The DDR memory used on the 9600 XT is Samsung 322 (K4D263238E-GC33), this is 300MHz DDR memory; the speed of the memory could be a bottleneck for overclocking. Our sample 9600XT overclocked well using Rage3D's overclocking add-on to the Catalyst drivers. By using the ratio of the stock clocking I increased the GPU in 5MHz increments and the Memory in 3MHz increments until I reached a plateau that showed artifacting in the CoD timedemo.

Once I found the sweet spot I ran it thru Splinter Cell, CoD and UT 2003, ensuring again that there was no artifacting. I was able to attain a GPU frequency of 563MHz and a Memory frequency of 338MHz, a nice 10% Overclock. I increased the AGP voltage from 1.5v to 1.6v, could I squeeze a few more MHz out of the 9600XT? It appears that will not improve the OC of the 9600XT. I was able to get more GPU frequency or more memory frequency, but the combination of 563/338 netted the best performance boost. Here we are comparing the Catalyst 3.8 Stock, 3.8 with Rage3D's Overclock utility and 3.9's with OverDrive enabled.

3D Image Quality

I took a screenshot in CoD using Fraps, one with No AA/AF, and one with (4x for Nvidia and 6x for ATI) AA/8xAF.

From left to right Radeon and Geforce No AA/AF

From left to right Radeon 6xAA/8xAF, Geforce 4xAA/8xAF

Notice the roofing tiles and the lines on the sandbags in the screenshots. It appears, at least from what I can see, that the 5600 Ultra is painting the picture slightly better than the 9600 XT. This is an interesting twist, as the ATI cards have painted the better picture in the past, maybe there is something to these 53.x drivers from Nvidia. On a side note, I was playing CoD MP to get the timedemo and had a VPU failure, the screen went black and about 4 or 5 seconds later, it came back, albeit at widescreen format. I found out later that I had neglected to change the AGP from the 1.65V that the 5600 Ultra required to the standard 1.5V, and the reason my screen came back without reboot, the VPU Recover, nice feature I must say.

2D Image Quality

I loaded up a 1280x1024 image David and Hubert normally use in our video card reviews. I also pulled up an HTML document with various sized fonts to judge the text rendering. The document used white text on a black background, and vice versa. The screen resolution for all tests was 1280x1024 @ 75Hz on a Hitachi CML175B (LCD).

Scores are subjective, but like most gamers out there I have worked with my share of video cards and believe I have a pretty firm grasp on what card renders 2D better than the others. The scores will be out of 10, with 10 being excellent.

The 9600XT and 5600 Ultra looked pretty close to me with the bitmap file, but there is an obvious quality drop when moving to the FX5600 when it comes to reading small text. The FX5600 rendered white text on a dark background horribly, and in order not to lose my eyesight, I had to use the mouse to select blocks of text I wanted to read.

Conclusion

Brook's 2 Cents

The ATI Radeon 9600 XT is a strong card for the price; at just under it is a relatively good deal. Add to that, you are getting a $49.99 game included (Half Life 2), you are looking at a real bargain for $130 USD! I was very impressed with the stock performance as well as the overclockability of this card.

I was disappointed in the Catalyst 3.9 drivers in that they did not offer a tab that showed me the temperature of the GPU, and that ATI controlled the amount of overclocking in the OverDrive tab.

Overall this card is the strongest contender to date in the "Midrange" market, and for that reason, it is replacing the 5600 Ultra that is in my main rig.

Hubert's 2 Cents

I do have some concerns about the Catalyst 3.9 drivers, and OpenGL issues, but it appears to be a problem for just the AIW cards. However, ATI has done a fine job in tweaking their 9600 series, and for the money, I really don't see any reason why anyone should look elsewhere when shopping for a sub-200$ video card. Performance is slightly ahead of the 9600 Pro, and the 9600 XT debuted at a lower price point as well. Image quality is top notch, and hey, it'll come with a voucher for one of the most highly anticipated games of the year.

Pros: Great Performance, Plays leading edge games well in High Quality mode, Good Overclockability, Good cooling / low noise, VPU Recover, Bundled with HL2

Cons: No Temperature tab, Included OverDrive controls overclocking rate with little performance improvement, Not as pretty as the Chaintech for you Acrylic case / window owners

Bottom Line: If you don't have the cash for a $300.00 + graphics card, but need performance for not just gaming, but overall graphics performance, come on down, we just found you a match. I would recommend as a Strong Buy. If you have any questions or comments be sure to hit me up in the Forums.

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