Last Monday night my Neighbourman gave me this good oldie :P

Hercules 3D PROPHET 9700 PRO AGP + TV-Out/DVI 128MB DDR 256Bit Limited Red X-MAS Edition Rev.A 0243 Boxed 100% complete! and it still runs like it did 3.5 years ago :) 8)
http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/6794/9700proset5uw.th.jpg

Topside
http://img68.imageshack.us/img68/5858/9700protop0fc.th.jpg

Backside:
http://img461.imageshack.us/img461/7060/9700proback8wi.th.jpg

Closeup of the outputs
http://img74.imageshack.us/img74/3113/9700prosmall1bp.th.jpg

I shot togeather with the befamed Rage Fury MAXX :P
http://img461.imageshack.us/img461/7314/9700prorfmaxx0nf.th.jpg

Herc 9700 Pro + Rage Fury MAXX Top Rear:
http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/8963/9700prorfmaxxtoprear6vl.th.jpg

Herc 9700 Pro + Rage Fury MAXX Back:
http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/2040/9700prorfmaxxback2qy.th.jpg

Herc 9700 Pro and Box Front:
http://img71.imageshack.us/img71/3096/herc9700proboxfront3vp.th.jpg

Herc 9700 Pro and Box Top:
http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/1496/herc9700proboxtop7uj.th.jpg



This model is a limited Red X-Mas Edition card about 5000 of there were made before this model Hercules had this Standard Blue model as thier main Production model:
http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/2189/herc9700problueblue5yf.th.jpg

When X-Mas came the Hercules Radeon 9700 Pro because of it's great succes had a PCB colour change to Red for a short period of time and around about Februari 2003 the Blue PCB'd cards returned but without the blue paint on the ram sinks for better heat absorbsion:
http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/2007/herc9700probluecopper8sq.th.jpg

Some other rumors of that Red Herc 9700 Pro was that the Blue PCB was out of stock and that was in the X-Mas period of 2002 til mid Feb 2003 :) hehe but still a nice piece to own now hopefully I can find the other 2 also :)

I love everything 3D Prophet!

;)

thanx heh it was the best Radeon 9700 Pro of it's time, it runs core/mem 325Mhz / 620Mhz DDR my max OC with the stock copper cooling was core/mem 388Mhz / 730Mhz  8) that was fast for a 9700 Pro in it's time and even with stock cooling :)

Anyways I only did that to see how fast it really would go without problems and it was quite amazing, after that back to stock speeds, and now it's running FarCry @ 1024 x 768 x32 with FSAA x6 AF x16 @ max details in an AthlonXP Barton 2600+ without problems and a very nice fluid 3D performance also.

That's a sweet card, Obi-Wan...

I wanted one for the longest time, but couldn't find a reliable retailer for high-end Hercules parts that would ship to my location.  Then they discontinued 'em, and the 9800's were out, and I sort of gave up on it.

:'(

Nice catch.

hmm I have seen a Herc 9800 Pro on ebay I am willing to PM you it if you are intersted? ;)

But yeah that 9700 Pro is always handy for use it even plays Half Life 2 @ 1024 x 768 with FSAA x6 AF x16 at max details that already gave me an example on how perfect the R300 was for it's time :)
This particulair card used to be my old GFX card in my ole Dual AthlonMP 2200+ and I sold it with that system to my neighbour man and now within 12 days my new ATi X800XT PE AGP / X850XT PE AGP will arrive. [dunno which one since they cost about the same]

the I use to have a XFX GeForce 6800GT and that card didn't make me happy in any case so my neighbour man was interested so I gave him that card and he gave me back my trusty good ole 9700 Pro and in some games it performs better ! the image quallity is better also. and I recieve some other old peices of hardware a Diamond Viper V770 Riva TNT2 oh well wasn't really my intention to take that thing but they used to be good 3D cards for thier times if I can remem.

anyways now that the 9700 Pro is back for great usage the X800XP PE AGP of X850XT PE AGP will be used in my main Dual OpteronDP 244 system and the 9700 Pro in the AthlonXP 2700+ system ATI LAN ready :)

So no more NV cards just a too bad experience with them, bad Image Quallity like I get glitches in FS 2004 and not in other games like Doom3, Quak4, UT 2004 Half Life 2 and so on, so it failed for my behalf.

and the 9700 Pro showed me the power of ATi better Image Quallity and performance is some areas. the R420/R481 should give me the best performance on the AGP bus.

Well, I have to say that my 6800GT pretty much hammers my old 9800 Pro in everything... and it flat out blows it away in OpenGL games.  It will never achieve the place in my heart that the old GF2 Ultra did, but it's still a damn fine card.

