SOLVED Seeking experienced vmodder for my 680's

Hi Folks

Any of you experienced modders available for hire? Have 3 4gb Zotac 680's that I'd like to get modded. Right now am using a modded bios which takes the cards up to 1.215v. Overclocked and running at load, temps are stable around 62C (I'll have to double-check and re-confirm that...for some reason I actually think my full load temps are in the mid-50's) so figure there's some decent headroom left.

I'm looking for a kind, trustable, experienced modder to make the needed voltage hardmods.

Am not entirely sure about when I'd be ready to send the cards out (I'd have to drain the loop and be without my nice gaming pc for as long as the mods take) but wanted to figure out who would be willing to do the mods and how much they'd want for their efforts.

tia!

Calling Bobnova!!!!

You might be better off getting a 680 classified (or Lightning) rather than messing with hard mods on the 680 due to the way that boost comes into play. From everything I've heard reference cards are a beeech to deal with.

Not really up for buying 3 4gb classifieds atm (at $600 a pop + the cost of waterblocks) so have to make the best with what I've got.

Guess I'm also looking for a sanity check on this thought...from what I've read the hardmods work even on reference cards. No?

Yeah...that's the main page I've been checking out. My vision isn't so great these days and work/family keep me pretty busy so if these cards are gonna get modded, I'd need someone to do it for me (for a fee, of course).

Reference or non-reference?
If it's reference, forget it. It's not worth it. (more on that in a bit).

If it's non-ref, like a DCUII or classy or something, then it might be worthwhile. If you can get a hold of older classies that have the EVBot connector you have it made. I suspect that the newer ones will work fine if you add the connector.


Reference GTX680s have a very locked controller, you can only go 100-170mV above VID before the controller shuts you down for OVP.
If that's enough for you, then it's an easy mod, no problem. If you want more than that, you're looking at a couple hours per card card. Three cards, 2-3 hours per card, you're looking at 6-9 hours of fairly high end soldering. I generally charge $30 to $50/hour depending on how much of a pain the soldering job is (this'd be on the higher end). Plus shipping and parts, of course. It'd likely be cheaper to buy classies that have the port than to vmod the reference bits.

Your best bet for reference cards is to be happy with what you have. Nvidia does NOT want them OC'd or OV'd, sources indicate that the lifespan of a card consistently run at high volts is rather short. Failing that simple VR mods for core and memory volts, plus bypassing the power limiters, will get you 1.3v to 1.34v at the core and some more overclocking headroom if you're lucky.


I'd be happy to do it, but I don't recommend it. If you want to OC your GPU sell off the nvidia cards and buy AMD. AMD likes OCing, nvidia hates it.

Thanks Bobnova

Well...that's all very sad news (but better to find out now rather than later). These are reference cards. The simple/easy mods to get them to 1.3-1.34v would be perfect...how long do you think that'd take you? Would you still advise against it? Does that classify as 'high volts' that'll significantly reduce the cards' lifespans?

Have to stay green team as I game exclusively in 3D (and have the 3 120Hz monitors). Green's 3D solution is just SOO much further along than Red's.

Will look around for used 4gb classies but new (with waterblocks) it's around $750/card. Thinking the best I could get for my cards (including blocks) is only around the $450-500 range.

Lemme know your thoughts on the mods to get the cards to 1.3v-ish (and whether or not it'll kill the cards) and if you think it's actually worth it. Sounding like I should just keep what I've got and be happy with it.

Thanks again

This is what he will have to do to your cards. Once they're that far gone, there really isn't much coming back. For all intents and purposes, the mod is for extreme overclocking only and is expected to lead to the death of their (rather weak) power plane in the quest for higher clocks. You don't want to do that to your cards on water.

FWIW, you can get MSI Lightning's for $480 after rebate. That's with the smaller amount of vRAM though.

This isn't to say there's anything wrong with your cards at all, they just (sadly) aren't designed for much overclocking.

What about a classy that doesn't have the port? Is it as "easy" as adding the port, or are other mods still necessary?

I don't know. The only people that know aren't saying, probably they've been banned from saying.

