadvantages:
Due for replacement soon .
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
As the last time I posted the same review for the same product, albeit being listed seperately, I got a ticking off from Trampus, I'll write a seperate one.
In case you haven't realised by the amount of different manufacturers offering Radeon branded cards, the graphics chips are made by ATI and then sold onto other manufacturers to actually make the cards that feature the graphics chips. This allows for brands to carve a niche for themselves as either performance brands, budget brands, or or just good value brands.
Sapphire is a performance brand that also offers good value. If you are considering buying a Sapphire card look carefully as for a while they were sold with a voucher that will get you Half Life 2 for free when released. Due to the delay in Half Life the offer was extended to a full Steam account. That means Half Life, Counter Strike and all the other mods as well.
The ATI range works that the higher the number then the faster the card. As such, the 9600 series is the mid range series just now, being faster than the budget 9200 series, yet slower than the premium 9800 series. It is also slower than the now discontinued and former premium range 9700 series.
Then for each series, there are several variations, the standard chip, the Pro chip which is faster, the SE chip which is slower and cheaper and finally the most powerful version, the extreme XT.
This particular card being a 9600 XT is simply the most powerful mid range card available just now. And it is backed up with 256 MB of dedicated VRAM so all games currently available and due out in the next few years should run well on this card.
Only down side is that in the past few months the card has become less good value for money. The reason for that is price cuts on the premium range, the 9800. A 9800 Pro is now available for only £140 or so, meaning twice the power for £20 more. I'd go for one of them now, over one of these. Still, this is a great card and if you find it cheap then a worthy upgrade for any system.
Advantages: Good for dx9 games Disadvantages: relatively expensive and outdated
I purchased my 9600xt just before the arrival of the new nvidia and ATI cards with 16 pixel pipelines. The 9600xt only has 4 pixel pipelines and cannot be modded to a better version. The arrival of these faster cards has meant that there has a been a severe drop in the price of the other cards.You can now pick up a 9800 pro for around the same price and the 9800 pro can be modded to a faster version by updating the bios and unlocking the pipelines. ... ...is mostly seen in the latest games. I would almost go as far as saying that it would be pointless buying this card when there are better options now available for the same price. If the price of the 9600xt dropped further I wouldnt hesitate in recommending it, but as it stands the price seems to be its main failing. ...
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: Full Direct-X 9 and advanced pixel shader support, great bang-for-buck Disadvantages: If you must have the fastest available look at higher priced options
...The Sapphireradeon9600XT is firmly sat in the "middle" of the mainstream - it isn't going to set any benchmarks alight (especially 3D Mark 2004), but it will give you decent and dependable performance, whilst support ing the latest technologies and at the most affordable price too.
My trusty old Geforce 2 just didn't cut it in modern games any longer (in fact it didn't run a lot of the newer games which required DX9 support for pixel shaders etc), so I needed something that would be able to handle the latest technologies without breaking the bank.
I went with the 9600XT as although it's a mainstream card, it supports all DX9 features, is fast enough to handle anything you can currently throw at it, and more importantly, was very affordable!
Sapphire's version of this card is slightly tweaked, in that the memory is overclocked...
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: Makes PC games more exciting Disadvantages: Makes PC games more addictive
...The SaphireRadeon9600XT is the pinnacle of the 9600 range of graphic cards.
Having previously used the 9600Atlantis version, I have found it to be a worthwhile upgrade.
This card is fully Direct X 9b compatible and comes with an easy to install software driver. The supplied software allows you to adjust the quality of the display and performance of the card, there is even an overdrive mode that gives you a top clock speed of 526 MHZ (this is safe overclocking as it monitors the card temperature to ensure stability).
Supplied with the card are various leads and adaptors which enable you to use a CRT or LCD monitor and display two monitors simultaneously or diplay on a TV.
Best of all - this graphics card performs beautifully when playing Doom 3.
It is not the best graphics card that money can buy but it is in my...
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful
API Supported: OpenGL, DirectX, OpenGL, DirectX 9.0
Max Monitors Supported: 2
TV Interface: TV out, Video in / video out
Analogue Video Format: S-Video, composite video
Digital Video Standard: Digital Visual Interface (DVI)
Video Compression Standards: MPEG-2
Manufacturer's product description
Blaze a trail into the outer rim of performance with the power and flexibility offered by SAPPHIRE RADEON 9600XT ATLANTIS. Encapsulating all of your cinematic and gaming desires is mission critical!
░▒▓ SAPPHIRE RADEON HD 2900 XT ▓▒░
In my view, there is nothing more important on a high powered entertainment PC than a graphics card that will give you the performance that you deserve for running high... more
Last December, I was assigned the task of building a low -cost PC for a relative. With only a maximum of 35 pounds to spend on a video card my choice was limited. I finally opted for Sapphire's version of the Ati Radeon 7000 model.
It cost about 28... more
08.02.2005
