Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9600 Pro

Company: Sapphire
Product: Atlantis Radeon 9600 Pro
Street Price: ~$165
Date Reviewed:  June 17, 2003
Reviewed By: Joey Chao

The Card:

The card is nothing to get really excited about in terms of looks. The black PCB is a nice look versus the Green color on the 9600 Pro built by ATi. The card is relatively short compared the Radeon 9800 Pro. There is also no direct 4-pin power connector going to the 9600 Pro like we saw with the Radeon 9700 Pro or 9800 Pro video cards. This is obviously because the card does not require as much power because it does not perform on the same level as those enthusiast cards.

The back of the card has the output that goes to the monitor as well as a connection for a TV-out. There is also a DVI-I (Digital Visual Interface) connector. More and more people are starting to use their PC's as their home multimedia center. The addition of the TV-out is nice but we would have also like to have seen a TV-in connector. There are a few users out their with huge monitors who would probably like to be able to use a TV-in feature.

The cooling solution is not big, so it will not take up any extra space. Also it does not produce a lot of noise. The smaller core does not get as hot as the .15-micron chips, which means a smaller fan can be used with good results. The heat sink has a silver/grey finish, with the Sapphire name imprinted into the metal. We didn't check to see what type of thermal paste is under the heat sink but it is probably some generic paste. Some enthusiasts may want to replace this thermal compound with something like Arctic Silver or some other high quality compound.

The memory found on the Sapphire 9600 Pro are the Samsung BGA chips labeled K4D26323RA-GC2A. The chips are rated at 2.86ns meaning they have a maximum speed of 350MHz. These memory modules should be good for overclocking well above the stocks speeds of 300 MHz, which we will test out more in the overclocking section. For now the only comments we really have about the memory chips is that they are high quality and are made by a trustworthy manufacturer like Samsung.

That wraps up the overview of the card. The card's size is not overwhelming and neither is the cooling solution used to keep the R350 core within good operating temperatures. The card should be a good overclocker with the quality components used. Now lets take a look at the rest of the bundle to see what other features Sapphire has included with the 9600 Pro video card.