x800pro Vivo PCIe => x800xt-pe PCIe

[ZenZimZaliben]

I have a Sapphire x800pro Vivo PCIe and am unable to unlock the extra 4pl's. I have tried everything suggested on this and many other forums to no avail. If I use an AGP (X800xt-pe) I do get Overdrive and ATITool says the default is 520/560. If I use a PCIe Bios it ends being a x800se in windows, and ATITool says its 500/500 and I lose the Overdrive tab.

I have used every single bios posted on techpowerup.com
I have used the Gigabyte and the <empty> bios trick. No luck.
I checked my GPU and there are no laser cuts.
I have verified that my card will run @ 590/565MHZ for an indefinite amount of time.
I followed W1zzards guide to the "T".
My GPU is Water-cooled, and I have Large Copper Vantec RAMsinks on the RAM.
I checked voltages and its running around 1.4Volts.

Has anyone here successfully modded their PCIe card? With the R423 core...?

I have done the 9800pro to the 9800xt with no problems. So Please help!!!

[singha]

If your core has a laser-cut, you cant softmod 4 pipes.
(Like non vivo AGP X800pro)
You;ll need to do hardware mod.
And i heard that pci-e X800pros(including PRO VIVO) has a laser cut in its core.
Go check it out.

And by the way, your card has an awesome OC limit. Hard to pick one up like that
Mine was a %&$#^$.

[ZenZimZaliben]

I have removed the stock HSF and put on my swiftech gpu waterblock, which is why I can hit high OC's. WHen I did the HSF I verified that my core was NOT laser cut. I used alcohol to clean of all the stock thermal paste and used artic silver. So it was all nice and clean and it was not laser cut....

But thanks for the response.

[ZenZimZaliben]

You mean to tell me that with 79 people viewing this thread none of you have experienced these problems? Am I the only person that own a Sapphire x800pro Vivo PCIe and is unable to unlock the pipes?

[ReconCX]

give em a little time ^_^ most people can't afford a x800 =D

[ZenZimZaliben]

LOL...What an insensitive Clod I am...

I should have just went with the 754 chipset and AGP,,But no, I had to get the DFI-Ultra-DR and a new 3000 Winnie. I figured I could mod the DFI to a SLI later down the road (switching to Nvidia, or hoping for ATI SLI technologies). The Winnie is running at 2.7Ghz, so that was a good buy. The x800pro is OC'ing very well so Im not to upset with it. But if I can get those extra 4 pipes and maintain close to what Im running right now I would be super happy. And saved a ton of money on a machine that is OC'd faster then the fastest retail machines.

I used to run a AMD XP2500 Mobile @ 2.533Ghz,,But man what a difference having the memory controller on chip makes. Sisoft memory bandwidth is off the charts,,gotta love that. At 2.7Ghz my Winnie is barely faster then a Opteron 2.6Ghz. Not complaining. But I want those 4 pipes UNLOCKED.

[ju1es]

I just bought a 3000+ winnie, DFI NF4 ultra -D board and a sapphire x800 pro VIVO PCIe which also runs fine at 590\550. Having the same problem with the pipes. I checked my card out and it does have the laser cut Where did you get your card from? And when did you buy it? It's just I heard the newer ones have the laser cut. I got mine from Overclockers.co.uk. Also how have you got your cpu @ 2.7. Have you unlocked the multiplier? I've got mine @ 2385 with a sync FSB of 265. Standard *9 multiplier.

[ZenZimZaliben]

Well I didn't get new ram. I am still running Corsair XMS 3200LL.

SO to get 2.7GHz outa the winne I had to adjust the memory ratio.

Here is how the memory Ratio works. Because the memory controller is on chip the FSB is independent of the HTT (kinda).

So you default ratio is 200/200 or 1
180/200 = .9
166/200 = .83
150/200 = .75
And so on.

You then take that multiplier and well, multiply it by the HTT. I am runnin 300HTT at a ratio of 140/200 or .7 which gives me a FSB of 210, and the cpu is at 300x9=2700Mhz.

You will need to increase your voltages.

[ju1es]

Yeah I figured it put after I had sent the post Might have to experiment. I always thought it was best to have the mem and cpu buses in syn (1/1)? Have you had good results?

Singha, what hardware mod are you talking about. I'm looking for a mod to get 16 pipes from my 12 pipe laser cut x800 pro VIVO. Anyone know of a hardware mod?

[ZenZimZaliben]

That is where it can get tricky. See if you use the default timings for the mem (depending on the mem) it can cause serious instability. At the default timings for 140/200 (.7) its 2-3-2-6. Far to low for my ram to handle, even though its only running 210. I think using the lower ratios requires the timings to be a little more relaxed.

