Considering Sapphire are owned by PC Partner, one of the few companies contracted to produce ATI's OEM boards, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that they would just trot out the reference designs and sell them in retail. However, so far it appears that Sapphire have been one of the more experimental of the ATI board vendors with their own board design for the 9700 series and their range passively cooled 'Ultimate' boards. Their willingness for variation extends to the new line of 9600 product as well.