X800 GTO² to X850 XT BIOS Mod

[Cally]

this just in: the agp version of the gto2 doesn't exist. sapphire screwed up, and excaliberpc called to tell me about it and cancel my order. it was gonna be such a good deal, too.

Looks like Wizzard was right again. He said they didn't exist in spite of all the post that they did.

 

[Unregistered]

I mean http://www.atacom.com/program/print_...A6&USER_ID=www has it for $229 wich is the cheapestplace i found

 

[XeoNoX]

grrr. let me try this again, lol.


http://www.atacom.com/program/print...RCH_ALL&Item_code=VIDR_ATIX_PB_A6&USER_ID=www has it for $229, cheapest place i found!!!

 

[Dr.D]

I need a place that has it for $200 or so. I WOULD order it from pagecomputers but a glance at resellerratings and thats out of the question

http://www.resellerratings.com/seller1830-p1-s4-d1.html#reviews
Ugh

 

[DanishDevil]

Well GOOD LUCK Dr.D my friend. That's the best place to get it unless you can come up with about $300. You're not gonna want to return the card (obviously we wouldn't be mindlessly babbling about it since the card has essentially become a part of us, a parasite if you will, expressing itself through its free four pipelines and extreme ocing) So hey! Don't worry about the reviews.

 

[Dr.D]

Actally I am gonna try this place:
http://www.atacom.com/program/print...RCH_ALL&Item_code=VIDR_ATIX_PB_A6&USER_ID=www

If I get screwed I am gonna be pissed

Edit: Anyone know what lite retail has in it?

 

[t^3]

I took the plunge and ordered from Page Computers on 9/29 when they still had it for $195 + $8 shipping. Arrived today via UPS Ground, but it only showed up as being shipped today on Page's order status page. Never received any emails or tracking numbers. I had to contact them via their live support page last Thursday to find out that it had actually shipped last Monday. There was no packing slip inside, and someone had actually ripped out the return address on the shipping label! I would not buy from them again unless I was really desperate.

Now, regarding the card, it was the lite retail version, so it came in a plain box with some cables and adapters. I flashed the card successfully, and then I tried flashing a X850 XT BIOS. Turns out that might have killed the on-card fan. I remember that the fan (or at least one of my fans) was running really loud, then quit all of a sudden, and after a few seconds, the screen locked up. I immediately forced a shut down, and I smelled something was burnt. Great. When I turned on the computer again, the fan would spin up really fast and then quit. I tried flashing it back to the modified GTO2 16p BIOS, and the same thing happened. Then I tried flashing it back to my original BIOS, and the same thing happened. I restarted again, and now the fan is completely dead. Does anybody have any suggestions? Thanks in advance! For now, I'm back to using my X800 Pro.

 

[Dr.D]

I took the plunge and ordered from Page Computers on 9/29 when they still had it for $195 + $8 shipping. Arrived today via UPS Ground, but it only showed up as being shipped today on Page's order status page. Never received any emails or tracking numbers. I had to contact them via their live support page last Thursday to find out that it had actually shipped last Monday. There was no packing slip inside, and someone had actually ripped out the return address on the shipping label! I would not buy from them again unless I was really desperate.

Now, regarding the card, it was the lite retail version, so it came in a plain box with some cables and adapters. I flashed the card successfully, and then I tried flashing a X850 XT BIOS. Turns out that might have killed the on-card fan. I remember that the fan (or at least one of my fans) was running really loud, then quit all of a sudden, and after a few seconds, the screen locked up. I immediately forced a shut down, and I smelled something was burnt. Great. When I turned on the computer again, the fan would spin up really fast and then quit. I tried flashing it back to the modified GTO2 16p BIOS, and the same thing happened. Then I tried flashing it back to my original BIOS, and the same thing happened. I restarted again, and now the fan is completely dead. Does anybody have any suggestions? Thanks in advance! For now, I'm back to using my X800 Pro.

Glad to see you got it from PageComputers.

Well the cards fan might be defective. Normally I would say send it back but because its PageComputers I would just get a Ati Silencer 5 (Rev 2). Not only will it keep it just as cool as the stock fan but with the silencer you can overclock alot higher.

