[Carbon]

Originally Posted by Cew27 sorry to hijack but im just wondering, what is the performance of the 9600 compaired to a 8800 ulta ko overclocked?

8800 Ultra? Ultra will outperform the 9600GT, obviously, but with a sufficiently overclocked 9600GT, I'd guess you could narrow it down to about a 20% difference on average in benches.

The 9600GT has several things going for it:

1. It runs on a 65nm die. So it's fast. It's also small, cool, and overclockable. The Ultra is roughly the size of a small moon due to its 90nm construction.

2. The Ultra has a small benefit over the 8800GTX. It's like 5% in most cases.

3. The 9600GT matches or outperforms (at some resolutions) the 8800GT in a majority of benches. Why this is is simple: a lot of the 8800GTs being sold are 256MB, and that hurts AA performance, especially at high resolutions.

4. The 8800GT outperforms the 8800GTS in all tests, including high resolutions, and with overclocking can almost match the 8800GTX.

An OC'd 9600 won't match Ultra performance, but it will come dangerously close for a fourth of the price. Two of them in SLI, or two 8800GTs, will most likely beat the Ultra out in both price and performance.

As for the 1GB card, this card is probably made for video at high resolutions on big displays. That would be the only real use for it.

[Cew27]

sorry i meant the 9800

[Carbon]

9800GX2 beats Ultra any day, but not by much.
9800GTX..probably, but it's a lot closer.

[Cew27]

ok so i shouldn't be beating my self to hard because i got the ultra in jan ?

[Carbon]

Not at all. I'd be beating myself because I bought an Ultra in the first place, though, it's massively overpriced for a difference that can be made up for in five minutes with RivaTuner.

[Cew27]

ok :(

[Tidusffx]

the 9800 is a complete rip off...tests show that the GTX and Ultra are not as good by a very narrow margin...So basically its just double the price because its 2 cards and 1gb its nothing special to the 8800 honestly...I have seen comparisons of my 8800GT...it owned the GTS...in some games it outperformed GTX but in most cases was 2-3% lower in performance and ultra it was about 10%. And for the money i saved with GT i can Sli this so i am very happy with my choice. The 9600 is a very good card price:performance ratio its top notch

[Tidusffx]

and i wasnt really clear about 9800's

9800GX2: waste of money
9800GTX: GPU lower than overclocked GT/GTX/Ultra's but memory clock is at 2200 which is higher than all 8 series models and 9600's but the GPU is what i personally find the most important area of a card.

So maybe once the 9800GTX has passed 700GPU core then consider getting one.