HIS X800 GTO Bios Flash

[tancho.sanke]

Hi! This is my first post on the forums. I'm also not very used to forums either so please excuse me if I have bad forum manners!

Ok my question.

I have this graphics card: HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X800 GTO ICEQII TURBO 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express). Here's a picture of it incase it rings some bells with those who know it visually.

Anyway. I'm an unwealthy student and want to squeeze the best out of it as I can. I have heard that these cards can be flashed to unlock the extra 4 pipelines to take it to 16. I have been reading the guides and kinda know what I need to do but basically I'm a bit scared of doing it. Here are the ATITool things that show if your card is unlockable.

It has the R480 core which is good I think as I am to believe that this might enable me to flash it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios, which I can get from the techPowerUp! site. Am I right in thinking this would be a good idea to try? I have already overclocked the card to: GPU - 500MHz and VRAM - 500MHz and it runs nice and stable with temperatures reaching about 50-52ºC under pretty intensive programs like 3DMark 06 etc and running at about 37ºC when idle and just in Windows etc.

Has anyone had success with flashing this card?... or even worse some bad experiences when trying to flash it?

Is it ok to use ATIWinflash as this does seem to be the easiest way to do it?
If I flash it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios will it change the clock/memory speeds as well? Will this be ok?
Should I flash it with a HIS X800 XT Bios (Which has 16 pipelines I think) and then manually overclock the GPU and memory?
If I do do it the latter way will it make any difference to flashing it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios?

I'm sorry there's loads of questions here so any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for reading/helping!

 

[dolf]

Hi! This is my first post on the forums. I'm also not very used to forums either so please excuse me if I have bad forum manners!

Ok my question.

I have this graphics card: HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X800 GTO ICEQII TURBO 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express). Here's a picture of it incase it rings some bells with those who know it visually.

Anyway. I'm an unwealthy student and want to squeeze the best out of it as I can. I have heard that these cards can be flashed to unlock the extra 4 pipelines to take it to 16. I have been reading the guides and kinda know what I need to do but basically I'm a bit scared of doing it. Here are the ATITool things that show if your card is unlockable.

It has the R480 core which is good I think as I am to believe that this might enable me to flash it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios, which I can get from the techPowerUp! site. Am I right in thinking this would be a good idea to try? I have already overclocked the card to: GPU - 500MHz and VRAM - 500MHz and it runs nice and stable with temperatures reaching about 50-52ºC under pretty intensive programs like 3DMark 06 etc and running at about 37ºC when idle and just in Windows etc.

Has anyone had success with flashing this card?... or even worse some bad experiences when trying to flash it?

Is it ok to use ATIWinflash as this does seem to be the easiest way to do it?
If I flash it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios will it change the clock/memory speeds as well? Will this be ok?
Should I flash it with a HIS X800 XT Bios (Which has 16 pipelines I think) and then manually overclock the GPU and memory?
If I do do it the latter way will it make any difference to flashing it with the HIS X850 XT PE Bios?

I'm sorry there's loads of questions here so any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for reading/helping!

Let start with the pipes:
Congratulations for that great card. It is moddable to 16 pipes but not with winflash.
Yse ATITool to dump your original BIOS and post it here. I will mod it to 16 pipes. After that you can use atiflash with the following command line: atiflash -f -p -newbios 0 biosname.bin (under DOS).

The normal XT (XT PE) BIOS is for dual DVI but I can modd one XT (PE) BIOS for 1xDVI and 1xVGA especially for you.
Here I need answer on the question VIVO or not is your card? And does it have external power connector? (it should). PCB Part Number is also interesting (top ftont side of the PCB - PN xxx-Axxxxx-xx)

 

[tancho.sanke]

Hi, Thanks for replying.

Ok firstly my card isn't VIVO and isn't Dual DVI. On the box it just says 'VGA, TV-Out and DVI-I supported'. On the connections part of the card I just have a small blue connection, a little round black one and a similar looking but bigger cream/white coloured one. I do have a seperate power connector on the card. My part number is: PN 109-A47401-10

Secondly I have dumped the BIOS using ATITool and here is a link to download it: HIS X800 GTO BIOS

If you kindly Mod the BIOS for me to unlock the extra 4 pipelines and then I overclock the GPU to 520MHz and the memory to 540MHz will that mean it is effectiveley a HIS X850 XT PE in every way except it will still have a HIS X800 GTO BIOS?

Thanks for your help!

 

[dolf]

Tomorrow I will do it. But please look at the back of the card for the VIVO chip (big black one and tell me is it there or the place is empty?)

 

[dolf]

Your PCB (PN 109-A47401-10) is for pure X850XT Non VIVO with 1xVGA (15-pin D-Sub), 1xDVI (Sapphire produces such cards). The original X850XT or XT PE BIOS is for dual DVI and with VIVO support. The modded BIOSes in my utility are with disabled VIVO support and changed connectors layout (from dual DVI to 1xVGA / 1xDVI). With the original GTO BIOS and XT (or XT PE) speeds you will have equal results with X850XT (PE) but the card will be recognized like GTO.
The XT (PE) BIOS will give you the Overdrive tab and ability to overclock the card from the drivers. After flashing to XT (PE) you have to reinstall the drivers. With XT or XT PE BIOS (different SubSystem ID) Trixx won't work until the SubSystem ID is differ than in the original BIOS.

