New X800 Pro -> XT Mod! Try it...

[albrob]

Well another successful story.

I got my Sapphire Radeon X800PRO VIVO Retail Box yesterday (ordered it on June 30). I installed it using the Cat's 4.7. It was correctly detected as an X800PRO (it also showed 12 pipelines in AtiTool). I then uninstalled the drivers, and did BIOS flash using the Gigabyte BIOS and program. It worked perfect. I then installed the drivers again, and now the card was detected as an X800 XT PE (Platinum Edition). I ran AtiTool again and it showed 16 pipelines.

I then ran Aquamark (score 62K), and then 3DMark03 (score 12K). You can see my project here.

Compare URL: X800 XT PE 3DMark03 .

This is great!. Thanks to all of you for your help (this thread was definitely very helpful for all of us with this particular cards).

I am currently running the card @ XT PE specs w/o errors in any of the main benchmark programs such as AtiTool, 3DMark01, 3DMark03, and Aquamark.

I am even now using the Overdrive function and now the card is overclocked a little bit (up to 526Mhz). I have not tried anything higher yet but will try very soon. The card temps are as follows: 44C (idle) 60C (load).

Alb
p.s.: I have not flashed it to the ATI X800XT PE Bios yet. Will do some more testing with Gigabyte BIOS before flash it to that one.

[Copyman]

Hi,

1) Who to inform some program to edit the BIOS of the X800? I tried the Radeon Edit, but he is not to open the archives of BIOS of X800Pro or XT. Error appears a message indicating. I tried varios BIOS archives and I did not obtain to open none to edit. What I intend is leaving of an original BIOS of X800Pro, to create another one, with values of GPU and bigger memories.

2) I bought yesterday in Miami a Sapphire X800Pro VIVO Retail (the VGA will be arriving for me in Brazil in day 16/07), however, I did not obtain no information concerning the codes of the memories of the VGA. Somebody knows to inform if all the Sapphire X800Pro VIVO are produced with the memories of the XT or only had been determined lots. It will be that my VGA will give Mod?

[Entity]

Just cancelled my order for a standard X800 Pro and as soon as my credit card gets refunded I will be ordering a VIVO Sapphire.

[quicksilverXP]

does anyone know if the 418 dollar VIVO Sapphire from Newegg is actually a VIVO. On the product description it is but the pictures it isn't.

[TerraPhantm]

well newegg does say that the picture may not represent the actual product

[klevermoniker]

Originally Posted by albrob

p.s.: I have not flashed it to the ATI X800XT PE Bios yet. Will do some more testing with Gigabyte BIOS before flash it to that one.

Please do report back on how that works out. I tried to run with the gigabyte BIOS for a little while, but got cold feet when I saw my GPU running at 75 degrees celsius. When I ran 3dmark 2k3 when I had the card set as a stock (non-overclocked) XT, I scored an 11.5k. When I brought it back to a Pro, even overclocked, I was only getting scores in the 10.25k range. If the Sapphire XT BIOS is stable for you, then I might just flash that one in, and be done with my video card tomfoolery for a good while.

[floguyep]

Well, I'm a little freaked out. I ordered one of those $418.00 "VIVO" cards from newegg, especially since one of the feedbacks for it specifically talks about the bios flash and turning it into an XT, but now that I've already ordered it I'm looking at the picture and the picture is incorrect. Well, either the picture is incorrect or the description is incorrect.

Do you think that since it says VIVO in the description, and the picture shows a TVO only card, it's a TVO only or a VIVO+TVO????

Ahh! I was so excited earlier today and now I'm just freaked out! Although, I'm sure newegg will honor their description, even if that means providing me with a refund?

Anyone else have experience with this particular product from newegg?

[TerraPhantm]

Originally Posted by floguyep

Well, I'm a little freaked out. I ordered one of those $418.00 "VIVO" cards from newegg, especially since one of the feedbacks for it specifically talks about the bios flash and turning it into an XT, but now that I've already ordered it I'm looking at the picture and the picture is incorrect. Well, either the picture is incorrect or the description is incorrect.

Do you think that since it says VIVO in the description, and the picture shows a TVO only card, it's a TVO only or a VIVO+TVO????

Ahh! I was so excited earlier today and now I'm just freaked out! Although, I'm sure newegg will honor their description, even if that means providing me with a refund?

Anyone else have experience with this particular product from newegg?

Well I ordered it, it ended up being a non vivo card so I called them up and explained the situation, after a littile bit of arguing the gave me an RMA number. I don't know if they sent me the wrong card or if they are all non vivo

[floguyep]

I called them this morning too. The card they sent me is not the VIVO card so they told me to just refuse it when it gets to me. I ordered from another company now so here goes nothing!

