8500/8600/GT/GTS Mod guide...

[cskpeter]

Originally Posted by Solaris17

on the "back of the card" pic you posted on the chip titled RT928 their is a resistor next to it (on the right side) labled "RE8" can you measure that one please?

Hey Solaris,

Please pardon my noob-ness but I have absolutely no experience with the multi meter. Could you please tell me if I am doing it right? Here is what I figured out so far.

8600 was removed from pc and then multi meter was set up.
Black lead to com/ red lead to v,ohm,mA
function switch set to 200 ohms (We are measuring the resistance, so I figured the switch should be set to ohms. Other numbers 2000, 20k, 200k were off the range)
test probe tips touched on both ends of "RE8", I mean literally, not on the board but on those tiny little metallic ends of the chip)
The numbers were not consistent at first but finally reached 02.5 after numerous attempts (I am reading exactly as it shows) but I am not really sure the range/number is correct.

Appreciate your help. Oh, I am right thru the summer semester which gives me the h3ll of lifetime. So please excuse my late responses. Thanks!

[dvijaydev46]

Hi Solaris!

I'm new here. Please help me. I just Bios flashed my xfx 8600 gt with 1.34 volts. I'm now able to cross 780 core and 950 mem. Need to check for stability. Before bios mod mine would not even cross 620/820. Can you please tell me upto how many volts I can set in BIOS without damaging the card?

Thanks

[wolf]

Originally Posted by dvijaydev46

Hi Solaris!

I'm new here. Please help me. I just Bios flashed my xfx 8600 gt with 1.34 volts. I'm now able to cross 780 core and 950 mem. Need to check for stability. Before bios mod mine would not even cross 620/820. Can you please tell me upto how many volts I can set in BIOS without damaging the card?

Thanks

First off Welcome to TPU

Im not sure what happened for you dvijaydev46 however changing the voltage in bios does not actually alter the cards voltage, makes me wonder why they even include the option... i have tried this on at least 4 nvidia 8 series cards, to no avail.

weird that you were able to clock higher....

in the odd case that it has worked for you, id say on air cooling do not exceed 1.5 volts, however still go up in increments, ie 1.35 -1.40 - 1.45 -1.50

Originally Posted by dvijaydev46

Need to check for stability

"ATi tool" artifact scan is great for that, also personally i like to run "Nvidia Geoforms" for at least a half hour to test gfx stability.

also what do you use to overclock, as "rivatuner" is totally the shizz.

i know solaris is THE man, however you may consider me one of his "cronies" as i am able to help you with the bulk of your 8600 questions, after all i have owned 5 of them (still own 3)

[dvijaydev46]

Thanks a lot Wolf. Yes I read all your posts too. You are really great here. I use Rivatuner for ocing and ATIToool to scan for artifacts. I actually scanned for artifacts with atitool. You know what I could OC my 8600 gt to the Rivatuner's limit. It looks stable with ATI tool but not with 3D mark loop. May be I need to find out stable OC for that voltage (1.34) again or increase the voltage to see how it goes. Last night it was 2 when I was doing all that stuff so went to sleep and now at office.

"changing the voltage in bios does not actually alter the cards voltage"

May be you are right, but why then Solaris was talking about BIOS mod here? I don't know but BIOS flashing seems to work for me. I'll get back home and put some screenshots of GPUz.

Thanks again dude.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by dvijaydev46

Thanks a lot Wolf. Yes I read all your posts too. You are really great here. I use Rivatuner for ocing and ATIToool to scan for artifacts. I actually scanned for artifacts with atitool. You know what I could OC my 8600 gt to the Rivatuner's limit. It looks stable with ATI tool but not with 3D mark loop. May be I need to find out stable OC for that voltage (1.34) again or increase the voltage to see how it goes. Last night it was 2 when I was doing all that stuff so went to sleep and now at office.

"changing the voltage in bios does not actually alter the cards voltage"

May be you are right, but why then Solaris was talking about BIOS mod here? I don't know but BIOS flashing seems to work for me. I'll get back home and put some screenshots of GPUz.

Thanks again dude.

not a problem.

i find that flashing new clock speeds on a card will extend rivatuners limit, and even give you more overclocking potential sometimes, however ive never heard of a 140mhz core speed gain, good work

thats usually why we talk about bios mods, once you find a nice stable overclock, you can flash those clock speeds onto the card and never have to run your overclocking software anymore.

also kudos for reading the whole thread before posting not everybody does that first, and you can come across as a dick if you jsut reply "read the whole thread first n00b"

[dvijaydev46]

That's right.

