Technical ATI Question

[Steve978]

I am a huge Nvidia fan just as i was an intel fan but suddenly you realize to be narrow minded as to brands and not performance and quality I really am giving myself a disadvantage. Therefore I am now trying to learn as much as I can about ATI. Heres my quesiton... What is the technical difference between a radeon Pro and Non-pro. more specifically the 9500's 9700s and 9800s. Is it simply better quality parts? or what? I'd appreciate some help :D

[Rav]

The difference between Pro and Non-Pro is just clock speed, although often slower memory accompanies the non-pros. Its the same quality part, but that depends on who the manufacturer is.

-Rav

[Steve978]

thanks for the answer. I had another question Nvidia has the Digital Vibrance option does ATI have a feature that resembles this?

[Rav]

With the ATI control panel you can set up different color profiles for 2D and 3D and bind them to hotkeys. You can adjust Gamma, Brightness and Contrast for R G B. You can also adjust overlays seperately.

-Rav

[PreservedSwine]

Big difference between PRO and NON-PRO R9500's.

R9500np 4 pipes
R9500PRO 8 pipes


Differences between PRO and non-PRO on R9700 and R9800 are just RAM differences (lower clocks, and usually RAM w/ a higher ns rating on np models)

R9800SE has only 4 pipes as well.

[Cowboy X]

Originally posted by Steve978
I am a huge Nvidia fan just as i was an intel fan but suddenly you realize to be narrow minded as to brands and not performance and quality I really am giving myself a disadvantage. Therefore I am now trying to learn as much as I can about ATI. Heres my quesiton... What is the technical difference between a radeon Pro and Non-pro. more specifically the 9500's 9700s and 9800s. Is it simply better quality parts? or what? I'd appreciate some help :D

Pro is different in different lines . In the 9500 series the pro has 8 pixel pipelines with one texture unit each on a 128 bit bus but the non-pro has only 4 pixel pipelines and can also come as a 64 meg version .

With the 9700 series the non pro is identical to the 9700 Pro ( 256 bit interface , 128 mb , 8 pixel pipes with one texture unit each ) except for having lower clock and memory speeds .

The 9800 series allows more instructions fixed a few bugs and added something called an f-buffer for future titles . This accounts for some of the feature differences between it and the 9700 series but the difference between 9800 and 9800 Pro is clockspeed and memory speed ( just like the 9700 series ) . But the 256 mb 9800 Pro is a bit different from the rest in that it offers 256 mb of DDR2 which is clocked a little faster than the mem on the 128 cards because ddr2 has more latency and thus needs that extra speed to be on par with DDR1 .

As far as better quality parts , it is still disputed as to whether ATI chooses the best R300 cores for the 9700 Pro and the worst for the 9500 non pro and the best R350 cores as 9800 Pros and the lesser ones as 9800 non-pros . Some say it was done and is still going on , while others claim that ATI's production yeild is so good that few chips have to be relegated for speed or quality reasons , meaning that many believe that most of the R300 cores in the 9700 non-pro and 9500 pro are just as good as those in the 9700 pro . I personally am in the middle , I believe that some quality selection is done, but that their yeilds are so good that many times 'good' chips still go into the lowerend boards .

[Steve978]

thanks for the great explanation :D but now I've got you both heres another question. Do you have a link to compare the clock speeds on the radeon line?

[Cowboy X]

Two links for you :

http://www.area3d.net/overview.php

http://www.beyond3d.com/misc/comp.php

[Rav]

And of course, check the "If you own a Radeon 7000-9800 post here!" Sticky in this forum to get an idea of speeds and overclocking potential.

-Rav

[Steve978]

thanks alot guys i appreciate the help