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3DVelocity wish to thank Liz at Crucial
in the UK and Rae at Pathway
PR for providing these cards for review.
Part Four: Sapphire's Radeon
9700 Pro
The other card in this shootout is
from one of the more familiar ATi partners. Sapphire's
8500's impressed many so hopes are high for the new
9700
Pro Atlantis part. Firstly we must make it clear
that the board we are reviewing is an updated model
that uses the new black PCB. This will become a standard
of all Sapphire cards this year so depending on stock
levels of your local retailer you may or not receive
a black version.
The board reviewed is the newer black model, it's
certainly a head turner without doubt but it is more
expensive than the Crucial card.
The back of the board is identical to the reference
version if you disregard the colour. Sapphire has
chosen to use an orb style cooler though for the main
GPU. (Below)
The ocb cooler looks very good indeed; finished with
real style. We shall see later how this affected our
overclocking.
It's fair to say this
board looks the business. The presentation of the
board is excellent and the black PCB really looks
great. The cooler is a nice addition and looks far
more appealing than the stock ATi version.
Sapphire did not provide
us with a sample of the retail box they are using
for this product but did send over the items received
in it.
Basically, the same items received as with Crucial's
version, once more we see PowerDVD's inclusion.
Its a pity Sapphire didn't
send us an example of the box art, however, their
website
contains examples of the artwork used if this is a
consideration for you.
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