Sapphire X800 GTO AGP pipe unlock

[matesusa]

The Retail one (about 10 bucks more), is actually the one with the smaller heatsink and fan. However, there is a chance that it will already be unlocked to 16 pipes when you get it.

I had been wondering about this, and just recieved the retail one myself. AtiTool was happy to tell me that I am one of the lucky AGP owners to get all 16 pipes already unlocked. I'll post some score differences from my 9800 pro later if anyone is curious

Now I just need to pray that it maintains a reasonable temperature...

Sounds like we're on the same boat. Mine came unlocked already as well.

What temps are you getting? Mine are hitting 90 on full load

It kinda gets me mad that it basically forces me to immediately buy an aftermarket cooler or else risk lowering my card life expectancy right out of the box

Oh well at least my new cooler will hopefully last a long time and will fit my next card in the future as well.

 

[Jonwink]

Well I got my new Arctic cooler today and the fan spun up just fine so apparently the fan was defective on the stock unit. Thanks to everyone who gave me tips earlier.
Now the bad news... the new cooler not only blocks two of my RAM slots (which is not a problem since the other two have 1 GB sticks) but it also blocks off the locked SATA connections for my hard drive. Lucky for me this Epox 9nda3+ has two additional SATA ports but they are unlocked. Unless I am mistaken, I am not going to be able to overclock the system with the hard drive hooked into an unlocked SATA port. Guess I will have to buy the zalman cooler sometime to replace the Arctic unit. Running at stock settings I am looking at temps of around 36 at idle and 55 at load. When the old fan went out, ATI tool showed my GPU temp at..... wait for it... 123!!!! I can't believe the card didn't fry itself but it seems to have survived intact <crosses fingers>.
Thanks again for all the help and great advice.

 

[simari]

Hi folks.

Am looking to open up my Sapphire x800GTO to 16 pipes. Have attached BUS info from atitool and I suspect that the extra 4 pipes can be opened.

Unfortunately, I cannot use the Image utility, since my cd/dvd drive is being replaced. Was wondering if I could get help from someone to:

1. Confirm that the extra 4 pipes can be unlocked
2. Modify my bios, so that I can try the floppy startup method

Many thanks in advance

 

[simari]

ignore the previous post !

Looked through several posts on this board and successfully unlocked the extra pipes.

The info on these boards is incredibly valuable

 

[x800professor]

Just wanted to add something, as I was a little confused on the Sapphire X800 GTOs that newegg is selling.

There are actually two versions of the exact same card for sale. The OEM one (which is out of stock), is the one with the larger fan and heatsink, and is set at 12 pipes when you get it.

The Retail one (about 10 bucks more), is actually the one with the smaller heatsink and fan. However, there is a chance that it will already be unlocked to 16 pipes when you get it.

They must have sent me a different retail version the first time because it was EXACTLY like the OEM version I have now...aside from the not working and all.

 

[Rhayven44]

Sounds like we're on the same boat. Mine came unlocked already as well.

What temps are you getting? Mine are hitting 90 on full load

It kinda gets me mad that it basically forces me to immediately buy an aftermarket cooler or else risk lowering my card life expectancy right out of the box

Oh well at least my new cooler will hopefully last a long time and will fit my next card in the future as well.

Depends on your definition of full load When running the 3D View on ATI tool, its kind of topping off around 85 C. We both know that few programs will use that much full load, so its pretty much the upper limit. On WoW, I am getting about 58 C max while running that game (during a full raid, full settings).

Here's the reference scores for the pre-unlocked retail Sapphire x800 GTO from Newegg, if anyone is curious:

Before
9800 pro - 03 mark - 5784
05 mark - 2781

After
x800 GTO (16 pipes) - 03 mark - 9372
05 mark - 4872

Just kind of curious...are the ones unlocking the 16 pipes on their's (the OEM ones), getting about the same numbers w/o overclocking?

 

[GotMilk]

Nub needs backup

Hey Dolf if ur still around I'd like you to have a look at my stuff I really don't know much about those bios flash things but everyone seems to enjoy the thing so here I have the R430 too but my atitools reading are slightely different from anyone that posted so here is my bio dumb file and my a jpg from my atitools results. I thank u soooo much if u can help Here is my email if u want to sent ur utilities to me volcom_jord@hotmail.com

 

[Ramirez]

Another Person in NEED!!

