Graphics Cards

[Dr_nwa]

For those of you with blinging cards, let people know what you think.
To get some scores of just how good/bad your card is, I would suggest running 3Dmark03 (from herel (http://www.futuremark.com/download/?3dmark03.shtml))
EDIT, I'll be back later with my review.

[wyrd_fish]

Asus Radeon 9600XT

Overview
Well what’s in the box?
1X Asus Radeon 9600XT
1X Half-Life 2 coupon :D
1X Assorted Manuals
1X Big assed collection of bundled software
1X FREE CD case
1X Big video in thing

3year warranty

Tecky Stuff
The card runs really quite cool and I’m sure it has plenty of room for over-clocking, and the 128Mb of high quality Samsung RAM can’t hurt either.
Stuff I’ve managed to dig up on the 9600XT:
www.ati.com
4 parallel rendering pipelines
2 parallel geometry engines
128-bit DDR memory interface (64-bit on RADEON™ 9600 SE)
AGP 8X support
SMARTSHADER™ 2.0
SMOOTHVISION™ 2.1
HYPER Z™ III+
TRUFORM™ 2.0
VIDEOSHADER™
FULLSTREAM™ video de-blocking technology
(the list goes on)

Performance, and Stability
I moved from a SiS* Xaber to this thing so the performance and compatibility went through the roof when I plugged this bad boy in. No more dodgy half assed rendering for me.

I’m not going to run a synthetic benchmark, as I distrust them and they rely to heavily on other system components, but it does run Halo in around 80fps at times, not when all hell’s breaking loose mind.

*Stick to chipsets guys :(

I’ll add more later, exam soon…

[Dr_nwa]

Specification (from www.hercules.com)
Graphics processor RADEON™ 9800 PRO
Processing technology 0.15µ
Memory 128MB onboard DDR RAM
Memory / Core interface 256-bit DDR
Bus AGP 2X/4X/8X
Rendering pipelines 8
DirectX 3D Hardware DirectX® 9
OpenGL version OpenGL®1.3
Output options DVI-I Output
TV Output
VGA Output
RAMDAC Dual integrated 400MHz RAMDACs
Maximum resolution of 2048x1536 @ 85Hz
benchmarks
I ran 3Dmark03. the card, as it stands, without any software tweaking, scored 5510. Now, I don't happen to have anything to compare this against, so if anyone else has run this test on a different card, I'd be interested to know what sort of scores you got. Attached is a screenshot of the test details.
I also checked the frame rate on MOHAA, (the only game I have in durham atm). I ran it with all the video settings set to max and I was getting a framerate of 85-100fps. I borrowed a copy of GTA vice city to see what that looked like, and again, I was getting a pretty decent framerate, but I can't remember what it was

My thoughts
I bought this card from overclockers.co.uk, as they were offering it cheap, but as OEM, so I didn't get anything with it. However, that wasn't a problem..,
I was upgrading from that pariah of the graphics card world, the FX5200. That card had issues on a couple of occasions with MOHAA, and keeled over and died when I played farcry on it. I haven't as yet had the opportunity to run farcry with this card, but MOHAA was a lot of fun. So far I have been massively impressed with the rendering this card can do, although I have not yet tested it to its full capabilities. The software bundle that would normally come with this card includes hercules own overclocking software, which allows you to alter the speeds of the RAM and the processor. I have played with this a little, but I actually think it hasn't really made that much of an effect on the performance so far. Currently, I have the core at 419mhz and the RAM at 358Mhz, from a default of 378Mhz and 338Mhz, respectively.
This card has a lovely little fan with a blue LED in it, which may have been why I actually bought it...

I think this card rocks. It cost me £100, and for the money it was massively worth it.

[sidneylopsides]

Hercules 9800SE All In Wonder

cost £160

This is a very good value card if you are lucky, around 2/3rds of these will softmod back to a 9800Pro.
The card itself has a red pcb, a tv tuner box, a silver heatsink with a small fan, and 128MB of Samsung RAM. It runs at the same clock rates as the Pro version. It comes with a remote control, a break out box for video in and video out leads.
Thats basically it, as an SE the performance is a tad better than 9600 level, but if it softmods it is back to full 9800Pro level.
The card I got actually was labelled 9800 AIW Pro, and worked perfectly. The all in wonder part is very good, it has TV tuner, rf remote control and lots of video in/out connections, it basically gives you a media centre pc. There is a problem with the tuner working with Driect X 9b, mine still isnt working after I installed it. The remote reciever needs a spare USB port.

Performance in 3Dmark 03was around 3000 before and 5700 after softmod. I never played any games without the softmod so cant compare those, but it plays Far Cry at over 40fps and UT2K4 at around 70fps at full detail.
This is an excellent value card, if you see one about get it!
Also look out, if you see a Herculse 9800Pro AIW not in a box for sale, make sure you check it out, I know of one person who bought one that turned out to be a failed softmod SE.

[Random]

http://img238.exs.cx/img238/5681/videocardtest5gq.jpg
It's a Geforce 6800 GT Overclocked I believe, got it for about $400.00. It's got a lifetime warranty, and runs everything nice and smooth like