[TerraPhantm]

Originally Posted by floguyep

I called them this morning too. The card they sent me is not the VIVO card so they told me to just refuse it when it gets to me. I ordered from another company now so here goes nothing!

Where did you order the other one from?

[floguyep]

GameVE, it was a PowerColor X800Pro VIVO and I called them and asked them to check and make sure it was a VIVO and they told me right on the phone that it was.

[B-Fix]

Hi all I just want to give my 5 cents back to the community.

I got my X800 Pro GeCube VIVO yesterday. I wanted the performance that a mod would do, but didn’t want to do a hardware mod.

I used the guide posted on page 3 by redrain85 in this thread.

The result of it all is that it works.
I ran the gigabyte bios for a while but the ram chips got extremely hot during the 3DMark2K3 test, so decided to change to the ATi bios. This bios ran even worse, and crashed during aquamark test. I therefore flashed my card with my original bios. ATi tool still reports 16 pipes and benchmarks are higher that what I started out with. I other words Success!

Here are the benchmark results:

Sapphire 9800 Pro 256MB DDR2
AquaMark:36.042
3DMark2K3: 5564

GeCube X800 Pro Vivo – Org. bios 12 Pipes
AquaMark: 41.096
3DMark2K3: 9302

GeCube X800 Pro Vivo – Gigabyte XT bios 16 Pipes
AquaMark: 41.040
3DMark2K3: 11025

GeCube X800 Pro Vivo – Org. bios 16 Pipes
AquaMark: 40.053
3DMark2K3: 9843

My system specs.
P4 NW 2.53 | Asus P4PE | 1024 MB PC3200 RAM | WinXP + Sp2 beta.

[ArconX]

I hope this is usefull. I did a quick test calcullation between your 12 pipes & 16 pipes benchmarks.

The Vivo's are failed XT's, so you have a higher change that they won't oc as high as Pro's.

12 pipes pro ( 19.53 )

10741 - 550 - 30mhz
11327 - 580 - 33mhz
12030 - 616 - 36mhz


16 pipes ( 20.72 )

10774 - 520
11333 - 547
12018 - 580

Note: this calcullation is based on the same memory speed ( 450 ), and shows the difference of 12 vs 16 pipes & there speed.

As expected, the higher you clock the XT, the more the difference needed is to overcome by the pro. As you start with a 30mhz difference, this grows larger the more you speed up the XT.

But it also shows something intresting. People who have pro's with pipes they can't enable, but who are great oc'ers, can take on XT speeds widout problems ( core based ).

I'll say it again, this was just a test to see how XT rejected cards ( who bearly reach XT speeds ) handle vs Pro cards ( who may oc higher ). Some people may have VIVO's who may oc beyond XT default speeds.

[euan]

add me to the list of happy "upgraders".

I got my Powercolor X800Pro Vivo yesterday, after ordering it the day before. What can I say but I must say, that if I had found a 6800GT in stock with VIVO anywhere I would have bought that instead. Close shave there!

[euan]

Actually, one problem I've found is that Video In doesn't see to work. Also windows and MMC seem to think that I have a TV Tuner installed, and even stranger is that the United Kingdom is missing from the regionalisation list for the tuner. Could it be that the bios' linked to on page 3 are NTSC? I know it worked before, and the dip switches are set to PAL... Any ideas?

I've tried video in with both the Gigabyte bios, and the ATI XTY bios. Currently using the latter.

Edit:

Flashed the original bios back in. VIVO is working again. I suppose I'll need to use TVTool to set the clocks up to XT PE speeds until I edit the flash to make it permanent. Or another bios appears for a X800XT VIVO.

[kona]

I just got my Gigabyte X800 Pro VIVO and it also has 16 pipes enabled out of the box. I have it overclocked to XT speeds without any problems at all.

[kona]

[Gaspar]

I triyed flashinf to Xt bios and it failed showing 12 pipes. I then tried using the gigabyte bios and it still didnt work my pc was crashing in like a minute I then tried reflashing back to a x800pro bios but its still crashng and my core and mem clocks are still x800XT speeds any help!!! My card is rendered useless right now. I also uninstalled reinstalled drivers etc

[ArconX]

You need to force flash it. Think you need a -f parameter or something to force flashing of the bios.

Your in luck, i bookmarked the link:

http://rage3d.com/board/showthread.p...ost=1332977927

The commanders are listed here.

