Hi Sunking,
I think it just depends on what looks better to you. I have a 19' monitor, but I use the same rez that you do. I think the higher rez looks really good, but text and icons are a little too small for my liking. I also like my refresh rate at 100.
As for the 9700 pro card, I just cranked everything up for best quality, with vsinc on. I'm not currently running it overclocked, though it does crank up well. I'm going to d/l the Catalyst 3 drivers for it soon. You may want to get the tweak utility if you don't have it. There are many tweaks, and I don't know what half of them do. If you don't have it I'll give you the link when I get home.
I did take extra steps for cooling the card. My case has 4 fans sucking in, front and back, and a large blowhole out the top. One of the fans sucking in blows directly over the video card. I put solid copper heatsinks on the ram chips with artic silver adhesive, and they do help.