Ok I'll flash new clock speeds tonight and confirm if it extends Rivatuner's limit. One more thing I had to say was that when I tried 3D Mark 06 with it gave around 5800 and the OC result was almost the same. Increased just a few tens. Could it be a processor bottleneck? Mine is 4200 X2 slightly OCed to 2340 from 2200 stock. Will try games and post tonight.

[wolf]

3dmark is very graphics sensititve, if you overclocked the core from 620 to 780, i would expect a gain more noticeable then the score only going up tens. id estimate on your setup you should get at least over 6000 points if stock gets you 58XX

[dvijaydev46]

That's a bad news. I'll check again tonight.
Thanks

[wolf]

some overclocking reults on the 8600GTS i got today

it appears to be an overclocked XFX model with stock clocks of 720/1566/2180

so far on stock cooling shes humming along at 810/1782/2400, and im not sure i want to go further without upgrading the cooling sitcho

[dvijaydev46]

that's cool

[Solaris17]

Originally Posted by wolf

awesome man, legend as always

good to know its essentially the same, especially with a potential voltage increase

ill bung her in and find her max clocks tonight, but if i want to get serious with this card, it'll need moar cooling, as it has the stock jobbie on it atm.

EDIT: ill always have a sweet spot for a good 8600 i think.... so many memories.

ahhh me to honestly since the 8600's release im going to have to admit 8600-GT280 9600 etc included i think in all honesty the 8600GT was THEE best nvidia card of all time....sooooo easily moddable absolutely can it 1ghz adjustments tweaks modifications lap jobs etc easily the most fun card to work on when oc'd and tweked in all honesty i was breathing down the necks of the first gen 8800's when i modded mine...not to mention sli...est scaling card EVER i simply love the card i want to get another i will someday....trophy card imo a hge peice of nvidia history. at any rate memory relapse over...if you lap the cooler wolf and mod the fan to run 100% she actually stays pretty cool. i used 2000grit for like 45min and made it BEAUTIFUL with some mx2 or AS5 mine would load around 55ish including pencil mod. However i have some slightely bad news anything over 900mhz wouldnt cut it. once you get close to 1ghz the cooling requirments become insane. youll probably need to do hat cdall dd an mod like a P3 HS to fit thats honestly the only thing i can see doing it.

Originally Posted by dvijaydev46

Thanks a lot Wolf. Yes I read all your posts too. You are really great here. I use Rivatuner for ocing and ATIToool to scan for artifacts. I actually scanned for artifacts with atitool. You know what I could OC my 8600 gt to the Rivatuner's limit. It looks stable with ATI tool but not with 3D mark loop. May be I need to find out stable OC for that voltage (1.34) again or increase the voltage to see how it goes. Last night it was 2 when I was doing all that stuff so went to sleep and now at office.

"changing the voltage in bios does not actually alter the cards voltage"

May be you are right, but why then Solaris was talking about BIOS mod here? I don't know but BIOS flashing seems to work for me. I'll get back home and put some screenshots of GPUz.

Thanks again dude.

its because in my experiance when you bump he voltage in bios though it actually doesnt increase the voltage it seems to get rid of OCP and OVP problems

Originally Posted by cskpeter

Hey Solaris,

Please pardon my noob-ness but I have absolutely no experience with the multi meter. Could you please tell me if I am doing it right? Here is what I figured out so far.

8600 was removed from pc and then multi meter was set up.
Black lead to com/ red lead to v,ohm,mA
function switch set to 200 ohms (We are measuring the resistance, so I figured the switch should be set to ohms. Other numbers 2000, 20k, 200k were off the range)
test probe tips touched on both ends of "RE8", I mean literally, not on the board but on those tiny little metallic ends of the chip)
The numbers were not consistent at first but finally reached 02.5 after numerous attempts (I am reading exactly as it shows) but I am not really sure the range/number is correct.

Appreciate your help. Oh, I am right thru the summer semester which gives me the h3ll of lifetime. So please excuse my late responses. Thanks!

you have to measure it while its on while the computer is on and the card is plugged in measure the RE8 resistor using the "DC volts" etting make sure that your black (ground) probe is touching yor case....Dont touch the resistor with it...only touch the resistor with the positive end.

[Scrizz]

the 8600gt will remain in my memories aswell.
Freaking sweet overclocker!

