9700 Has 8X Issue AND ATI FIX

[Prometheus]

Spent over an hour with ATI Customer Service Canada and more important, the Engineering Dept. The subject: Our testing shows the Radeon 9700 will NOT work at all on the Asus P4S8X (SiS648), Gigabyte 7VAXP (KT400/8235), and VIA P4PB (P4X400/8235) which are the only 8x AGP boards on the market. Customer Service was not completely aware of this, but Engineering is.

According to ATI, they are now receiving and testing these 8X AGP boards. They are ALSO finding the 9700 does not work at all or works intermittently at best on these boards. Engineering indicated most of the boards already shipped have this problem.

Solution: A new BIOS and some board revisions are now available that fix this problem. Call ATI Customer Service for help with the issue. At present, they will ship a replacement board that WILL work in SiS and VIA 8X, but they are also considering a BIOS flash solution for problem boards.

Customer Service and Engineering deserve a 10-1/2 for their wonderful handling of this issue. They are very concerned that it be corrected quickly. They also shared that most of their 8X validation testing was done with Intel's unreleased 8X chipset and that they are just now receiving shipping versions of the SiS and VIA 8X chipsets.

[MaNiaC]

Originally posted by Prometheus
[snip]
They also shared that most of their 8X validation testing was done with Intel's unreleased 8X chipset and that they are just now receiving shipping versions of the SiS and VIA 8X chipsets.

hmm.. bit contradictory to the statement in another thread saying it HAD been tested and worked with all chipsets, but very reassuring to hear the good response from ATI support. also nice to hear you were directed to the right people to discuss this issue with you.

If only all CS depts were so helpful..

[X-Reaper]

To save time, a bios flash would be the best soultion. I hope ATi goes this route instead just having to RMA the board for a new one. Saves time & frustration.

This thread should be sticky.

[Lethal Dose]

Well it looks like I will be on the phone with ATI this afternoon.

[Yeuemmaimai]

Hey man,


I am getting one of those things and a future SiS AGP 8X board for my Athlon later and damn if I have to swap a card

[T2k]

Yeah, sounds good.
The only question is the timeframe: ATI has to resolve this problem within the next weeks rather days. Yeah, I know, very-very few people got his new AGP v3.0-mobo but when the time goes on, this thing will turn to very bad PR quickly.
On the other hand: if they will fix it within a few days, that would make another very good public PR-point...

Yes, definitely. Mods, pls, stick it!

[T2k]

Originally posted by Lethal Dose
Well it looks like I will be on the phone with ATI this afternoon.

How is this going in your rig? Working fine?

[Lethal Dose]

Man, I get constant lock-ups, mysterious crashes, and reboots. Just dropped my GeForce 3 in the system and boom I'm running just fine again. Put the Radeon in my other computer 1.4 GHz Athlon/KG-7 Mobo and it works like a champ. Damn AGP 8x!!!!!!!!!!!

[Glythic]

well first time i called tech support at ati they didnt know anything about the p4pb400 board from via - didnt even know via made thier own boards but later today i will contact them again and force the issue to see how they are going to fix my board.

i need to get the fix and new board if that is what is needed by my 30 day return time so i can be sure it works or they have to garantee my being able to return for full refund.

i'll post later and tell you what they say to me.

[T2k]

Originally posted by Lethal Dose
Man, I get constant lock-ups, mysterious crashes, and reboots. Just dropped my GeForce 3 in the system and boom I'm running just fine again. Put the Radeon in my other computer 1.4 GHz Athlon/KG-7 Mobo and it works like a champ. Damn AGP 8x!!!!!!!!!!!

That's very-very embarassing, I know.

But it's brand new... I'm sure ATI will release a fix within a week. (Hallo, ATI! Call back everybody from holiday, work on the weekend!)

They should have to...

[Xp2000]

There is nothing really embarassing about it. 8x agp is new and therefore its going to take some time to get the issues worked out. In almost all cases in new technology there are setbacks. Ati likely should have tested better but if they had of done that you all wouldnt have your video card and then would be mad at them for that also. The only question I have about this is does the card work fine under 4x? If it does I dont have a problem dropping down to 4x until Ati comes out with a correction for this issue. There isnt much performance gain in 8x agp at this time anyways

[Diseaseboy]

What about the Sapphire OEM boards? Who is going to replace them? I just ordered a Asus A7V8X and a Sapphire OEM Radeon 9700 Pro from Newegg. I hope this gets solved soon. Would anyone from ATI like to comment

Scott

[MNBob]

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2002/giga...r9700prop1.htm

We ran the system under 8x mode on Shuttle AS45 mainboard

So how was that site able to test on 8x without problems?

