RADEON 9700 and 9500 Pro

Sapphire RADEON 9700 card

DVI/VGA and S-Video outputs

RADEON 9700 still requires external power source

Board layout

The Atlantis RADEON 9700 closely resembles the more powerful 9700 Pro with one exception -- it utilizes a distinctive black PCB versus the red PCB used on Sapphire’s Atlantis 9700 Pro card. Apparently Sapphire is using red PCBs’ for its “Pro” line of cards, just like ATI, and the black PCBs’ for non-Pro boards. ATI contracts its board production to Sapphire so those of you who planned on purchasing a “Built by ATI” card may want to consider Sapphire. It’s the exact same card and it costs less.

As far as cooling is concerned, Sapphire uses the same Orb-style cooler on all of its video cards. From RADEON 9500 all the way up to the 9700 PRO, the same unit is used. This certainly makes sense from a business perspective, as using the same part keeps costs down. Because the card’s memory bus operates at 270MHz, it also doesn’t need the costly 2.8ns memory used on the RADEON 9700 Pro. Instead, the 9700 uses 3.6ns memory rated for 275MHz, though we’ll truly push its limit in our overclocking tests.

Another feature of the R300 processor is its dual, integrated, 10-bit 400MHz DACs, giving the card support for dual displays. Further, it also includes an integrated 165MHz TMDS transmitter. The result is a single DVI output and a 15-pin VGA output. Using an adapter, the DVI port can be used as a second VGA output.

ATI RADEON 9500

More of the same connectors on the 9500 PRO

Power header is placed in a different location for 9500 PRO

In comparison, the Atlantis RADEON 9500 Pro features the same display output capabilities, the same memory modules (also with 128MB of RAM) and even the same heat sink. As stated earlier, the main difference is that the 9500 Pro sports a 128-bit memory bus. Consequently, the reference board layout differs slightly from the 9700 family. The power connector has been relocated and the memory modules themselves now line the top of the card. Again, be sure to note that the R300 processor goes unchanged between the 9700 Pro, 9700 and 9500 Pro cards. The vanilla 9500 is the only one of the group that differs – it features an R300 with four pixel pipelines rather than eight.