How-to: Pencil mod your HD 3870!

[Deleted member 24505]

It would be stock at 96 i reckon.

By the looks of his pics,he needs to clean all traces of the old volt mod off and start again.It really does look like he bridged something on the resistance connection.The earth is fine onto the pci-e connector.

 

[Dr. Spankenstein]

Any possible way of getting a better picture of the affected area (Man, I do sound like a Dr.!)

Does your camera have a MACRO setting? Do you have access to a flatbed scanner?
It would be of great help to have a focused, high-resolution photo of the card.

 

[KurosakiIchigo]

Any possible way of getting a better picture of the affected area (Man, I do sound like a Dr.!)

Does your camera have a MACRO setting? Do you have access to a flatbed scanner?
It would be of great help to have a focused, high-resolution photo of the card.

Here

i can't get more detailed photos...

 

[Random Murderer]

maybe we're all missing something and the hard mod doesn't really bypass r1222?
get a 2Kohm multiturn pot and put it in place of r1222.
something like this.

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Do you reckon that could be an easier v mod by altering the resistance of r1222?

 

[Deleted member 24505]

I uploaded KurosakiIchigo's pic from the rar,it does not look very healthy.

 

[KurosakiIchigo]

maybe we're all missing something and the hard mod doesn't really bypass r1222?
get a 2Kohm multiturn pot and put it in place of r1222.
something like this.

ok , Stay Tuned for infos

 

[Dr. Spankenstein]

I uploaded KurosakiIchigo's pic from the rar,it does not look very healthy.

THAT is an understatement!

"Why won't it boot?" Are you serious!?! You should be arrested for molesting that poor card!

 

[Random Murderer]

THAT is an understatement!

"Why won't it boot?" Are you serious!?! You should be arrested for molesting that poor card!

woah there, it's ok. his soldering skills may not be on par with yours, dr.
remember, i killed the first card i hard modded.

ichigo, remove the wire and clean up the soldering job a bit. solder wick will really help here.

 

[KurosakiIchigo]

woah there, it's ok. his soldering skills may not be on par with yours, dr.
remember, i killed the first card i hard modded.

ichigo, remove the wire and clean up the soldering job a bit. solder wick will really help here.

this was the first time i sold in my life
i don't understand the last words

 

[Dr. Spankenstein]

@ Random,

Please forgive. That was meant to be more "tongue-in-cheek"...

Should have used the "winky" emoticon. At least I didn't go with "sodomizing" iron!

@KurosakiIchigo
solder wick

The heat of your soldering iron on top of this will remove extra solder.

 

[KurosakiIchigo]

@KurosakiIchigo
solder wick

The heat of your soldering iron on top of this will remove extra solder.

Thx

 

[sleepsus]

although i can't say this for sure, palit has never made a reference 3870. if they have, i've haven't seen it.
in the case that it is not a reference pcb, you'll need to do a bit of detective work(we'll help you) to find out where the measure point is. there is only so much we can figure out without actually having the card in our hands.

I can't seem to find an R1222 marked resistor on the PCB, I do see an SR122 one?

Full backside:

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Can you post as good a close up as you can get of this area please.

 

[Random Murderer]

Can you post as good a close up as you can get of this area please.

my thoughts exactly.

 

[sleepsus]

Can you post as good a close up as you can get of this area please.

Here ya go:

 

[Random Murderer]

sorry for the long delay, i know it's been over two weeks.

is there any way you could get a nice, high res shot of the other side sans the cooler?

 

[crapgame]

thank 2 all for the mod tips.
will do pencil mod soon but want 2 get water cooling 2 my vid card.
what make of waterblock r u guys that r on water using?
thanks
tom

 

[Random Murderer]

thank 2 all for the mod tips.
will do pencil mod soon but want 2 get water cooling 2 my vid card.
what make of waterblock r u guys that r on water using?
thanks
tom

swiftech is good, as well as dangerden and d-tek. if i'm missing one, i'm sure one of the others will pick it up quickly.

 

[Thrackan]

Has anyone tried gophering around with the non-reference Asus 3870?
I have the version with the gold-colored heatsink and I want to find out whether I can pencilmod this baby

 

[Random Murderer]

yes, unfortunately asus uses proprietary chips that we have not been able to figure out yet.

 

[k_9virus]

thanks for the tips guys

 

[ivanka_13]

Hi! any updates on the Palit HD38xx PCB? i have the same gfx card but i can't find the R1222.

 

[Random Murderer]

Hi! any updates on the Palit HD38xx PCB? i have the same gfx card but i can't find the R1222.

if you can post some high res shots of the back of the card and the front without the cooler, i can have a look.

 

[Thrackan]

yes, unfortunately asus uses proprietary chips that we have not been able to figure out yet.

Do you think you could figure stuff out if I make hi-res pictures of the PCB?
I equipped my 3870 with a Zalman VF1000 yesterday, which dramatically dropped load temps by 12C with the fan on low and that's without taking thermal grease cure time into account...

Unfortunately, this didn't seem to improve my card's overclock capabilities. Volt modding must be the answer

Current results (yes, I have a small case, which affects GPU cooling capabilities):
Stock clock: 777/1126 @ 56C load
Stable max: 864/1168 @ 61C load

Previous results (stock cooler):
Stock clock: 777/1126 @ 68C load
Stable max: 864/1126 @ 74C load

I have a gut feeling this can be improved :shadedshu