At 210FSB and 140/200(.7) ratio I am stable @ 2-4-3-7

I know that my sig say 225Mhs, that was at 150/200(.75) and I had to use 2-4-4-8. Running 210 with lower timings actually improved my performance over 225Mhz with the above timings.

Again this only with my RAM if your running PC4200 or above its a different story.

[ZenZimZaliben]

To answer your other questions I got my Video card at NewEgg.

I refuse to accept my video card can not be unlocked. I think I am going to try atiflash instead of flashrom. Good thing I have a extra PCI video card....Good ole Voodoo 3,,that things has lasted forever!
Anyways, I well post if atiflash works. I have heard on other forums to give that a try.

[DeadlyArtist]

Have the same card you have and been trying to get those extra 4 pipes now for some time if you get it let me know I will do the same good luck!

[aL Doom]

Did u ever think about using the search feature? Anyway, it seems to me that most Sapphire ATI x800pro pcie vivo are indeed lasercut and after asking around a bit, only the vivo with 1.6 ns memory are not lasercut. Mine is and I couldn't try to hardmod it since I couldn't find all the proper tools. Anyway I got my card from zipzoomfly.com in oem form. I also assume urs also has 2.0ns memory which makes a xt pe overclock very hard... but seems ur running at these settings ok.

[ju1es]

al Doom, what is required for the hard mod? Are you telling me there is a way around the lasercut?

[ZenZimZaliben]

Well ATIFlash failed.

So I went to Fry's and bought a Conductive Paint Pen for 15.00. Went home, removed my waterblock on the gpu. Cleaned it all up with some alcohol.

Now as you may know the PCIe-VIVO uses the R423 Core, and not the R420. But the lasercut appears in the same location. So I scraped a channel through the PCB board, and applied the conductive paint bridging the two contact points.

Wadda ya know. It worked. 16 Pipes.

Results are from GPU 590, RAM 560, 16Pipes.
AquaMark = 83,500 gained 3,500
3dMark03 = 13,200 gained 1,300

[chr0n1c]

This is awesome! I have the same exact card, pipes are cut also, and mod is a no go. Saw ur post and now I have a conductive pen on it's way.

Care to explain how u scrapped a channel a little more? ;D

[ju1es]

This is great news. Looks like it's time to get in the conductive pen business

Yes please share exactly what you did.

[ZenZimZaliben]

Here is a good image of the lasercut bridges.

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.p...49#post3546849

Basically you mod it just like you would a r420 core. There are instructions on how to do this all over the net. Just google it.

You may also want to check your voltages and make sure they are around 1.4Volts.
If not do the pencil mod.

[Urlyin]

Originally Posted by ZenZimZaliben

Here is a good image of the lasercut bridges.

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.p...49#post3546849

Basically you mod it just like you would a r420 core. There are instructions on how to do this all over the net. Just google it.

You may also want to check your voltages and make sure they are around 1.4Volts.
If not do the pencil mod.

Zen ... if you look at the pic close ... it says TechPower up ... here ... congrats on the extra pipes ....

[ZenZimZaliben]

Not sure what you mean by that last comment. I was totally aware that link pointed to an image contained within this site. For whatever reason people above me couldn't find this information.

But yeah I am pretty happy about the 16pipes.

[chr0n1c]

We found it fine, we were curious exactly what you did by scaping a channel. DOn't see hoe you could misunderstand that.

[ZenZimZaliben]

Ok, well I took an exacto knife with a fat/short razor blade and etched a groove between the 2 contact points with the corner of the blade. Not to deep. But far enough to see some copper at the pin outs. From there I used 2 pieces of scotch tape and made a channel to apply the conductive paint. Let that dry a little, remove the tape and let it finish drying, and it should be good to go.

[chr0n1c]

Ok I see now, I was just filling in the laser cut channel with thermal paste and then going accross that and connecting the two contacts. but your saying we should gouge out that space a little till we see copper and then use the concutive pen. Just want to really test my understanding.

O <- my contacts
|
- < --- is my laser cut
|
O

Scrape right across them till i see copper then use the paint?

[ZenZimZaliben]

Exactly. Clear the contact points to the copper and scrape a thin channel to the center piece on both contacts. Tape it up, and apply conductive paint.

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[Ford Freak]

I have the pro and modded it without any problem. I followed directions from another site since I heard you had to use the Gigabyte bios to get the 16p. After flashing to the xt(non pe), atitool said 8p. I was like wtf. I guess it had something to do with it being the agp bios. I then flashed using the pci-e xt bios and it worked fine. I want to flash to xt pe but I can't find a pci-e version.