[wolf]

+1, best overclocking card i have ever owned. to get from a stock core speed of 540/1190 to 850/1836 - 100% stable is just magical

[lycanwrath]

Originally Posted by lycanwrath

Hi there Solaris,

I have taken new closer pics with better detail on the chips of my card.
Please find below:-

CARD: http://www.imagebam.com/image/4113408508577
CHIP1: http://www.imagebam.com/image/d4243f8826230
CHIP2: http://www.imagebam.com/image/732bdc8826234
CHIP4: http://www.imagebam.com/image/862ffc8826237

Do let me knw if its gud enuf, I also hav a multimeter at hand if needed.

Thx in advance

Are these pics any good Solaris? Am still waiting to volt mod my 8600GT

[wolf]

remember give him time folks, this man has alot of work to do!

[Solaris17]

Originally Posted by lycanwrath

Are these pics any good Solaris? Am still waiting to volt mod my 8600GT

their all kinda too blurry for me...however i was able to read the marks on "chip 1" and your inluck that would be our VGPU chip so can you get me a close up of the surrounding area relatively clear?

[ramo_din2007]

hi Solaris.

now i have a xfx 8600 GT XXX edition. I know it have a G84 chip. i would like flash it to 8600 GTS. now with riva tuner i have core/shader/mem 680/1500/880 with no problems.

you know, only change the label to 8600 GTS.

thanks.

[Solaris17]

so youd just like it to show up as a GTS? would you like the GTS clocks to be flashed as well?

[ramo_din2007]

Originally Posted by Solaris17

so youd just like it to show up as a GTS? would you like the GTS clocks to be flashed as well?

yes, I would like to change the label to 8600 GTS with the clocks that i have now. 680/1500/880 core/sh/mem.

I tried with the bios of the xfx 8600GTS, but didn't work. why??
i used a bios with the same memory, brand and all.

[cskpeter]

Originally Posted by Solaris17

you have to measure it while its on while the computer is on and the card is plugged in measure the RE8 resistor using the "DC volts" etting make sure that your black (ground) probe is touching yor case....Dont touch the resistor with it...only touch the resistor with the positive end.

Thanks for your instruction. I learn a new thing or two everyday.
This time VDC shows 12.15 and I hope that's close to what you expected. Let me know what you think.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by ramo_din2007

yes, I would like to change the label to 8600 GTS with the clocks that i have now. 680/1500/880 core/sh/mem.

I tried with the bios of the xfx 8600GTS, but didn't work. why??
i used a bios with the same memory, brand and all.

you can have it boot and say 8600GTS, but it will not show as a GTS in any other areas. yes they are both G84 chips however the cards themselves are quite different.

GTS cores are binned higher, ie the better ones got to make GTS cards.

GTS cards have considerably better memory chips on them.

GTS cards natively need a 6 pin pci-e power adapter to work which can change the dynamic of the card.

your best bet is to dump the cards current bios, write your new clocks in "680/1500/880" and make a boot signon that says the card is a GTS

[ramo_din2007]

ok, I'll do that.

why it can't mod the bios for only change the model of the vcard? only is a label, what's the problem?

maybe with a editor software in binary code, i don't know.

thanks for all.

[Solaris17]

Originally Posted by ramo_din2007

ok, I'll do that.

why it can't mod the bios for only change the model of the vcard? only is a label, what's the problem?

maybe with a editor software in binary code, i don't know.

thanks for all.

you need to mod all feilds. all 3d settings not just one. uninstall/reinstall the drivers after. it works you just need to trouble shoot calm down

[Wyshniukas]

I have just installed my 8600GT with AC Accelero S2 + Noctua S12-1200RPM. Tried to do the OC on memory first, as a n00b I just used ATITool Find Max Memory & Core button and came to this point http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/knbf8/. I done 3D Mark 06 test and VGA went stable without any artifacts or bigger glitches. How come DDR2 went over 2GHz limit? My 85GT was stuck at 520Mhz?

[Solaris17]

WTF?!!!! hmmmm idk gpu-z fkd up with me once....ill need you to answer a few questions


1. have you volt modded the card? if so what voltage?

2. sometimes the nvidia drivers screw up. Do you have riva tuner insalled?

3. if you have riva tuner installed in the monitoring window does it say thats what the clocks are?

4. how hot is it idle at those speeds?

5. what is your 3dmark score? with those speeds it should be over 75xx