Vmod wise, I don't recommend any voltmod for 24/7 use. 1.3v is into the zone that slowly (or less slowly) kills cards. How fast is unknown, but keep in mind the amount of trouble and bad press Nvidia has gone through to limit volts to 1.175! Tons of effort, *@&#%loads of bad press, but it was still worth it to them!

The full on mod routine isn't very undoable, I have a dead GTX680 sitting here waiting for me to have time to attempt to desolder the memory voltage controller (that SMD chip...) and put a new one on. That, combined with half an hour of amazingly painstaking soldering (soldering a wire to the pins on the side of the main controller chip. Not the side of the PCB mind you, the side of the controller. The 0.2mm pins with 0.5mm spacing that are mostly under the card...), will hopefully resurrect the card.
It died due to voltmods and benching


Here's the bottom line:
1.3v might buy you another 50-100MHz. It will shorten the life of your card. It will cost you around $40/card. Is $0.50 to $1/MHz and a non-trivial lifespan shortening worth it to you?

The last Kepler I modded (GTX660Ti, GK104) gained nothing from voltages over 1.2v.

Bobnova said:

Here's the bottom line:
1.3v might buy you another 50-100MHz. It will shorten the life of your card. It will cost you around $40/card. Is $0.50 to $1/MHz and a non-trivial lifespan shortening worth it to you?

The last Kepler I modded (GTX660Ti, GK104) gained nothing from voltages over 1.2v.

Click to expand...

Good to know, thank you. This card has been pretty good to me as is for points (stock bios and everything), but I've been curious about the whole voltage thing since I got it and missed out on the port. I'm concentrating on getting what I need for cold at the moment, so no I don't want to kill it and have to buy another one just yet. Maybe down the road a ways I'll change my mind....

hokiealumnus said:

This is what he will have to do to your cards. Once they're that far gone, there really isn't much coming back. For all intents and purposes, the mod is for extreme overclocking only and is expected to lead to the death of their (rather weak) power plane in the quest for higher clocks. You don't want to do that to your cards on water.

FWIW, you can get MSI Lightning's for $480 after rebate. That's with the smaller amount of vRAM though.

This isn't to say there's anything wrong with your cards at all, they just (sadly) aren't designed for much overclocking.

Click to expand...

Holy cow! I don't follow nVidia because I'm a red fan, but my god, they have literally locked their cards down and thrown away the key. Ridiculous if you ask me, and I am aware they lose money with a bunch of rma's. But how many are they rma'ing from voltage death and overclocking?

Enough, apparently.

Thanks again everyone. Will just keep them the way they are and sell them when I want to upgrade or ask someone to mod them when they're relics.

If you are really interested in benching modded cards, you could pick up some old ones and bobnova has done a great job with mods for me. Still fun, lots of hardware points up for grabs, and if/when they die you are out <$50.

I'd actually recommend going that route to anyone thinking about benching with hardmods, on any card. Do it first with a card that won't hurt when it dies. It's a lot of fun having physical voltage controls, and I've had a ton of fun benching old 8000/9000 series nvidia - not to mention massive hardware boints.

I.M.O.G. said:

If you are really interested in benching modded cards, you could pick up some old ones and bobnova has done a great job with mods for me. Still fun, lots of hardware points up for grabs, and if/when they die you are out <$50.

I'd actually recommend going that route to anyone thinking about benching with hardmods, on any card. Do it first with a card that won't hurt when it dies. It's a lot of fun having physical voltage controls, and I've had a ton of fun benching old 8000/9000 series nvidia - not to mention massive hardware boints.

Click to expand...

I think this is the best advice I've heard all day.

I.M.O.G. said:

If you are really interested in benching modded cards, you could pick up some old ones and bobnova has done a great job with mods for me. Still fun, lots of hardware points up for grabs, and if/when they die you are out <$50.

I'd actually recommend going that route to anyone thinking about benching with hardmods, on any card. Do it first with a card that won't hurt when it dies. It's a lot of fun having physical voltage controls, and I've had a ton of fun benching old 8000/9000 series nvidia - not to mention massive hardware boints.

Click to expand...

Thanks I.M.O.G. Will look around to see what cards I've got laying around.