To recap: *All* 9800 Pro boards made by ATI have a SILVER heatsink. No exceptions. The 9700 Pro and 9800 Pro boards were both RED (AIW and non-AIW). AIW 9800 Pro has only been available for couple of months - if you got the card at Christmas, it was before the 9800 asic was even announced, so it's DEFINITELY a 9700 and would say the same on the box. I know my friend at work did not complete the artwork fr the AIW 9800 Pro box until only a few months ago.

I was away at Macworld in NY, otherwise I would have replied sooner, sorry. The 9800 boards should run hotter - they consume about 75-watts of power. Many people have AIW 9700 Pro boards in Shuttle systems with stock power supplies and two hard drives without 3D problems. I have the same setup but don't play 3D games right now. I'll be swapping it out for an AIW 9800 after I move (already have he card just no time to play with parts until then).

The ASIC has some small optimizations and is running at a higher clock rate (along with the memory) in the 9800 series, 380/340MHz). There were some 9800-specific driver optimizations that helped account for an "up to" 30% improvement over the 9700. I believe those optimizations have now been exposed for the 9700 as well. Both will still provide better quality, more stability and higher speed than a similarly-priced board from the competition.

We just announced (and shipped) the 9800 Pro for the Mac (which I had a tremendous amount to do with). Macworld was super-tiny, but it was a good show for us. We accepted the award for "Most Dangerous Swag of Macworld" with honour (Nerf-type rockets, finger launched). Other vendors did not share our joy.

Bruno