far cry is a ram eater so maybe try another 512mb of ram first as really your card should handle the game
as for o/cing ive used radlinker which is easy to use and quite good and also i have used rage3dtweak
http://www.rage3d.com/index.php?node=r3dtweak&37488 this was quite good as well
don't the 9600xt's have the overdrive o/c tool ?
as for the 9800 pro get one m8 !!! for the £40 or £50 extra you would pay on top of your card (could sell your card in the forums for £90) you will love the difference
the far cry demo struggles on my pc (even with catds 4.4) its got me worried about my set-up as well lol