[Xenxon]

uh... that's just my luck... I JUST got my 9700 Pro OEM from newegg and now this... yay i got a kick ass card that i can't use! btw i have the VIA P4PB400... Glythic please let me know how it goes with the conversation with ATI... thx...

[Lemmy]

Originally posted by Xp2000
There is nothing really embarassing about it. 8x agp is new and therefore its going to take some time to get the issues worked out. In almost all cases in new technology there are setbacks. Ati likely should have tested better but if they had of done that you all wouldnt have your video card and then would be mad at them for that also. The only question I have about this is does the card work fine under 4x? If it does I dont have a problem dropping down to 4x until Ati comes out with a correction for this issue. There isnt much performance gain in 8x agp at this time anyways

I dunno... I'd perhaps be a bit embarassed if I advertised a product as 8x AGP compatible and it turned out it generally wasn't. Sure, it'll get fixed in a BIOS rev... and us folks that spend too much of our free time reading online forums dedicated to video cards (/self hangs head in shame... mutters something about getting a life...) will flash the BIOS and go about doing all those wondrous things that 8x AGP lets us. (?)

But that's not the case for Joe User. He buys his 9700 from Best Buy, takes it home, and it doesn't work in his rig. He doesn't have an extra motherboard under his mattress he can test it on, nor a DivX rig to put the card in to test with. All he knows is that he spent $400 on a video card that, while living up to the "card" part of the description, doesn't seem to be having anything to do with "video" at all, except for the lack thereof. He doesn't know that video card forums exist online (and would likely be frightened to find out they do) - and even if he did, Joe User is not one to want to spend time and effort forcing his new purchase to work, or waiting until it gets "fixed" - all he knows is that he's got a card that doesn't work, figures he's got a bum card, takes it back to Best Buy to exchange it. So the replacement doesn't work either, and so when he returns it the next time he exchanges it for another model/brand. Even if Best Buy tests it there in front of him on their 4x AGP rig and it works just fine, he's not going to say "Oh, it works on your machine... well, let me take it home and I can just spend an hour or more talking with the manufacturer to find out if it will work with my system at all, and when I can download the BIOS update... by the way, what's a BIOS and how do I update it? Do you sell those here, too?"

Perhaps it's not an "embarassing" problem for ATI, no. But the average Joe User isn't going to care that it's a minor problem that will be fixed soon, he just knows his card doesn't work and he wants to pick one up that does.

[Lethal Dose]

Luckily I did have 3 extra machines to do a test with(did I actually admit that? I must really be a geek ) But you are right about Joe User not being able to fix or even trouble shoot his rig.

[Braham]

"joe user" doesnt usually spend $400 big ones on a vid card he hasnt researched. Its a high end card for high end people, like us, joe-forum-surfers.

if joe user can spend $400 on a vid card without a twitch, he probably wouldnt have missed that $400 if he'd lost it in the couch.

--Braham

[Diseaseboy]

I'm sorry, but I disagree. You would not believe how many "Joe Users" who have they money just go out and buy things based on "they cost a lot so they must be the best" philosophy. It happens all the time. From computers to stereo equipment. I have a family member who spent $500.00 on a dvd burner thinking he could copy dvd movies and convert vhs tapes to dvd- only to find out there is no standard for dvd-r yet, his old dvd player wont play dvd-r's and he needed to spend additional money on a VIVO card to import his VHS video. Don't give Jo Users that much credit. The 9700 will be no different.

Scott

[3DCube]

Prometheus,
I don't know who you talked to at ATI. But I am working closely with people on AGP8X validation. I can sure you we are not encontering any issues so far (Or I should say no problem from our side)

VIA: We work very closely together. We actually participate the VIA AGP 8X plugfest two weeks ago.
http://www.viatech.com/en/Digital%20...gpplugfest.jsp
We test our SW/HW with VIA P4X400 daily. We also test KT400. But I don't have enough information to share.

SiS648: We got a few versions of this chip. The previous version doesn't work well (system can hang). We got the new SiS648 from SiS few weeks ago. We qualify this part without any problem

We also work with other un-announced AGP8X vendors. R300 also work well with these chipsets.

I really think it is just the problem with your board. It may escape from AGP8X testing. I don't know who you talk with in engineering. It could be mis-understanding. Please PM the engineering name to me and I can find out what's going on.

[FPSPCGamer]

This really stinks!

So does anyone know what serial number we need to look for? Or are all 9700 Pro cards out now bad? Also, what's the number for ATI tech support?

Could someone please find out what's going on? Do I need to call ATI and get a new card or not?