Sounds like everyone is having some pretty awesome results....BIG SHOUT OUT TO Dolf and all the others who have helped out the rest of us along the way and to those who continue to help. I just ordered this card from Newegg so I expect it in a few days. I believe I have downloaded most of the tools required (atitool, atiflash utiltity 3.15, Dolf's original BIOS16 file(floppy bootable disk), and the ISO image to make the CD Boot file) to flash this card. I never made a ISO file...the program I was going to use was either NERO Express, Easy CD/DVD CREATOR, or PowerISO. Will one of these programs be sufficient to burn the ISO?
I saw a ISO.EXE in one of the other threads and have also downloaded that one. I cannot find the RaBit 1.7 download so as too make sure that my vid card BIOS meets the flashing criteria. Can someone direct me to this download I cannot locate it on the web. Man I hope I don't screw this up!!!

Congrats to all that succeeded before me...and BIG thanks to Dolf who got this ball rolling!!

Respectfully,

Ramirez

 

[error_f0rce]

I cannot find the RaBit 1.7 download so as too make sure that my vid card BIOS meets the flashing criteria. Can someone direct me to this download I cannot locate it on the web.

http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/search.php?q=rabit

 

[Ramirez]

http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/search.php?q=rabit

Thanks ErrorFrorce for hooking me up to the link, I really do appreciate it.

One more question...this RAR (Rabit 1.7) file...do I need to burn it to disc/floppy then install it or do I need to put in manually into a folder or registry??

Respectfully,

Ramirez

 

[Ramirez]

Burning the ISO

gotta right click it and open with. . . (whatever burner program u use) for me i use nero, so after u right click it and use the, (open with) command, it should go right into the burner program and just select burn speed and hit burn. (if this dont work, and it deff should)

load up your burner software, hit file-->load, and select that .iso image (wherever you extracted the zip) and burn

if ya cant get it to work still, i dunno, thats as easy as i can explain how to burn an .iso file.

I pretty much did something to this effect using PowerISO...opened the Folder with the ISO the files showed in the right hand side of PowerISO screen and I hit burn. Burn read successful and in the bottom left hand corner it read "bootable disk". However when I went to check the disk no files appeared was this normal since it is a bootable disk???
Please any help would be appreciated since I am not very experienced at this and I really would like it to go well the first time.

 

[error_f0rce]

I pretty much did something to this effect using PowerISO...opened the Folder with the ISO the files showed in the right hand side of PowerISO screen and I hit burn. Burn read successful and in the bottom left hand corner it read "bootable disk". However when I went to check the disk no files appeared was this normal since it is a bootable disk???
Please any help would be appreciated since I am not very experienced at this and I really would like it to go well the first time.

Ok, I've never tried the CD method, but if you can't figure that one out, just use the floppy. Right click on the floppy, select "format" and "quick erase"... wait... then right click and select "make bootable disk".... wait... then drop in atiflash, your new bios file, your old bios file and boot from the disk. make sure to use this command from DOS: atiflash -newbios -p -f 0 newbios16.bin
(Obviously newbios16.bin is just an example, use the actual name of the new bios you are trying to flash)
pretty simple, let us know how it goes.

 

[Ramirez]

Hey ErrorForce,

Thanks a bunch...I figured I should go the the route I was familiar with. The method seemed pretty similar to flashing a motherboard. I will follow this method. Thanks again for your assistance Error and I will follow up after the flash. Good thing I asked about this...because I did make a floppydisk but I did not load the old bios along with the new one. Thanks again Error I really do appreciate it. Hey one other thing..what about the Rabit 1.7 file? When I downloaded them they came up as RAR files do I need to manually put those file somewhere into my registry key or folder?

Respectully,

Ramirez

 

[error_f0rce]

Hey ErrorForce,

Thanks a bunch...I figured I should go the the route I was familiar with. The method seemed pretty similar to flashing a motherboard. I will follow this method. Thanks again for your assistance Error and I will follow up after the flash. Good thing I asked about this...because I did make a floppydisk but I did not load the old bios along with the new one. Thanks again Error I really do appreciate it. Hey one other thing..what about the Rabit 1.7 file? When I downloaded them they came up as RAR files do I need to manually put those file somewhere into my registry key or folder?

Respectully,

Ramirez

Hey no problem man, glad to help.

Ok, when you downloaded all that stuff it was kinda overkill. All you need is one method to flash your bios, although there are two methods you could use.
1.) burn dolf's ISO image to cd and boot from that
2.) floppy method with dolf's bios16 file

Now, RaBit is just for if you yourself are going to modify your own bios, which from what I gather, you don't need to do because you have dolf's pre-modded bios16.bin file. So don't need to use that as long as you have dolf's file. starting to make more sense?

