# AGP Sapphire X800 Pro @ 16 pipelines - corruption



## cybn (Jun 5, 2005)

Hi, I recently bought a modded Sapphire X800 Pro VIVO card from eBay. The previous owner had unlocked all 16 pipelines from the original 12. On receiving the card I used the ATi Tool software to check the number of pipelines available to discover that there are in fact 16. The default core speeds are actually lower than an XT - they are still set at the X800 Pro speeds of 475 for the GPU, and 450 x 2 (900) for the memory. This is fine as my CPU is a 2800 XP Athlon, so the graphics cards is almost too powerful for the rest of the system. Erring on the side of caution, I chose to fit an Arctic Cooling fan anyway, which I recommend as they are very quiet. However, after some five months of solid use the card seems to have developed a strange problem. From bootup onwards, I get columns of corruption on the screen about an inch wide, with a perfect display between them. There is some corruption on the mouse pointer as well. This is regardless of which drive I boot to (I have an SATA and a PATA drive I switch between). And anyway, this corruption starts before Windows loads. I get the same horrible corruption in the BIOS screens. The AGP warning light on the motherboard (Asus A7N8X Deluxe) does not come on. POST goes through as normal. I've tested the monitor on another PC and it is fine. On one occasion I did get the VPU recover message and I did send the information to ATi, but I haven't had a response back. I would like to know if I have an obvious pipeline issue (is there a waty of dropping the pipelines back to 12?) or do I have another type of problem? Curiously, on about a third of occasions, I DON'T get this problem (right now in fact) and I can use the PC as normal. This is why the idea of say a broken pipeline would seem odd, because it does work sometimes. The system is never pushed, it's clean and well looked after, and it has been rebuilt and all the components reseated. I have the latest (stable) drivers for the motherboard etc. No significant changes were made to the system before it began this odd behaviour. Halo has been played on it at 1280 x 1024 for months on end without problems. I briefly tested the card in another PC and it worked fine, although no games were tested on it. Here are the system details for reference:

Asus A7N8X motherboard
Athlon XP 2800 (not overclocked)
2 x Crucial 512MB PC 2700 memory (dual channel)
Maxtor SATA 200GB HDD
Sapphire X800 Pro @ 16 pipelines (AGP)
Audigy 2ZS
300 watt PSU

Any advice or insight would be really appreciated, thanks, cybn.


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## gR3iF (Jun 5, 2005)

hm bios update?
or just corrupt pipes


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## 15th Warlock (Jun 5, 2005)

Doesn't sound as a pipeline problem, as you don't get the infamous checkboard effect.
I see your PSU is rated for 300 watts only, have you tried with a more powerful PSU?


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## watzup_ken (Jun 5, 2005)

That's the prob with enabling pipelines in some instances. Normally, the enabling process is not very dif, but as time goes by, the pipes may fail. Anyway, what's the temp readings like right now? I suspect its a pipeline failure as well.


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## cybn (Jun 5, 2005)

*Temperature readings for X800 Pro @ 16 pipelines*

I've made one change since this problem began (straight after some of the forum replies here). Using the ATi Tool, I have dropped the core and memory speeds down from 475 / 450 to 430 / 400. Given I've just played Halo at 1280 by 1024 for half an hour without artifacts, this would seem to have introduced more stability. The desktop temperature reading for the X800 is 38. However, when I launch Halo it goes right up to  55 plus. That seems high in my opinion. Remember I have the Arctic Cooling unit fitted (the fan is working on it), and the system isn't overloaded in terms of peripherals (no power hungry USB devices attached). What are the safe limits for temperature? Thanks again, cybn.


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## cybn (Jun 5, 2005)

*Reverting back to 12 pipelines - clear instructions*



			
				gR3iF said:
			
		

> hm bios update?
> or just corrupt pipes


Hi, I am considering trying to revert back to 12 pipelines if this is a: feasible, and b: is likely to cure the problem. At the moment the card is OK, however as I have stated in another post, the temperature reading of 55 seems high to me, suggesting that even if I carry on at reduced core and memory speeds, the card may burn out sooner rather than later. With this in mind, can anyone offer me good, clear instructions on reverting back to 12 pipes? I emphasise the word clear because some instructions in other forums are next to useless - 'flash the BIOS' is not really good enough. I believe that the ATi Tool  does not allow any changes to pipelines? Thanks again, cybn.


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