 

[t^3]

I actually have a Zalman VF700-Cu on my X800 Pro, and it works great. I might just end up switching it over and getting some RAM heatsinks. Then hopefully I can sell the Pro for a decent amount.

Edit: Is there any way I could take out the RAM heatsinks that are stuck on by thermal adhesive?

 

[Dr.D]

I have a question myself, how do I check card temprature?

And whats Retai Lite?

 

[t^3]

I have a question myself, how do I check card temprature?

And whats Retai Lite?

There are various programs that will check the temp. I use ATITool - it's probably the most popular overclocking program.

The full retail version includes the nice retail box with some games included, while the lite version doesn't have these. The other stuff I got is listed below:

-Male-male yellow composite video cable
-Male-male S-video cable
-Male S-video/female component video adapter
-Male S-video/female composite video adapter
-DVI/VGA adapter
-4-pin Molex to PCI-E power connector adapter (needed if your power supply doesn't include a PCI-E power connector)
-Catalyst 5.8 driver CD with Sapphire Trixx overclocking utility

Just had to include the genders to avoid any confusion.

 

[DanishDevil]

OK. Here's the answers to all your questions.

Reguarding the fan on the X800GTO2:

The fan is controlled by the card's BIOS and allows you to set your own fan percentages for 10 (I think it's 10) different variables (Ex. 40C=45% Fan Speed, 50C=65% Fan Speed, etc.) as shown here:

The computer boots for 2 seconds at 100% fan speed on the card's fan. The fan at 100% is the loudest fan in my case (next loudest is my Zalman 7000Cu soon to be replaced by my CNPD9500LED in the mail). Do not worry about the change of fan speed. If you smelled burning though, you may want to check the fan out. Play with the fan speeds and unplug any loud fans you have in your case as long as your temps will be OK.

In order to check card temps, download ATITool. It will give you readouts of GPU Core Temp and Ambient Temp (does anyone know where that thermal sensor actually is ). The beta will also give you statistical information in the form of a graph and if you want it to, write it to a file.

And thanks t^3 for answering the question on Retail Lite

Hope this answers all your questions!

 

[Unregistered]

mongoled

Asking alot, but is it possible someone registered here to make a list at start of this thread (need mod to do this) documenting the success/failures of the GTO/GTO(2) cards?

 

[t^3]

Just an update on my fan issue - I plugged in a different fan momentarily and it works. I'm thinking that the X850 XT (not sure about XT PE) might control the fan at different voltages. I found a thread where someone also flashed a Sapphire X850 XT BIOS and the fan also died. I even used RaBiT to turn off the VIVO on the XT BIOS. So I'd recommend that everyone DO NOT flash a X850 BIOS until we get to the bottom of this. However, I've noticed hubgods flashed a X850 XT BIOS several pages back on this thread and apparently hasn't complained.

Still, there is no benefit in having a X850 BIOS. Just use RaBiT 1.7 (can find on Google) to change the clocks permanently in the modded GTO2 BIOS, and you'll get a X850 XT, XT PE, or whatever in disguise as a "X800/X850 series" card. Or, to be even safer, just stick with ATITool.

 

[Dr.D]

I just dont know how to get to that screen:shadedshu

 

[HousERaT]

I just dont know how to get to that screen:shadedshu

hit the button down in the bottom right corner that says settings.....

 

[DanishDevil]

Start ATiTool. Click settings in the bottom right corner. Scroll through the drop-down menu until you get to "Fan Control."

 

[Unregistered]

Goof off, or goof off two :|

 

[Trevor]

^^That was me.

 

[blackadder]

x800 gto2 results

Purchased x800 gto2 from Newegg for $203.
Purchased a Zalman VF7000-Cu Vga fan for $28

Unlocked pipes using the atiflash to 850 then flash back to 800. Showed 12pipes in Atitool 0.25 beta8 -> currently shows 16pipes.

