ati 9600xt any good?

[mrpotatoman]

Heh I was just wondering if the ati 9600xt will be good enough to play games like doom 3 and half life 2, etc.... Because I was thinking of buying one since I have a low buget. Thanx

 

[Paratus]

Hi!

I thought I would chime in before the whole world comes down on you and says you need to spend at least $400 on a 6800 GT or wait forever for an AGP version of the $200 6600GT or X700XT/PRO.

The 9600XT will play most games just fine with a few caveats.

DX8.1 games should be no problem whatever resolution you use.

Games like Farcry and Doom3 however your going to want to knock down the resolution. If you are comfortable gaming at 1024/768 you should be fine for newer titles. If you want 1600x1200 your going to have to pay more.

So if your got about $130 to spend its not a bad card. I have the Asus version of the 9600XT and does fine for my uses (I'm getting about 4200 on 3dmark03. Note this version is more expensive because it includes a TV tuner)

If you can stretch to $200 get a 9800 PRO or wait for the above mentioned 6600/X700 cards.

Your other option is to look for a used/refurbished card were you might be able to get a 9700PRO or 9800PRO for under $150.

The 9600XT is a decent card but not at the "high point" for best bang for the buck.
Good Luck

 

[kogase]

Like baldy said, I would look for a used 9500pro/9700pro/9800pro. Much better buy in a similar price bracket as the 9600XT new.

 

[dug777]

1024 for d3 on 9600xt- you'll be lucky- certainly not on high or even medium at smooth FPS

 

[Cawchy87]

A 9700pro can be had for the same price, and will TEAR the 9600XT appart and play all the games you want it to. a 9800pro is worth the money as a step up for ~30 dollars more.

 

[jadbox1]

I play farcry at 1024/768 with everything on high and never had a prob with a 9600xt
i upgraded to a 9800pro and returned it cos i didnt feel any difference........maybe cos my cpu was holding me back

 

[ScrewFace]

Just wait a coupla more months and get the 256MB Radeon 9800 XT. The price'll drop considerably when the X800 XT's are freely available in retail channels. Then you can play Doom3, Half-life2 and S.T.A.L.K.E.R at a reasonable resolution with most of the eye-candy turned on.

 

[dfloyd]

Personally I say forgo Ati all together. In the lower price range Nvidia is soon to be crowned King. In fact they already are but wrong inteface, at least for me.

What I am speaking of is the 6600 GT is on its way out in AGP format and will be the king of the mid to low end cards. Personally if your investing I would consider this first unless it is just completly out of budget.

The problem right no with Ati is that they are just about choosing to ignore this segment. They are not going to make a X700 into AGP format so there will not really be a new decent competitior in this price range that can compare with Nvidia. So Ati is using the 9800 Pro as its comparison for th is market, yeah the 9800 Pro is a good card but it does not compare with the 6600 Gt. Imo this is a very very bad move on Atis part. The around $200 (Give our take $50) price range is a huge segment in graphics cards and right now Nvidia is going to rule that roost. Which is fine with me as I am going to purchase the 6600 GT as well just as soon as it hits AGP.

So again, the 9600 Xt does good. Suprised me. But for the same price the 9700 Pro is a ton better. I stepped down from a 9700 Pro to a 9600 XT and I honestly have yet to notice the difference in most all games. A few that are more graphics intesive (Doom III, Battlfront, etc). Still a great card but if the prices are the same definatly grab the 9700 Pro. Or if you can afford a little more and have PCI Express, or can wait a few days for the AGP Version, then I would not hesitate to choose the 6600 GT over both.

 

[Tarrant64]

Personally i have a Sapphire ati 256mb 9600xt, and i love it. it was CHEAP, and i can play most games at 1280x whatever(no, not 1024, i mean 1280x). I have no problems with FPS and honestly I've used plenty of other PC's with 9800's and haven't noticed 'that' big of a difference in FPS. Now I have used an x800, and that IS a huge difference. Stick with 9600xt especially if your looking to upgrade in the future. You can get something with the best bang for the buck now, and later when the all the x800 models are out and prices start to drop, sell your 9600xt and get the hottest card out there!!

Just my 2cents

 

[2Xtreme21]

9600xt, logically, is a horrible choice as a "bang for the buck" card. Its four pipelines cripple it as does the 128bit bus. As many have said, the 9700 pro will definitely be your better buy for the price range. If you're willing to spend an extra few dollars, get the 9800 pro which is a step up even from that. With a 9800 pro (or even a 9700 pro), you'll be able to play all of the new generation games with pretty good graphics settings (assuming the rest of your rig can handle it) and you won't have to worry about upgrading in 6 months.

If you're strictly at the $130 range, get the 9700 pro or at the very least a 9500 pro. If you're really set on getting the 9600XT quality, get a Geforce 4 Ti4600 for about $30 less... it's pretty much on par with it.

 

[CyGoR]

I honestly don't know if it's for sale in the US, but I've bought a Nvidia 6800 LE (it's OEM, but they sell it here without a pc ) and it's faster then an 9800XT 256Mb.
They OC very very well. Here's my 3DMark03 result. Stock I'm getting around 6800 points.
With my highest OC (and unlocked extra pipelines, just as much as the GT version) I'm past the 10.000 mark.
This card costs ~?200,- but might be cheaper in the US.

Otherwise, it's a good advice to wait (and save a little) for the 6600GT APG, it's a great card for a great price!

I own an 9600Pro, and I regret buying it. On the Ati website is says this card has trouble running @ AGP 8X while it says in huge letters on the box 'AGP 8x compatible!'.
If it were a few months earlier, I should say, buy a 9800Pro, but now you should wait for the 6600GT..

Good luck!

