TH7-II & ATi 9800 Pro ??

Does a 9800 Pro work fine in the old TH7-II ? Who is actually or has been running this combo?

My friend just installed the Guillemot Hercules 9800 PRO 128MB on his TH7II, he had no problems what so ever, he did reformat and use the updated 3.8 catalyst if I remember right.

Are you going to upgrade from a 9700 to a 9800pro that doesn't seem like a good idea and really a waste of money. My Ti4200 is still crunching fps just fine.

Good Luck

Thanks for your reply!

I can get hold of a 9800 Pro quiet cheap in exchange for my 9700. It's about 70US$...

Merkor, you got a sweet deal. Yes I have a TH7II that uses a 9700Pro, it works fine, but I do remember long before some of the recent released BIOS, I recall the issues of 9700's inside the TH7II. Now is all fixed.

I have a 9500np w/ soft mod & Omega 2.4.96c driver on a TH7II-R. No probs! FSB is 140; AGP/PCI is at 2/4 (35/70MHz). If I set AGP/PCI to FIX (33/66MHz) I get the Dreaded Cold Boot issue. Good luck with yours!
-Dave
btw - Nice Deal!

Wow,

I don't get that cold boot issue with my TH7 II. Interesting.

Should I be getting the cold boot?

jerry,
Be happy you don't have the cold boot prob. This only seems to be a prob with certain BIOS versions on the TH7II. What happens is, when you start the comp after it's been shut down , it will hang during POST. You just hit the reset button & then it boots normally. It's mainly a nuisance. I'm running Mr. Natural's 40B BIOS, which allows you to bump your v-core all the way up to 1.85V, which is probably too much for a Northwood. It's also supposed to improve performance, if I remember correctly. Check out the TH7II sticky HERE
-Dave

Dave,

You are right on that. I have searched this out on the abit forums and at anandtech and hardocp.

I am thankful that my board doesn't have this issue.

Aside from just a couple of quirks, the TH7II is one of the best boards out there. people might say it's outdated because it's an RDRAM board, but my Samsung PC800 will run at 142 FSB. At my current ettings of 140 FSB I'll get SiSoft Sandra Mem scores of almost 3500. Only when Intel came out with the Canterwood chipset & dual channel mem did DDR surpass these scores by a significant margin. I've had my P4 1.6A as high as 2.64GHz (165 FSB) but I had to raise core voltage to 1.7V to do it. That was a little bit more than I felt comfortable with; also cpu temps were starting to climb a bit higher than I would have liked. I'm tempted to try something like a 2.4 or 2.53 P4B which would put me close to 3.0GHZ or maybe a bit higher. I also think if I could find some good PC1066 RDRAM, I could push this board even further. Obsolete? Not quite yet! Different? Most definitely!
-Dave

I have maxed out at 158FSB no matter what CPU. I think my samsung PC 800 45ns memory is holding me back. Running the x3 multiplier and no rambus vmods yet.

Your luckier on that machine than I am. You get 165FSB? Wow. I stuck in my 2.4b from my Abit BH7 (other machine, 3rd one) to see if I can reach 3.06ghz, nope, at max, 2.85ghz.

I love the TH7 II no doubt, because it was ahead of its time in memory bandwidth, but DDR is available, cheaper and faster with the new canterwood chipsets that are out. I have the best of both worlds, and I will miss my TH7 II.

MY trusty 1.6a has been running at 2.53ghz at 1.7v for nearly two years stable (knock on wood)in the TH7 II. Low temps. (Still cheaper back then what I paid for it, than what the true 2.53ghz CPU is listed for today)

I will trade you boards, for my non cold boot issue for yours that does higher FSB.

Good that another fellow TH7 II person is still around.


Got to get back to setting up prime95 on my 2.4c in this signature below. (running two instances of it)

j,
I think I'll keep mine. Thanx for the kind offer. Cold boot on mine only happens when I have AGP-PCI set to "FIX". Right now I'm running 140 FSB, Mem @ 4/4 & AGP-PCI @ 2/4. It runs very nicely at these settings. 165 FSB happened when I was pushing to see what the limits were. Mem was @ 3/4, V-core ~1.7V & temps were getting a bit higher than I would like. My Samsung PC800 (2x256) will run @ 142-143 FSB. 144 & no post. I've found it amusing to watch ppl post here bragging about SiSoft Sandra mem scores near 3000 when I get close to 3500 on mine.
That DID change w/ the new dual channel chipsets, so my next main rig for myself will prob be one of those. But not for a while yet. I'm gonna keep this one for a bit longer. Keep the faith, guy!
-Dave