I can't take it! I thought i could deal with my geforce 3 but im too antsy to wait for the next gen cards. I want someting now...so just a few quick questions. Im looking at a 9700pro from zipzoomfly for 210. Im trying to stick around 250ish. Is the 9800np better then the 9700pro? Also which version, ie manufaturere of the card should i keep an eye out for. Finally, which 9800np's can be flashed to 9800pro and what are the risks in doing so.
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You guys were right....
- Thread starter KomraD
- Start date
First off, 210$ is an excellent price for a 9700 Pro.
Anyway, 9800 np and 9700 pro are almost exactly the same. The 9700's RAM runs 10 MHz faster but the 9800 has some updated hardware on the core, so they will be almost exactly the same. In general, though, the 9800 will have more OCing headroom than the 9700 with or without a BIOS flash.
My very biased opinion is to go with the 9800 np, this because I have one and think its just great. The main obstacle in finding one that will take a BIOS flash is the RAM. If it has samsung RAM on it (either 2.8 ns, or 3.3 ns) you should be good to go. Infineon RAM will usually not take a flash. The other factor is whether or not the core will run at pro speeds, almost all of them do but its always possible to get a super sucky chip. The best place to get one these days on eBay or in the FS/FT forum. Otherwise you have no idea what kind of RAM is on the card.
The main dangers in flashing your card are either a bad flash (which is fixable) or frying the GPU or RAM (which is preventable). If somthing goes wrong with the flashing process, you can put a PCI card in your system and run the video of off that while doing the flash procedure, so even if you hose your card's BIOS its not the end of the world. And, if you flash the card and get artifacting and distortion, you know you need to put it back the way it was or you'll fry somthing. So the procedure is "relatively safe", but there is always the possibility of losing your card.
Still, even at stock speeds both cards are great and will make you much more happier than your GF3.
Good luck.
Anyway, 9800 np and 9700 pro are almost exactly the same. The 9700's RAM runs 10 MHz faster but the 9800 has some updated hardware on the core, so they will be almost exactly the same. In general, though, the 9800 will have more OCing headroom than the 9700 with or without a BIOS flash.
My very biased opinion is to go with the 9800 np, this because I have one and think its just great. The main obstacle in finding one that will take a BIOS flash is the RAM. If it has samsung RAM on it (either 2.8 ns, or 3.3 ns) you should be good to go. Infineon RAM will usually not take a flash. The other factor is whether or not the core will run at pro speeds, almost all of them do but its always possible to get a super sucky chip. The best place to get one these days on eBay or in the FS/FT forum. Otherwise you have no idea what kind of RAM is on the card.
The main dangers in flashing your card are either a bad flash (which is fixable) or frying the GPU or RAM (which is preventable). If somthing goes wrong with the flashing process, you can put a PCI card in your system and run the video of off that while doing the flash procedure, so even if you hose your card's BIOS its not the end of the world. And, if you flash the card and get artifacting and distortion, you know you need to put it back the way it was or you'll fry somthing. So the procedure is "relatively safe", but there is always the possibility of losing your card.
Still, even at stock speeds both cards are great and will make you much more happier than your GF3.
Good luck.
A small correction. The difference in default RAM speeds between the 9700 Pro and 9800np is 20MHz. The 9800np runs its RAM at 290MHz and the 9700 Pro runs its memory at 310MHz.
However, I do agree that the 9800np is likely to be better overall. Primarily because these cards already have a ton of bandwidth, and their occlusion culling is quite good. Overall these cards gain the least performance from increasing the RAM speed unless you are into that 1600x1200 area with the AA enabled. Otherwise, the biggest gains from the core overclock, and the 9800np is generally the better o/c between these two cards. My 9800np is currently running 400MHz core, and I just haven't spent the time to find the actual top end for it.
The memory on any of the current crop of 9800np is going to be the 3.0ns Infineon, and they don't o/c as well as the 3.3ns Samsung, which are the cards that everyone was flashing to Pro speeds. As a general rule, the Infineon memory seems to top out between 320-335MHz...mine does 325MHz stable, but even 1MHz more seems to start causing mild corruption problems.
However, I do agree that the 9800np is likely to be better overall. Primarily because these cards already have a ton of bandwidth, and their occlusion culling is quite good. Overall these cards gain the least performance from increasing the RAM speed unless you are into that 1600x1200 area with the AA enabled. Otherwise, the biggest gains from the core overclock, and the 9800np is generally the better o/c between these two cards. My 9800np is currently running 400MHz core, and I just haven't spent the time to find the actual top end for it.
The memory on any of the current crop of 9800np is going to be the 3.0ns Infineon, and they don't o/c as well as the 3.3ns Samsung, which are the cards that everyone was flashing to Pro speeds. As a general rule, the Infineon memory seems to top out between 320-335MHz...mine does 325MHz stable, but even 1MHz more seems to start causing mild corruption problems.