My 9800 Pro (Sapphire 128MB) was vastly improved by the addition of a Zalman VF-700 cooling solution.  It may not have the raw power of the 6800GT, but it only puts out half the heat... that's worth something.

in new 3D apps yeah true there but in 2D image quallity the ATi still wins, but yeaps the 6800GT was faster in games like Doom3, Quake4 OpenGL games that's for sure only the image quallity wasn't better which is a shame.

Obi, I wouldn't agree on that. Pretty much all the today's cards have the same (perfect) 2D quality. Especially with the DVI outputs. DVI does not depend on the quality of components used on PCB. If the 2d image is crappy, then the card is faulty. If colours are a mess - adjust gamma/saturation/contrast.

3D quality is another story: 3dfx on the pedestal (apsolutely first place, the cleanest, sharpest and most colourful display, even with 16 bits), ATI follows behind with nice colours, and NV falls faaar behind. I remember the time when I compared the 3D output of the Voodoo 5 5500, ATI Radeon 8500 and GF FX5200. What a difference... Like a comercial for contact lenses! :D

It's no wonder NV won the speed-battle in 2000-2001; there was apsolutely no chance to improve image and texture quality (at least not enough to compare with voodoo) in detonators...


I hate this nostalgic feeling :(

it is well known that the image quallity of ATi and 3dfx cards are better if you think NV has good image quallity ask the others really it isn't that great afterall

Nvidia cards get thier speed because of worse image quallity than ATi cards by adding cheats in thier drivers. I have had the 6800 GT myself and in games like HalfLife 2 there were vertical lines visable in water surfaces,  in Flight Simulator 2004 the water was also crappy and on an ATi Radeon 9700 Pro, X850XT PE and MR 9800  all was fine and no crappyness. I have had more than 70 types of Graphics cards and to be honest the 3dfx and ATi's were the best Matrox cards were the best in 3D since that is thier best role.

after this I tested it with my GeForce4 Ti4600 and the same happened lol .

there are enough image quallity tests in this place that Glide games run better on 3dfx cards qua Image quallity the facts are just there, I have been confronted by many nvidiots but they just couldn't admit and agree that I was telling them the truth.

my experience with NV cards and many others from this place are noit that great thier cards suck imho.

wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

it is well known that the image quallity of ATi and 3dfx cards are better if you think NV has good image quallity ask the others really it isn't that great afterall

What others?  I'd like to form my own opinion based on evidence, thank you.


wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

Nvidia cards get thier speed because of worse image quallity than ATi cards by adding cheats in thier drivers.

You're trying to tell us that ATI doesn't use "cheats" (a.k.a. optimizations) in their drivers?  Um, I have a really nice piece of ocean-front property in Utah that I think you might be interested in...


wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

I have had the 6800 GT myself and in games like HalfLife 2 there were vertical lines visable in water surfaces,  in Flight Simulator 2004 the water was also crappy and on an ATi Radeon 9700 Pro, X850XT PE and MR 9800  all was fine and no crappyness.

I've run both of those games on my 6800GT with no rendering problems.


wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

I have had more than 70 types of Graphics cards and to be honest the 3dfx and ATi's were the best Matrox cards were the best in 3D since that is thier best role.

That's quite a sampling.  I don't suppose you bothered to take comparable screenshots with each of them so that we could analyze them objectively?

I'm assuming you meant 2D when referring to the Matrox cards...


wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

there are enough image quallity tests in this place that Glide games run better on 3dfx cards qua Image quallity the facts are just there

Show me.


wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

I have been confronted by many nvidiots but they just couldn't admit and agree that I was telling them the truth. my experience with NV cards and many others from this place are noit that great thier cards suck imho.

Hmmm... what an objective, logical statement.





No, I'm not trying to pick a fight, despite what it looks like.  I am, however, tired of reading extravagant claims about how one graphics hardware developer totally dominates the others... without any useful evidence.

If you want to convince me, try providing persuasive evidence.  If you don't know how to do that, read the following article:

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2679&p=15

Now use that format (or something very similar) to show me specific differences, and suggest to me why the difference is actually significant rather than a mere point of interest.

do you always ask for eveidence when you don't agree with someone? sorry for telling my experience then it is the truth lol but if you don't believe me you must do what you feel is best ofcourse ... as we Jedi masters never Lie it is forbidden for our belief

Judging from what must be hundreds of IQ investigations and 'optimization' findings I've reviewed :

Currently, Nvidia apparently got its latest 'optimizations' (since a few months) into the OpenGL, hence its fast rendering. As usual, these are hidden until discovered, after which they move on to other hidden optimizations (or keep at it until the uprising becomes too big for their PR to keep down).

Very competitive speed with optimizations turned on, but more or less clearly reduced IQ.
All that translates into hefty performance losses when forced to render 100% IQ.

