Customer Reviews

ATI Technologies 100-435002 Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

You may want to ignore the reviews of these other people who spent hundreds on a top quality video card without knowing what it is used for. If you don't know how to resize your desktop, do not buy this video card. If you think an expensive video card will help you to play DVDs, do not buy this video card.

But if you're into gaming or other applications that need serious graphics processing power, the 9800 Pro is without a doubt the most powerful video card out there, excluding the ones that are crazy expensive. In benchmark tests, it consistently rates #1 across the board of all commonly used video cards. Sure, you can get OK graphics with cheaper video cards, but if you want to pay a bit more for the best quality graphics, this is the one you want. It's worth the investment... it will be a very long time (2 years + minimum) before this will be anywhere near the low end of the spectrum, and probably twice as long before an application will even be invented that the Radeon 9800 Pro can't handle.

This card is very close to the 9800 XT, and not very noticably different from the X800, which was just released. Both of these cards are much more money, and only increase video quality by very little and unnoticable amounts. The 9800 Pro is half the price of all its competitors and just as good in my mind. This card is top shelf now and will be for years to come. It is compatible with every game coming out, and every game that is out now. I now turn up all my quality on all my games to as high as it can go, and I experience no lag. I dont recommend for people who wont be using high end applications and gaming, because those are these cards main purpose. Excellent quality, very reliable.

my current system:
intel motherboard (i'm at work and i don't know exactly which one)
p4 2.5GHz
768mb rd ram
120gb hard drive
audigy2 sound card
(all of which came in a Dell Dimension 8250)

i picked up the 9800 last week after using an ATI 9700tx card for several months. the 9700tx is a sweet card if you play all but the most intense games. even with the most demanding games, the 9700tx made the games look great, but i started to run into issues with the frame rate dropping on games like Unreal 2 and ut: 2003 when there was a lot going on at once (like multiple characters all fighting at the same time and/or large, seriously cpu-intensive environments, etc.). this issue was also caused by the resolution being turned up all the way and all of the bells and whistles being turned on (including EAX audio features). so, with the res and some details turned down, the 9700tx was able to take on everything out there (including the Tron 2.0 demo, with no problems and the demo looked sweet!)... but i didn't want any of the goods turned off. for once, i wanted to see everything a game had to offer.

i installed the 9800 pro card with no issues (the card comes with directions if needed). you uninstall the old drivers, turn the machine off, pull out the old card, slide in the new card, turn your machine back on, pop in the cd included, install the new drivers = you're set. i haven't had a problem with this card on any of my games or apps yet.

basically, this card is a monster. frame rates jumped so much that i had to turn the mouse sensitivity down on most games because the games were running so much faster than what i was used to. the more demanding games didn't see as much of a jump in frame rate, but they did become very stable and the issue with the frame rate dropping was completely eliminated (so taking on a server full of folks playing ut: 2003 was no problem). details in games looked better with more features turned on, but the increase in frame rate was the big plus of the 9800. no skips, no jerks, no lag, no problems with games running on full tilt, on or off-line.

i'm not sure what else to say about this card since i don't test hardware for a living or hobby and i don't have any specs to throw out. most games now run at 60-80 fps with all of the details and filtering abilities turned on. other games that are more demanding ran at 40-50 fps, but were very stable and i'm really happy with the overall performance of the 9800.

yeah, the card is pricey but if you can swing the $$$, definitely give the ATI 9800 pro card a look. basically, there's no game out right now that this card cannot take on (and then some). i played the following pc games using the 9800 with no issues: Aliens vs. Predator 2 (and the PH mission pack), NOLF 2, Unreal II, Unreal Tournament, Unreal Tournament 2003, GTA: III, GTA: Vice City, Quake III, Red Faction, Ghost Recon (and both mission packs), Max Payne (and the Kung-Fu mod), Mafia (demo), Vietcong (demo), Tron 2.0 (demo), XIII (demo - cool game), Serious Sam II (demo), and Battlefield 1942 (demo).

(the price is the only thing that kept this one from five stars... but that will drop soon enough.)

I purchased this video card expecting to receive a non-OEM, genuinely original ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb adapter. After all, that is what is advertised, and the picture shown is that of an original ATI 9800 Pro box. Nowhere in this item description is the manufacturer JETWAY mentioned. The box you will receive upon buying this card is different from what is pictured above, as is the product, which is manufactured by a company called Jetway; you can find this card on their website at www.jetway.com.tw. I will be honest here and say that despite the card not being what I expected (and more importantly, not being what I paid to have sent to me), its performance has so far been acceptably good so I probably won't go through the hassle of returning it. The only problem I have had has been occasional white/multi-colored flickering of polygons, but it doesn't happen extremely frequently. Unfortunately when it happens in dark areas in games such as Half-Life 2 it can be quite noticable. I am not sure if this is due to the card being a Jetway or not, having never used a truly original ATI 9800 Pro..
The bottom line however is that the product being sold here is not the same as what is described and what you are lead to believe you are buying. Thus in what could have otherwise been a perfectly satisfactory transaction, I am forced to rate the item and the seller poorly, because in my book, lying to the customer is a pretty poor business practice. If you are looking to buy an all-original ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb card, don't buy it here.

