someone please brief me on ATI "Atlantis"

[guppie]

Currently using ATI 9600 Pro 128MB. I was looking on pricewatch for a ATI 9800 Pro card. Several vendors have listed that "Atlantis" has replaced "Pro"? Is this right? I am looking to stay below $150 and want to see if there are any 9800 Pro cards... Does 256MB vs 128MB make that much of a difference? Is it worth it to upgrade now or wait until after the Hoildays are over to see if prices drop further? I don't plan on playing Doom3, but HalfLife2 looks enticing. Right now I'm playing StarWars Battlefront and Joint Ops. Both games play/look fine, but are we ever REALLY satisfied?

[Jacobman]

Most of there 9800pros are called an "atlantis", I would recomend this one,
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-268&depa=1
This is the one im getting for christmas though
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-340&depa=1
But that 9800pro is a beast card flash it and it flies my buddy has one.

[Chixofnix]

256 vs 128 9800pros aren't that different in stock performance... in fact in most cases they are nearly identical... check the charts in this older vga roundup:http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031229/vga-charts-03.html#unreal_tournament_2003

i had a 9800pro atlantis - oc wise i can say the ram was amazingly ocable, but the gpu got real hot real fast on stock.... forgot the #s sorry

i'm not sure what things cause ATI/vendors to change their pricing policies over time quickly, but atm the 9800pro (128/256) is whomped in performance with the 6600gt agp (nvidia) - funny thing is, when it debuted, the 6600gt cost about as much or even cheaper than a 9800 pro - so naturally the 9800pro had to drop in price to sell, but another factor has shown up - only one vendor (xfx) is making the card availiable in agp, and so demand has knocked the price up in most online retail spots (i believe monarchcomputers has been holding the best pricepoint recently)...

so ANYWAY to make a long story short, the 6600gt is i believe intended by nvidia to be sold for something similar to the pcie version - i.e. 200 bucks, and eventually other vendors will come out easing the supply/demand issue and also give xfx some pricing competition. that will cause this lower price to come about faster. when it does, if you're still stuck on getting a 9800pro, and still waiting, then its a pretty sure thing that the 9800pro will eventually react by lowering in price further

sorry this is a bit rambly, and i may have a lot of misspellings today - i can't see my screen very well w/o my glasses ;)

[guppie]

but atm the 9800pro (128/256) is whomped in performance with the 6600gt agp (nvidia)

I'm a bit confused. Does this mean that the 6600GT is better than 9800Pro? I won't be changing out my MB anytime soon, so AGP only... Hopefully, both cards will come down in price (even if its only like $10-$20) Like you said, I think another 2-3 months of waiting can't hurt. But which card to get?

[Chixofnix]

I'm a bit confused. Does this mean that the 6600GT is better than 9800Pro?

that's exactly right.
here's a review at anandtech with many charts showing the 6600gt coming out on top:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2277

here's an xbitlabs HL2 performance roundup showing much of the same:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/half-life.html

and to round it off here's the tomshardware review of the 6600gt:
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20041119/index.html

note that there are some cases where the 9800pro nearly matches and sometimes barely exceeds the 6600gt's performance, but these cases usually occur at very low resolutions and only during certain parts of certain games...

I won't be changing out my MB anytime soon, so AGP only... Hopefully, both cards will come down in price (even if its only like $10-$20) Like you said, I think another 2-3 months of waiting can't hurt. But which card to get?

yep they'll both drop, and the 6600gt will drop AT LEAST 20 dollars on newegg when more become available from different vendors (which should happen within the next few months, hopefully). again if you want to buy now check monarch computers, i think they had them for about 230 last i checked.

waiting in the computer upgrade world never hurts, unless its something you won't be able to buy it later (like bh-5 ram), or if you're emotionally hurting for not being able to play counter-crack-source because you're waiting for the 6600gt's prices to settle out the way they're supposed to (like me!)

if you're willing to spend the money to get a 6600gt, there's no real reason to get a 9800pro instead, unless you need to color-coordinate with a red pcb ;)