My advice is to start with flashing to 16 pipe GTO, to test with ATITool the core and memory maximum and after that to decide which BIOS to flash: X850XT (520/540MHz) or X850XT PE (540/590MHz).

On the back side of the card (right-top corner) on the XT card are present 8 mosfets but on that card probably they are 6 (PCB PN 109-A47401-10). Probably this will be a reason for limited overclock of the core. You can cool them for better overclock or to add the missing elements some day.

Also something important: Does your card have connector for the external power on the PCB?

All the best

 

[tancho.sanke]

Thanks for all the help. What are these MOSFETs and how do I go about cooling them? (I did look up a little bit about them but basically I didn't understand what they were and I'm not sure it was explained in a graphics card context)

I do have an external power connector on the PCB and it is currently connected. If it isn't connected then my PC won't boot. I get a message saying it needs to be connected.

Thanks again.

 

[tancho.sanke]

A little update for anyone who is reading this thread. I have used the flash utility that dolph kindly made for me and have flashed it with a modified X800 GTO BIOS with 16 pipelines. It has worked well! I havn't overclocked past 500/500 yet as I'm going to test for longer to make sure everything is stable first.

What would be the name of the card if it was sold as I have it now with the R480 core at 500/500 with 16 pipelines?

 

[Lekamies]

-

 

[dolf]

Perfect that card is real XT board with external power connector. The chips (mosfets should be 8 - back side top-right corner). You can flash with one of the modded XT (PE) BIOSes without problem and they have to work.

 

[tancho.sanke]

Ok are you saying that I may have 8 MOSFETs but they can only be unlocked using a different BIOS?

BTW here is the utility that Dolph made for me with the instuctions by the man himself:

Click here to download

Flashing instructions:
1. Unpack the image file
2. Burn the image on CD (CD-RW) using "burn image" option
in your burning software. (NERO, Alchohol120%, .....)
3. Boot from the CD (first boot device).
4. Choose the desired flash option and press "enter".
5. Remove the CD and restart - ready

I shall check later to see if I have 6 or 8 MOSFETs.

 

[KennyT772]

mosfets have nothing to do with it. just run the utility to unlock your pipelines

 

[dolf]

Mosfets will have something to do with the max. overclock . Here you are picture of the mosfets (they could be 6 or 8).

 

[tancho.sanke]

Hooray I have 8 MOSFETs. How much of an increase in overclock do you think I will achieve because I have not had much luck so far.

 

[dolf]

See that: http://www.techpowerup.com/articles//overclocking/voltmods/112/3

Lockate the place on the bach of the card and look for 3 resistors (0, 1 and 4) should be present. It corresponds to 1.4V core. If the commbination is differ let me know.
I am not sure which memory your card have but probably it is with 1.6ns - 600MHz (Samsung K4J55323QF-GC16) or it could be 2.0ns (xxxxxxxxxx-GC20) 500MHz. The expected overclock for the core is 500-600MHz. Usually the 1.6ns memory can't even reach the specification of 600MHz (550-580MHz).
The 2.0ns memory is better for overclock and could reach 530-580MHz or even more.

If you want to besure what memory you have it is necessary to gently remove the back cooling plate and to see with your eyes.

What are your max. core/memory overclocks using ATITool?

 

[tancho.sanke]

OK I have to level here... Reading that guide you pasted a link to made me feel out of my depth. At the moment I am not managing to get more than 510/505 which is poor I think considering it has the Samsung 1.6 and an R480. The card it really cool though (temperature wise ). It is crashing while using ATITool (the furry box test thing) when the core is only at like 47ºC. If I flash with a different BIOS will it unlock any of these MOSFETs and allow a better overclock?

Is it possible that I have been unlucky with overclockability or could it be something else with my system? (My system spec is listed pretty thoroughly under the Sytstem Specs thingy to the left)

Thanks for all the help

 

[KennyT772]

ok sory about the mosfet thing i thgouth u were talking about pipelines

 

[SaDrsII]

HIS X800GTO VIVO 256MB PCIe

Hi i have HIS X800GTO VIVO 256MB PCIe, it's external power connector and R480 core, on the back side of the card (right-top corner) on the card are present 8 mosfets,
p\n 102A4748810160714. can it be moded to 16 pipes? in atitool i have
0x554F:R430, Bus:1, Dev:0
0xFFFFBFFF
0xFFFFFF9E

 

[dolf]

Unfortunately no more pipes for that core. (12 is the maximum )

 

[SaDrsII]

Whyyyy?????

 

[dolf]

Whyyyy?????

Because of that:

0xFFFFBFFF
0xFFFFFF9E

The marked in red means 3 pipe quads.

 

[SaDrsII]

))) ok i'll waiting for RV570

 

[KJMach]

Hey i just found this thread through Google. I just inquired a Sapphire X800 GTO Fireblade 256mb. I am wondering if I can flash it to anything faster since it has the R480 core. Tweaking it in anyway would be nice. My max clocks right now are 600/1200, and i really would prefer not to do the pencil mod.

 

[dolf]

If you have seen all the post you should know that before to ask that question you should be ready with your homework - the fuses data : http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=5367

 

[lilpsboi]

Is it possible

I hav the HIS X800GTO IceQ II Turbo VIVO 256MB PCIe, can it be flashed, to unlock all the pipelines.

 

[dolf]

Probably you can but please first post here your fuse values: http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=5367
and also:
1. VIVO or not is your card?
2. Core type?
3. Dual DVI or 1xVGA/1xDVI?