[eeglot]

I am in the market for a 9700 PRO. I have been a little concerned with overheating on the direct ATI. Can you all give me your opinion on the best 3rd Party manufacture of the 9700 PRO?
The Hercules looks immpressive, but I wanted to get some opinions. FWIW, I am not interested in extreme overclocking ability, but I want one that will stay cool, and be rock solid.
Thanks for the help.
Eric

[BigJk-47]

I hear the Tyan ones are good.Retail ones arent too bad either.

[Evnas]

There isnt really a "best"...they are all the same really except the Tyan one.

[eeglot]

anyone know if the Tyan unit has ram-sinks on the back as well? I cant seem to find a photo that shows the back

[mfjonny]

yes it does.... only one to have it on both sides i believe...

http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/2...s/index.x?pg=3

looks like a DAMN nice card.

[Evnas]

the Hercules has them on both sides too i bellieve

[eeglot]

Great, thanks for the help, and yes I did see the the Hercules also has ram sinks on the back.

I just placed my order for the Tyan..cant wait to get this in. I now have a Leadtek TI 4600 with the huge heatsink, and twin fans. It was SUPPOSED to be an immpressive peice, and overclock very well. Well.........I have had the card for 4 months, and had it moderately overclocked, now the card is making noise, (differeing pitch noises), especially when rendering textures. I am thinking possibly one of the fans has a bad bearing. Also twice the other night I had Links 2003, and Battlefield 1942 kick me right back to the desktop...this has NEVER happened. So I think the TI 4600 is starting to go south.
I now have somewhat of a bad taste in my mouth and really want to try the new Radeon. I know Nvidia makes good GPU's, but I have not been very immpressed with some of the manufactures putting out these cards.

Thanks for listening
Eric

[Evnas]

The thing i have never liked about nVidia, is they really dont make a single thing. They design a GPU, give the design to TSMC, they produce the chips and ship them to the 3rd party manufacturers who build the PCB for them. ATi on the other hand, both designs the GPU, and builds their PCBs, which are of a very good design, thus the reason u dont see vastly different PCBs between the different brands like u do with nVidia based cards.

[eeglot]

Agreed Evnas
well put

[mattspalace]

You picked a good card...it was the same decision for me as well, the tyan or the Hercules..end the end, the Tyan was some $40 dollars cheaper and that pretty much sealed the deal.
Yes, the front and back of the card does have ram sinks, and they do actually get warm to the touch.
The hardware monitoring feature, is a bonus too.
Where did you get it? Those are hard to find, and I've only seen a couple of places carrying them..

[eeglot]

yes I only found a few places that had it. I ordered it from Micro-Pro out of Ohio. They had them in stock, and I should have it in a couple days.
Glad to hear I made the right decision. Micro-Pro spoke VERY highly of the Tyan,a nd said it outperforms other 9700's regularly with benchmarks they do, whatever that is worth. And yes, I found it for less money than other 9700's.

I let you all know how it goes. Also, does anyone have any recommendations going from Nvidia Detonators to ATI catalyst in WIn XP?? I assume I just need to make sure the detonators are uninstalled and uninstall the card, than I can install the Radeon?

Thanks again for the help

Eric