[blai76]

Hi all, I flashed my Sapphire x800pro non-Vivo to the ATI x800 XT BIOS and also the gigabyte method and it ran fine but even with the hardmod the last 4 pipelines are still disabled. I then flashed it back to the x800pro BIOS to return it back to original form but now the video card won't initialize and my machine does not boot up with it anymore (black screen). I used the bios file located at http://ocfaq.com/softmod/bios.php. It seems like the same file that is linked to at http://rage3d.com/board/showthread.p...ost=1332977927. I'm thinking it was a bad bios file? Does anybody have a version of the ATI x800pro BIOS that they know is working, and can host it and/or link it for me? I used the standard proper flashing syntax (flashrom -p 0 -f biosname.bin) from a true DOS prompt. I now need to get a PCI video card from work to get a command prompt in order to reflash the AGP x800pro. Sigh...please, I need some help If all else fails, I may try the gigabye version of the x800pro bios; however, I am afraid it will boot up with a gigabyte x800pro title, and not allow me to exchange it for a ViVo version of the sapphire card, which is already coming in the mail with a pre-paid UPS shipping label for me to ship this card back. Please, I need some help

[Gaspar]

Originally Posted by ArconX

You need to force flash it. Think you need a -f parameter or something to force flashing of the bios.

Your in luck, i bookmarked the link:

http://rage3d.com/board/showthread.p...ost=1332977927

The commanders are listed here.

I used this command in dos
flashrom -f -p 0 ATIX800XT-filename.bin
it seemed to flash ok said 6578bytes out 6578bytes good. But card is still clocked at XT speeds and crashes as soon as I go to ATI control panel.

[babyelf]

Hi

i'm pretty new to this bios flashing thing.. so if there is a step by step guide that would be great.. will be getting my Gecube x800pro VIVO soon or the powercolor ones.. both at almost the same price.. negligable...

[ArconX]

Gaspar,

Try removing your drivers & reinstalling them. It's just a wild guess, but some people reported problems (crashes) after the flash, and after removing & reinstalling there drivers, the problem was fixed.

[babyelf]

ok.. sort of got a guide to do that..

what flashware do u guys use?

but if there's one specially for the x800pro - xt ones please send me the link or explain to me?

thanks alot guys

[laja]

Another success story. Gecube X800 pro VIVO running nicely with 16 pipes at XT PE speeds. Using the Gigabyte XT bios as described earlier in this thread (I think the poster's name was redrain or something like that. My deep gratitude to him.)

[koldphuzion]

Hello all

I've just flashed my PowercolorX800Pro VIVO to the XT PE with success. But im having problems flashing it back to either my orriginal Pro bios or the ATI bios.
Firstly I backed up the orriginal bios, then flashed it with the Gigabyte flash tool to the gigabyte bios, checked in ATI tool and all 16 pipes un-locked, great!
But now I cant seem to flash back? I've tried many different command lines:
flashrom -p 0 ATIX800~1.bin
flashrom -p 0 ATIX800.256.Samsung16.bin
flashrom -p 0 ATI X800256Samsung16.bin
flashrom -f -p 0 ATIX800256Samsung16.bin
flashrom -f -p 0 ATI.X800XT.256.Samsung16.bin
flashrom -p 0 ATIX800XT256Samsung16.rom -f
flashrom -p 0 ATI.X800XT.Samsung16.rom -f
FLASHROM -p -f 0 ATI bios name.bin
and I've tried all of the above and others I cant remember with my orriginal X800Pro bios.
Every time I try this I get the same error:
file opening error
ERROR 0FL01

Does anyone know what that error means and can anyone suggest what may be going wrong?

Can anyone suggest a good cooler for the ATIX800?
Thank you

[Gaspar]

I had the exact same problem, If you change the file name to a dos 8.3 format. A smmaller fien name like x800pro.bin that will work

[Rush585]

I flashed my Sapphire X800pro vivo to the gigabyte xt bios to unlock the pipes but had to flash back because of high gpu temps but coudnt flash back to my original backup so i used the gigabyte x800pro bios, so now i got 16pipes and I used ati tool to oc it to 480/510. Has any1 noticed random freezing in the 3DMark03 Pixel shader and Fill rate test?

[blai76]

Ok, just got home from work and checked my x800pro bios file on the floppy I put it on, and realized it wasn't the same size as the original that I copied over to it. I had renamed the file, which appeared had a truncated dos name~1. I renamed it to x800pro.bin from within dos, which apparently did something to the contents of the file(I can't explain why). The one I copied over to the floppy was 56k, while the one on the flpoppy which I renamed while in dos was 44k.

So I renamed it from within windows and reflashed it to my card and Viola! It's back to normal. The one caveat was I had to boot up with a PCI video card in order to do this, since the x800pro agp card wouldn't initialize at all. Just fyi, this was a bba ATI x800pro non vivo, which was sent to me by mistake from the vendor I ordered a Sapphire VIVO card from.

So today I received my Sapphire ViVo x800pro and gigaflashed to XT, flashrommed to ati xt, and now I have a Sapphire X800XT Platinum Edition running at full XT speeds with all pipelines enabled. Time to see how far I can OC this further on stock cooling

[Rush585]

AH Think i found out the random freezing problem in 3DMark03 Pixel and Fill rate tests, it happens when u enable temp check in ati tool.