We all know about the past, blatant cheats, which got NVidia their reputation it still has.

OmegaDriver comes to mind, as NVidia prohibited him to distribute his Driver sets (which revealed how much their Cards were loosing them put on really full IQ). They had to bite the sour apple when the community uproar prove to big to handle for them.
ATI, in turn reacted positive and even took the one or other optimization Option into their own Drivers for the User to enable/disable.

ATI occasionally did comparable, although far not on a such significant scale (so they're not fully innocent either), but when discovered the issue quickly got a sound response and plausible explanation, and the Company chose the cooperative way (Options to enable 100% IQ Rendering in the Driver Controls, aka A.I. and "High Quality").
That made it much more transparent, which lead to ATI's current reputation as unchallenged leader in IQ.

Currently translates in close performance race with Optimizations enabled, clear winner though at 100% rendering (since quite a while).

What it all boils downto is personal flavor (100% IQ desired or 95% being good enough in favour of competitive performance) and whether a User accepts being repeatedly un- or mis-informed concerning actual IQ used in the NVidia Drivers.

Since most optimizations have only mild effects to the casual Gamer, it's more of a philosophy question.

My philisophy is that I expect nothing less than 100% IQ from current generation, 500$ + Hardware.
So far, only ATI remained to deliver exactly that.

For the 95%-people, there's enough left from NVidia to be happy with, with enough suitable options to choose from at fair prices.

Note :
As history teached us, all above holds true until proven otherwise. Who knows, maybe tomorrow someone discovers some hidden ATI optimization.

Another important lesson learned that it is not enough to look at any single review Site to judge the Hardware. It has become mandatory to find out on what actual IQ the Benchmarks/Comparisons were run.

Not few (formerly highly regarded) Articles were rendered useless, as the reviewers did not pay sufficient (or any) attention to fully disable all optimizations and put the Hardware really on the same level.

wrote on 15.03.06 at 21:51:04:

it is well known that the image quallity of ATi and 3dfx cards are better if you think NV has good image quallity ask the others really it isn't that great afterall

Nope. This is OLD news lol ;)
Allmost every single video card dating from 2003-2004 until today use native digital video output. Therefore - the image is digitaly displayed on the monitor. There is absolutely no difference in sharpness. Only difference may be in the colour specter and that can be modified through drivers. Hell, nvidia cought up with ATI even on TV-out! You must give credit for that.

For as long as the older cards are in question - I'd agree that the best 2D display rankings are:

1. Matrox
2. 3dfx
3. ATI
4. S3 (or an Nvidia from ASUS)
5. everything else  integrated/non integrated/nvidia
6. Nvidia (no name model; EAGLE, Xelo usw)

And one more thing: 3dfx had the most transparent driver in all this mess; LOD @ -8 was like "WOW!" and LOD +8 (like +8 dioptry) was like "hey, what the hell is this Nvidia crap doing in my computer?! And moreover, why is it set at highest quality?" ;D

hmm Ati has better 2D than 3dfx as far as I know ATi Video chips are most ly used in High end servers also they are much older also, 3dfx has better image quallity in games for they are built for ATi is much like Matrox 3dfx does have sharper image quallity than NV however.

every card has it's own very special pupose like FalconFly said.

For 2D:

1. Matrox [G400MAXX]
2. Ati [Rage Fury MAXX, Radeon 9700 Pro]
3. 3dfx [Voodoo3, 4 and 5]
4. S3 [Virge 3D, Savage 2000]
5. nVidia [Riva TNT2, GeForce4 Ti4600, GeForce 6800GT]

[This is because that well state the obvious Matrox is King in 2D and they still are, thier cards have 3 sepperate 420Mhz Ramdacs]

For Present 3D :

1. Ati [Rage Fury MAXX, Radeon 9700 Pro]
2. nVidia [Riva TNT2, GeForce4 Ti4600, GeForce 6800GT]
3. Matrox [G400MAXX]
4. S3 [Virge 3D, Savage 2000]
5. 3dfx [Voodoo3, 4 and 5]

[this is because 3dfx cards are missing alot of advanced Pixel and Vertex Shaders.]

For OldSkool:

1. Matrox [G400MAXX]
2. 3dfx [Voodoo3, 4 and 5]
3. Ati [Rage Fury MAXX, Radeon 9700 Pro]
4. nVidia [Riva TNT2, GeForce4 Ti4600, GeForce 6800GT]
5. S3 [Virge 3D, Savage 2000]

[this is because that Matrox had EMBM as a speciallity which made the image quallity insane for it's time 3dfx had FSAA and FXT1 in later cards but still lacked EMBM]

Anyways these are the results of my experiences with these Card brands from plain 2D work with photo's to advanced 3D Flight Simulators to 3D shooters.