Radeon 9500?

[MarkFahey]

I am trying to make a decision on what video to put in my new rig? It's down to either a GFTi4200 or a ATI 9500. What experiences have you guys had with both of these cards? And which do you think is better in terms of performance?

When comparing the 9500 to the 9700 the only difference I can see is the memory speed, the 9700 running at 620mhz, the 9500 running at 540mhz. Is this the only difference? Also what does the Pro have that is better?


Thanks

Mark

 

[vexingv]

i would go w/ the 9500 since u can do the hack/mod to turn it into a 9700...otherwise spend like 20-30 more and get the 9500Pro; i have the 9500pro and i love it

 

[lifeguard1999]

My vote would be for a 9700 OEM for $220, less after the 9900 comes out in a month. Otherwise it is the 9500 Pro. The 9500 has 4 pipelines and a 128 bit memory bus. The Pro has 8 pipelines and a 128 bit memory bus. The 9700 has 8 pipelines and a 256 bit memory bus.

 

[rogue1979]

If you can't mod the 9500 to a 9700, you will end up with a card much slower than the GF4 Ti4200. I would get the GF4 Ti4200 128MB or the Radeon 9500 Pro.

 

[AnAndAustin]

Yeah the 4200 is probably the better choice as the 9500 & 9500PRO are a fair bit more expensive ... but the 9500PRO IS worth the extra esp if you have a fast CPU. Modding a std 9500 to a 9700 is almost impossible now and even when you could get your hands on a 9500_128MB on the 9700PCB (which was rare anyway) the chances of a successful mod is only 50% at absolute best.

So forget the Rad9500, it really isn't worth as the 4200 is slightly better and a fair bit cheaper ... while the 9500PRO is a LOT faster and more capable if you don't mind paying the bit extra. The 9500 is SLOWER than a GF4TI4200 and even with FULL AA & AF the 9500 doesn't really pull away, it really isn't worth paying the extra for. If you want something more than the 4200 look to the 9500PRO which is very close to GF4TI4600 perf but with FULL AA & AF it really pulls away.

As pretty much covered the 9500 and 9500PRO are essentially completely identical except the 9500 only has 4 pipes while the 9500PRO has all 8 pipes just like the 9700 & 9700PRO. The 9700 is again essentially identical to the 9500PRO except it uses 256bit RAM instead of 128bit RAM, clock speeds are the same. The 9700 is completely identical to the 9700PRO except the PRO has higher clocks. HTH!

 

[rogue1979]

AnAndAustin, I gotta ask why so many people are saying the Radeon 9500 Pro is so much faster than a Geforce4 TI4200? At least in my case I have a GF4 Ti4200 128MB @ 300/662 and a Radeon 9500 Pro at 350/630. As posted in another thread at 1600 x 1200 no FSAA they are almost identical in speed in a wide variety of games. As usual 3DMark 2001 is heavily favored by the Radeon, but gaming framerates tell a different story.

 

[AnAndAustin]

Remembering that the GF4TI4400 is decently faster than a 4200 and represents the perf MOST (not all) 4200 will achieve once o/c'ed we see the Rad9500PRO a snip ahead of the 4400 in almost all games without eye candy, as soon as you enable eye candy, particularly FULL AA & AF the Rad9500PRO is easily ahead of even the 4600. When you consider other things the Rad9500PRO is well ahead there too; TVout, DVD/MPEG playback, image quality and DX9. Then most 9500PRO o/c to yield 9700 perf which is way better than any GF4TI card can produce and not only in 3Dmark of course, the faster the CPU the bigger the diff should become. Given that 4200 are about $/£100 and Rad9500PRO are about $/£150 they aren't really in the same category, both represent very good value for money but the Rad9500PRO is clearly superior in every dept.

TomsHW

AnAndTech

FiringSquad

HardOCP
HardOCP

GamingNexus

Hexus

Xbit Labs

 

[rogue1979]

All those benchmarks are a good back up to your opinion, but not even the same as having both in your own machine

I am currently using the 1.1.82 Omega for the GF4, and it does not use anisotropic filtering. But it easily looks better than the 41.09 or 30.82 Dets with anisotropic on. To be competitive for image quality the Radeon 9500 Pro has to have anistropic on. Kinda evens things up and user preferences like this are never considered or talked about in generic benchmarks. Plus, depending on FSAA settings and resolutions this can make a big difference too. Just something to think about. I let the benchmark reviews somewhat guide me, but they don't come close to telling the real world story in ones own real world gaming.

 

[MarkFahey]

Thanks guys for all the great replies!

To AnAndAustin, Great info and Awesome Links!!! I really got alot out of them. Much Appreciated Amigo!


Mark