ATI 9800 Pro core question

[bcsman]

Am looking at buying an ATI 9800 Pro and I thought the only core the Pro came with was the R350. He has a picture of the card and it says right on the core R360. He bought the card new, it's an ATI original and still has the box that says 9800 Pro. Did any of these come with the R360 core 'cuz I thought that was changed when ATI came out with the 9800 XT?? Maybe they stuck a few R360 cores in the 9800 Pro before changing?? Or should I have a few more questions?? Thanks for any help!!

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: bcsman
Am looking at buying an ATI 9800 Pro and I thought the only core the Pro came with was the R350. He has a picture of the card and it says right on the core R360. He bought the card new, it's an ATI original and still has the box that says 9800 Pro. Did any of these come with the R360 core 'cuz I thought that was changed when ATI came out with the 9800 XT?? Maybe they stuck a few R360 cores in the 9800 Pro before changing?? Or should I have a few more questions?? Thanks for any help!!

a lot of 9800pros have R360 cores since ati stopped making r350s and supply dried up, ati used r360s in 9800pros. with the right work, you can turn ti into a 9800xt with 128mb memory and no temp sensor/no overdrive. I've done this and it's a common mod. All that the r360 adds is more optimized vertex shaders which are masked(the optomizations) by the 9800pro bios. flashing the correct bios will get it to use the optomization built in.

you'll want to replace the cooler though before you mod. the 9800pro cooler is pretty worthless/weak. I got an ati silencer revision 3 for cheap, but a zalman vf700 will work too.

The mod ganed me ~200-300 points in 3dmark 03 and 150~200points in 3dmark05

 

[bcsman]

mwmorph,
Thanks for the info, wasn't sure if I should go for something that wasn't above the table or possible!! He has modded the HSF with a Vantec Iceberg and Zalman BGA ramsinks. He said it's much quieter now and more efficient. I want to use this in my HTPC so I don't want alot of noise. Should the Vantec keep the noise down pretty well??

He wants $92 shipped for an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro retail with all the accessories incliding the box. Sounds OK to me huh??

 

[mwmorph]

The Iceberg 4 was not a good cooler just average. the iceberg 5 is and it's decently quiet but not class leading. the Iceberg 5 was a good but not great cooler.
it will work though. The noise is not as quiet as a silencer or vf700 but it is around a 7.5-8 in quietness.

$92 is a good deal. i paid $105 for mine shipped , card and cooler combined a couple of month ago(more like 1.5). I got no accessories though besides the power extender cable, but then i'm not running a htpc.

 

[emilyek]

If you can spend 130 dollars, get a 6600gt or better. Buying a 9800pro with added on upgrades sounds like a bad idea to me in 2005.

As for the 9800pro, the type of memory matters, and not just the core, if I remember right.

It has to be r360 and samsung (not hynix) memory, if I'm not mistaken.

 

[loudSilence]

Deffinitly get a 6600GT a much better buy, 9800pro is outdated.

 

[bcsman]

Couple problems with the 6600GT for me. First off. don't have a PCI-Express MB, but I see they do make an AGP variety. Second, the AGP 6600GT's I've looked at have dual DVI and I can't use the DVI. Just need a normal 15 pin VGA connector and an S-video out to my HDTV. And before anyone asks no I don't have a DVI on that either!! Other than that I would spend a little more and get the card, but doesn't seem practical to me!

 

[lavaheadache]

Originally posted by: bcsman
Couple problems with the 6600GT for me. First off. don't have a PCI-Express MB, but I see they do make an AGP variety. Second, the AGP 6600GT's I've looked at have dual DVI and I can't use the DVI. Just need a normal 15 pin VGA connector and an S-video out to my HDTV. And before anyone asks no I don't have a DVI on that either!! Other than that I would spend a little more and get the card, but doesn't seem practical to me!

The 6600Gt will no doubt come with a dvi to vga converter

 

[Munky]

Actually, the hynix ram is the good kind on the 9800p (rated at 2.5ns I believe, 800mhz max, but realistically expect to get about 750-760mhz on the ram with decent cooling) . I used to have a 128mb 9800p, with the r360 core, and I flashed the modded xt bios, slapped on a zalman vf700cu, and OC'd the sucker from stock 380/340 to 440/375. 3dmark05 scores went from ~2700 to ~3000.