ATI RADEON® 9800 Pro, (128 MB) AGP Video Card

I'd been hoping to see the price of this card go down in light of ATI's recent announcement of the 9800's successor; the x800. Sure enough, I found a great price at Fry's 1-Day Anniversary Sale on this card.

The 9800 Pro 128 is definitely a top of the line unit. Even when compared to the "higher end" models in this card's series (9800 Pro 256 and 9800 XT 256), the 9800 Pro 128 pulls off performance that is easily comparable. I can now play games with the settings maxed (AA, AF) and still get awesome performance. Currently, the only game that gives this card a little trouble when settings are at their highest is Far Cry, and still, it's playable (Far Cry has actually received the same complaint on the high end Nvidia cards as well, so it doesn't appear to be exclusively an ATI issue).

I purchased this card to allow me to play the "next generation" of games that are soon to be hitting the market (Doom 3, Half Life 2, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., etc.). This card should have more than enough power to run these games at optimal settings.

The only quibble I have about the 9800 Pro is that it can get pretty hot. The stock heatsink/fan on the card seems woefully inadequate for long sessions of graphically intense games (I had Far Cry lockup and even restart my system a few times due to overheating). If you plan to play games like Far Cry or Doom 3, look into getting a really good GPU cooling setup (I purchased a Zalman Heatpipe w/80mm fan attachment for exactly this reason).

Unless you can find an incredible deal on a 256 Pro or XT, I'd say save your money and buy the Pro 128. Comparisons between each 9800 model from sites like tomshardware.com indicate the difference in price compared to performance is fairly negligible.