 

[chinkgai]

here is a card def worth considering for your price range

not sure if its better than a 9700 pro or not, but should definitely be on par and is cheaper than 9700pros i've seen go for

CyGoR: i duno the rest of ur system specs, but my 9800pro flashed to xt with only 128 meg of ram got that same score as ur LE

edit: i just clicked ur link and it said u hit 9800 3dmarks, something my 9800pro could never do

 

[dguy6789]

The 9600XT can do doom 3 at 1024X768 PERFECTLY at high and even ultra settings with a few tweaks. Yea fps will drop here and there, but doom 3 can be made playable at 1024 with ultra settings on one, as i have seen it in action.

Remember, if you get a used 9700, it may be close to death. and to be honest, the radeon 9700 non pro is NOT that big of a jump going from a 9600XT as people say. 9700 Pro may be a different story, but im hard pressed to see a performance diff between my friends 9600 pro and my other friends 9700.

 

[Hyperlite]

Originally posted by: dfloyd
Personally I say forgo Ati all together. In the lower price range Nvidia is soon to be crowned King. In fact they already are but wrong inteface, at least for me.

What I am speaking of is the 6600 GT is on its way out in AGP format and will be the king of the mid to low end cards. Personally if your investing I would consider this first unless it is just completly out of budget.

The problem right no with Ati is that they are just about choosing to ignore this segment. They are not going to make a X700 into AGP format so there will not really be a new decent competitior in this price range that can compare with Nvidia. So Ati is using the 9800 Pro as its comparison for th is market, yeah the 9800 Pro is a good card but it does not compare with the 6600 Gt. Imo this is a very very bad move on Atis part. The around $200 (Give our take $50) price range is a huge segment in graphics cards and right now Nvidia is going to rule that roost. Which is fine with me as I am going to purchase the 6600 GT as well just as soon as it hits AGP.

So again, the 9600 Xt does good. Suprised me. But for the same price the 9700 Pro is a ton better. I stepped down from a 9700 Pro to a 9600 XT and I honestly have yet to notice the difference in most all games. A few that are more graphics intesive (Doom III, Battlfront, etc). Still a great card but if the prices are the same definatly grab the 9700 Pro. Or if you can afford a little more and have PCI Express, or can wait a few days for the AGP Version, then I would not hesitate to choose the 6600 GT over both.

6600GT is anything but low end...

 

[dfloyd]

lol Hyp your totally missing the point friend.

The 6600 GT is low end, in cost. Compared to a X800 or a 6800 it is very very low end. Once again, this has to do with cost.

I know it performs very well and thats why I recommended it. Nothing to do with performance overall though I am speaking of cost. Being able to purchase it for $190 compared to up to $600 for the other cards puts it in the lower end of the price range. When people are speaking of low prices they are not wanting low end performance, they are wanting as much performance as they can get. So when we state low end in this context it has more to do with the price than the perofmrance. So again, imo the 6600 GT will be the king of the low end (Cost) cards.

Sorry you misunderstood what I was stating.

 

[WA261]

I use to have the 9600XT. It ran Doom3 very well. Even with nice settings.

 

[Nurse Jason]

I have a 9600 XT, before i got my 6800GT, and the card was ... Great. I never had a problem with it, EVER. Ran good, and displayed better graphics than i had thought it would've for that cheap of a card. But thats just my 2 cents. I'd go for it, although i had the one made by Gigabyte, which is what i was told the best companies for just about anything, yet they're much more expensive than most other companies

 

[pretzelb]

I still have my 9600xt and I'm running D3, even play with buddies via lan and it works. I can't remember my settings but it's at least 800x600 and I'm sure I could get 1024x768 with some tweaks.

One thing to be careful of is your cpu. I upgraded from an XP2000 to an AMD64 3200. It was almost like getting a new video card. I used to play horribly at 640x480 and with the new cpu I'm sure I can hang on to this card for a while.

One nice thing about my card is that it's made by Sapphire and it's totally fan free aka it's silent. No whiney little fan to drive me crazy. Very few (any) Nvidia cards are made with passive cooling out of the box. You could add a heat sink later but I was lazy and paid extra to let Sapphire do it for me.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: dfloyd
lol Hyp your totally missing the point friend.

The 6600 GT is low end, in cost. Compared to a X800 or a 6800 it is very very low end. Once again, this has to do with cost.

I know it performs very well and thats why I recommended it. Nothing to do with performance overall though I am speaking of cost. Being able to purchase it for $190 compared to up to $600 for the other cards puts it in the lower end of the price range. When people are speaking of low prices they are not wanting low end performance, they are wanting as much performance as they can get. So when we state low end in this context it has more to do with the price than the perofmrance. So again, imo the 6600 GT will be the king of the low end (Cost) cards.

Sorry you misunderstood what I was stating.

I think his point is that $200 is not 'low-end' in terms of pricing. 'Low-end' cards cost ~$50-100, midrange ~$100-150, and $200 is more like 'mid-high end', with $250-300+ firmly into 'high-end' cards. The 6600GT is certainly not "low end, in cost", and neither is the 9800Pro (at least currently). $200 is still a lot of money for a single component for a lot of people. $300+ price points are just insane, especially when you could build an entire new system for about the same price as the graphics card.

 

[tfinch2]

If my Ti4200 can run Doom 3 at 1024x768 at 35-45 FPS at High Quality than a 9600XT can too. A 9600XT is not a bad choice if it offers the performance you are looking for in your price range.

 

[imported_JeReMY]

I think the 9500 pro is the same price and is better than the 9600 xt.

 

[ronnn]

Actually I have been looking at an Asus 9600xt, as I need a low mid range card and this one appears to come with hl2. At least the asus web page linked on the sales site states that. I am just waiting for confirmation as it makes it a decent price. :beer:

 

[mrpotatoman]

oops my bad...i just posted the same question again haha.