Wait, or go for it

[memize]

I know a lot of new stuff is gonna be comming out in the next few months so i need your oppinions on this. Should i go ahead and buy a Radeon 9800 Standard, or should i just wait until the new stuff comes out and upgrade then. Also, does anyone know how long its gonna be before the new line of graphics cards on the market come out? Thx in advance :t

[MJCfromCT]

...i'd say wait until you have enough money for the 9800 pro...you'll be set for at least two years then

[Bigjakkstaffa]

The only diofference between the 9800np and PRo is clock speeds, the 9800 is about 5% slower, but still has the full 9800Pro feature set.

If like me you cant afford a 9800 Pro but want its performance, pick up a Sapphire (must be Sapphire because of the RAM used) 9800 non-pro which go for about 100quid less than the 9800 Pro, these can then be soft modded to full 9800 Pro status with a simple BIOS flash

--Jakk:t

[MJCfromCT]

Bigjakkstaffa,

Is this a "legal" bios flash??? or will it void your warranty?

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Its an official Ati BIOS, not a hacked work, ive used it and it worked straight off the bat, in fact ive not heard of anyone having it fail.

Even in the event that you do screw it up a backup BIOS file can be written to floppy before the flash and you can either re-flash or flash the old BIOS back 'blind'

However if you follow the usual do's and dont's of BIOS flashing (e.g. Do use a good floppy disc, Dont do it during a thhunder storm) and youve got the appropriate card (Sapphire 9800), then it shouldnt present any problems

--Jakk:t

[MJCfromCT]

...i really wish you could backup your Bios from a CD-r...you don't know how many times i've put a file or two i really needed on a floppy, and it turned out to be corrupt...maybe its just my luck...or maybe there's an MRI machine in my room that i don't know about :)

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Floppies are a pain in the jacksie, i hate the darn things, they get far too easily corrupted and unreadable today, not like the days of the Amiga when you could jump up and down on a floppy and it would still run

--Jakk:t

[memize]

Originally posted by Bigjakkstaffa
Floppies are a pain in the jacksie, i hate the darn things, they get far too easily corrupted and unreadable today, not like the days of the Amiga when you could jump up and down on a floppy and it would still run

--Jakk:t

Thx Jakk, I was reading of what you said in another post about doing this. You can get the 9800 Saphire for $198 shipped on pricewatch. Oh and thanks for the help :)


ps: do you have the link to the 9800 Pro Bios i could download?

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Read dis:

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=33695811

dis:

http://4peeps.com/ivb/index.php?showtopic=4204

and dis:

http://www.sysopt.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=143644

They shoudl tell you all you need to know including the ins and out of it and what to do in the rare case it all doesnt go to plan, as you'll see though, success rate seems pretty high

--Jakk:t

[memize]

Originally posted by Bigjakkstaffa
Read dis:

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=33695811

dis:

http://4peeps.com/ivb/index.php?showtopic=4204

and dis:

http://www.sysopt.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=143644

They shoudl tell you all you need to know including the ins and out of it and what to do in the rare case it all doesnt go to plan, as you'll see though, success rate seems pretty high

--Jakk:t

Thx for all the help jakk, I ordered the card a few minutes ago and I am eagerly awaiting its arrival :r

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Let me know how it goes.

Also be sure to follow the steps here:

http://4peeps.com/ivb/index.php?showtopic=4204

specifically the "flashrom -s 0 original.bin" line prior to the flash, which will create a backup of the existing BIOS file to the floppy, which you can then flash back in the unlikely event that things dont work out

--Jakk:t

[memize]

Hey Jakk have you overclocked yours past the 9800 Pro standard?? I'm wondering how far you can go with these things. I'm considering buying a heatsink for mine if i can overclock it past the 9800 Pro speeds

[Bigjakkstaffa]

I had a wee play and managed to get an extra 15Mhz out of the memory, which is so small due to the fact the ram on my card is slow 3.3ns stuff and even 9800 Pro stock speed is pushing the ram quite a way (put it this way it wont plain overclock to 9800 Pro, i tried, the BIOS flash is the only way)

I aint tried the core yet

--Jakk:t

[memize]

I found the Built by Ati Pro for 282 so I went ahead and ordered it :)