Used stock fan - ran the max core.
Core hit 513, screen blanked and system froze.
ran max memory - got to about 590 before stopped it.
ran overclocked at 500 and 580 fine (temps 65c)

default core and memory = 3dmark05 4994 (not overclocked)
idle temps = 56c

Next. Changed to Zalman VF700-Cu
Core hit 522, screen blanked and system froze.
(have not run overclocked for long period - wanted to give time for heatsinks and arctic silver 5 to settle in)

default core and memory = 3dmark 5000 (not overclocked)

Temperatures:
Stock fan - Idle = 45c
Stock fan - Load = 56c
Stock fan - Load overclocked 500/580 = 65c

Zalman VF700 - Idle(normal 12v mode) = 34c
Zalman VF700 - Load(normal 12v mode) = 50c
Zalman VF700 - Load overclocked = not tested yet but expect @60 since thats what it reached when doing find max core.

Installing the Zalman - I used Isopropyl Alcohol (>99.8+%) to clean memory to ensure heatsinks would stick. Also cleaned r480 chip and used arctic silver 5 before mounting heatsink. Initially when i first powered up unit - temps of gpu jumped all over the place and scared the hell out of me jumping from 45c to 80c - realized it was probably the chip bonding with the fan....

I have a friend running the same card purchased from Newegg on same day. His card reached 610core and 690memory before crapping out. His system recovered from it and he clocks it at 540/590 when playing games. He is using stock fan. His only complaint has been noise of stock fan, but isnt going to touch it because his performance is fine. Compared to my setup - he is running a 775 intel p4 3ghz on a newer intel board 995chipset i think, while mine is an older hp compaq dc 7100. He is going to run my card on his machine to see if we can get performance out of it. I will also check on bios flash for my system and check other things, since the system does NOT recover. OOOH and i think he is running atitool 0.25 beta 5 - i will confirm that with him.

 

[blackadder]

Mine went up to about 530/600 with the stock cooling. Ironically my clocks didn't go much higher with my silencer but the temps went down. I think I have a weak card. I've seen other people with much higher clocks still on stock cooling.

Sounds like we have similiar cards - weak ones - ill let you know if system makes a difference.

 

[Unregistered]

So what is the best way to flash this card. The main article says to use flashrom. On this forum people use ATI flash... Can someone please tell me how it is done...please.
Will be my first flash so im a bit nervous.
Getting mine tomorrow (from Slovenia) for 240Euros.
Thanks for help.

 

[blackadder]

The commands for flashing to enable pipelines using atiflash 3.09 are as follows (where x800gto.bin is the name you save your current bios as and x850xt.bin is the bios you are flashing to):

atiflash -s 0 x800gto.bin
atiflash -f -p 0 x850xt.bin -newbios
atiflash -f -p 0 x800gto.bin

The -newbios option will not work with atiflash versions below 3.x and will not work with any version of flashrom.

Note: In Windows make sure you give the bios file a name 8 characters or shorter before the .bin or .rom, so that you can use it properly in DOS.

If your pixel pipelines are unlockable with only flashing the bios, that will do it. When using another card's bios, you risk having it not work because of an incompatible bios, but this way you still use your same bios, except with 16 pipelines enabled. If it is successful at unlocking them, the only thing that could go wrong is that the unlocked pipelines are defective. BTW, this is equivalent to using the modified flashrom to flash the bios then using the normal flashrom program to flash back your original bios, but it only requires one program rather than two.

As far as I know, the size of the bios shouldn't really matter as long as it matches the type of gpu you have and the memory the card has.

I used this method - bumping this so people can see.

 

[Dr.D]

I purchased form ATACOM and this is the email I got:

Dear Valued Customer:



Thank you for shopping at ATACOM. We are sorry to let you know that we were unable to complete your order #(My Number) because your shipping address is not listed as an authorized address match to your credit card records. Please contact the card issuer and make sure the deliver address is on file in order to processing the order. Once you have done that, please give us a call or send us an email to notify your status.


Thank you for your attention to this matter.

ATACOM Inc.
www.atacom.com
4725 Hannover Place, Fremont, CA 94538
TEL 877-4282266 / 877-2282266
FAX 510-9331201

Apart from having bad grammer they have it all wrong. I called my credit card company and they said they have never heard of such a thing. So I called ATACOM and we went around in circles a few times and eventally decied to have it shipped to my billing address which is going to be another big hassle.

What the hell ATACOM?

 

[DanishDevil]

Iunno? GL gettin the card though. I've been playing the F.E.A.R. Multiplayer Demo with it. OH MY GOD. It is the new friggin CS man I swear. And with this card, I'm running smooth as silk