Bottom line, all you need is one method & don't worry about RaBit.
Also, if you are going to use floppy method, you don't need your old bios on the disk, but it's a darn good idea in case you have to flash back for some reason. Just make sure to name the old bios something so you wont' get the two confused like old12bios.bin or some such name. (if you don't already know, use ATiTool to dump your old bios into a .bin file)

Good luck and please feel free to ask more questions!!

 

[Ramirez]

Heheheheheh.....Thanks Error for putting everything down in more simpler terms. I am still very "noobish" at some of this. Ok...I will dump the Rabit files. Yeah I know I pretty much went overkill with the downloads just wanted to make sure I had every tool under my belt just in case I needed something. Gonna go the floppy method since I am familiar with flashing mobo's and this seems like more familiar territory. You are right, I will make another disc though with the old bios so if things go awry I won't be S.O.L. Thanks again Error for all your assistance and step by steps. I feel more at ease now...don't want to just spend money and then crap up a product. Could you double check back in a few days.. gonna post The ATItool image of my card..just would like someone to verify the fuses and such.

Respectfully,

Ramirez

 

[x800professor]

Click

For some reason my modded X800 was clicking yesterday. I opened Titan Quest and every time it made a strange click, the game would freeze. I've been working on computers since the Pentium II was amazingly fast and I have never had a GPU click and temporarily freeze the game. Anyone have any ideas?

Oh, by the way, I stuck a case fan on top of my card and directly in front of my CPU and now my card goes down below 38 degrees and never goes beyond 50s overclocked to 430x530 with the stock heatsink and fan! Hmm...I guess I can wait for the zalman. Well, I still want it because thing is noisy.

 

[Ramirez]

Posting Screenshot

Hello,

I recently purchased a retail version of the Sapphire X800GTO 256mb AGP card and was planning on unlocking the extra pipes until I installed the ATITool and saw that the card was reading 16 pipes open already. It sounds like some people have gotten lucky with this card purchasing it from Newegg. I was hoping to post some screenshots of the ATITool, Catalyst Contol Center, and some Memory pics for review but cannot figure out how to capture these and post. Could someone please add a helping hand, I would really appreciate any assistance. Plus another poster recommended a Arctic Cooler heatsink, however the Zalman VF-700 has come up more and more in post about being more of a solid heatsink for this model of card. Any opinion is welcomed.

Respectfully,

Ramirez

 

[stevorob]

I like my ATI Silencer because of the fact that it vents air out of the back of the case... Since I have a Dell Dimension 8300, the case has poor airflow, and my temps would get out of hand on the stock cooler (90C+). The highest I have seen my temps now is 56C (ATI Tool artifact scan)

The zalman is also a good cooler, but it doesn't vent out of the case. That's why I didn't get one.

 

[x800professor]

I like my ATI Silencer because of the fact that it vents air out of the back of the case... Since I have a Dell Dimension 8300, the case has poor airflow, and my temps would get out of hand on the stock cooler (90C+). The highest I have seen my temps now is 56C (ATI Tool artifact scan)

The zalman is also a good cooler, but it doesn't vent out of the case. That's why I didn't get one.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835186129

Is that the one you have?

 

[stevorob]

Yeah. I love it.

 

[Azhrei]

Hi all,

I've just bought a Sapphire Radeon X800 GTO board from Komplett.ie. As you can see from the screenshots of my ATi Tool results below, it has an R480 chip, with 12 pipelines enabled. I'm wary of flashing my bios right now because of the horror stories and despite the greater number of successes, I remain so because I just don't want to damage my new card!

What I'd like to know is, I think you guys can tell if my card can be unlocked by looking at my ATi Tool results - and if it can be, then please let me know which bios I should use to unlock it.

Thanks muchly ^_^

 

[15th Warlock]

^^ Yes, it can be unlocked according to the fuses data you get.

Good luck with your card

 

[Azhrei]

Thanks for your reply! ^_^

Which bios should I use to unlock it? I want to make sure I have the right one.

 

[Azhrei]

I downloaded the latest version of ATIFlash as I have no idea how to use the Flashrom utility, and when I loaded the bios that Stevorob listed (http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=10955&page=45), this came up -

When I click on Program, it says "P/N mismatch"

I don't want to move any further until I know I have the correct bios image. Can someone help me?

 

[15th Warlock]

Use the "bios16" dolf file posted here:

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=10955&page=2

Personally I prefer using a floppy boot disk and DOS command lines to perform any BIOS flash procedure, create a boot disk, then copy the "recommended" version of Atiflash found in the BIOS collection page, and the bios16 file to the floppy, then use the following command upon rebooting:

atiflash -newbios -f -p 0 biosname.bin

I used that procedure and didn't have any problem with my flash, too bad my card was defective, hope everything goes well with your card, good luck