While not the absolute bleeding edge anymore (ATI x800 and nVidia 6800 series have that title now), this card offers tremendous bang for the buck. It is abundantly clear, however, that the laughable 1-star reviews are from people who were too stupid to buy a video card.

For instance, as noted earlier, this is not a card for professional 3d design work, but for games. If you want a card for 3d design work, BUY THE ATI CARD MARKETED FOR THAT PURPOSE, YOU DOOFUS!!! You might as well (...)about how the dump truck you bought isn't winning any drag races for you, or how your claw hammer makes a terrible screwdriver. Your IGNORANCE isn't ATI's fault.

Likewise, if you are too ignorant to open the "display" settings on your desktop to adjust the screen size & color settings after moving the resolution from 640x480 to 1,600x1,200, you probably are too ignorant to buy a high-end graphics card. Sorry.

HINT: your monitor also has little knobs that adjust this sort of thing, and even brightness and contrast!

Let's go over a few points in the hope, however vain, that future idiots won't write freakin' ignorant 1-star reviews:

-This is a 3d graphics accelerator card, mainly for games. If you don't play games with 3d graphics, you have no reason to get one. It won't make the pictures of your puppy you took with your Kodak digital camera look any better, sorry. Don't give the card a low score because you are too ignorant to even know 2d from 3d graphics.

-If you want a card for 3d design work, buy a card for 3d design work with full OpenGL support (ATI sells a whole line of them, by they way). Don't be a schumuck and give the card a low score because you were too ignorant to buy the right product. Actually reading the features on the box label might help you here, tough guys.

-Before you give a 1- star review, and stick your name on something in public that will make you look like an idiot, try the following:

-- Download the latest driver for the card.
-- Open the display settings in Control Panel to see if there is a button that will automatically fix your problem for you.

If that fixes your problem, then guess what? You have to do that with EVERY 3d graphics card. So kindly be quiet.

I don't get the latest and greatest thing to hit the shelf every week. But let me say this...I had a gforce 5200 ultra...upgraded to the 9800pro, and was blown away. explosions, scenery, and all kinds of other things were able to be seen that I never saw with my 5200. The frame rate is unbeleivable, and so freakin smooth. If you are looking to upgrade, this is it. I'm playing SWG, HALO, UNREAL, FF11, etc... A MUST BUY for gamers especially. (this review is based off of a PC running with a Intel P4 2.8 and 1 GIG of memory)

I upgraded from a Gainward Ti4200. First thing I noticed: this 9800pro is so much quieter! It no longer sounds like I have a Huey in my PC.
The catalysts work great with all games out in the past several years, every blue moon a game comes out that has a few issues, but ATi releases a new driver to take care of it in a week or so, and the problems are always minor. A lot of people complain about the drivers because they incorrectly set their bios(on older VIA AMD boards you need to turn off FastWrites).
Compared to my Ti4200 this card is as I said is quieter, the 2d is leaps and bounds better, and of course 3d is much better.
By far my favorite card ever, and I started out with Voodoo cards.

I just recently put together my first computer (my aim was gaming) and i could not have chosen a better video card. I have had absolutely no trouble running even the most demanding games. Unreal 2, Unreal Tournament 2003, Tron 2.0 (retail version), and Planet Side all run at breathtaking frame rates with details all on full (including the trilinear filtering option in UT2003). Sure it is very pricey, but you won't need another card for a very long time.

I bought one of these, was very happy with the performance of the card itself, however, the fan died and by the time the source of the problem was found the card was damaged beyond repair. So, thinking this was a fluke I again bought the same card, but lo and behold the fan died AGAIN, this time I've hopefully caught it before the damage is permanent and have replaced the fan, but I will never buy a Radeon again.

I spent a long time deciding between this card and the Nvidia Geforce FX5900. The last time I got an ATI card it was a nightmare. My ATI All-in-wonder card was plagued with constant lockups and slow downs.

With that being said, I was very wary of putting another ATI card in my system. I had always been happy with Nvidia, so the choice should have been obvious, but I did extensive research and my results prompted me to give ATI another chance. I purchased the 9800 Pro from ebay for a steal at $150 for my PC build. I must say it is worth every penny.

All of my games run smoothly on my Athlon 3000+ with 1GB ram. The only problem I had with this card is that I could not get it to run Doom 3 right out of the box. The game would always crash to the desktop when I tried to start a new game. No other games gave me any problem except doom 3. I searched the internet and found that many others were having problems with this card and Doom 3. I found and downloaded some third party drivers that fixed the problem. Doom 3 runs very good on my system now and doesnt crawl along as I expected it to. I haven't played Doom 3 too much after getting it working, because I haven't really gotten into the game as of yet. However I have been playing other games like Halo and quake 3 and I am amazed at the crispness, and brillant colors. These games run very smooth and quick with no slowdowns or choppiness whatsoever.

ATI may have won me back as a customer, but only time will tell.

As a note, I have also seen a couple of reviews saying that when they bought this card from Amazon, that they got a third party knock off and not the actual card from ATI. Functionally, the card should be the same, but you never know and I can surely understand the frustration when the card arrived and you discover it is from a manufacturer like Jetway. Just for the record I did not get my card from amazon but from Ebay. So in case you were wondering if I got a geniune ATI card directly from Amazon, the answer is no.