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will I notice a difference?

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Surfeit00

Disabled
Joined
Nov 29, 2003
Location
VA
my 5900 ultra 256 MB died on me yesterday & today I ordered a 9800 pro 256 (got a good deal on one). Will I notice much of a difference? I hope I didn't buy a slower card.
 
I doubt you will notice a different at all. 5900 ultras are compared to 9800 pros on the ati vs nvidia scales. Although some might say that a 9800pro is much better at games. :)
 
Neil.b said:
flash it to an xt and it will be faster than your old card :)

thanks for all the insight

is there a link anywhere about this mod??
 
There are a few guides in the ATI section (search for 9800 softmod). The two things your card should have/do to ensure the highest chance of an XT softmod (BIOS flash) are the following:

1) Run at 412/365 (XT clocks)
2) Have an R360 core (XT core)

It doesn't have to have the 2nd one but it should do the first to ensure that you won't get artifacting like crazy in games/benchmarks. To see which core it has, remove the heatsink and wipe the thermal paste off the core. It should say the core version right below the ATI logo.

Since you're switching from nVidia you should run DriverCleaner to remove the files that nVidia drivers leave behind that screw up ATI's drivers.

Popular overclocking utilities are RadLinkier/RadClocker and ATITool. If you use ATITool you should be advised that it's artifact tester can't be trusted 100% as it tends to exadurate core artifacts and minimize memory artifacts. Also, don't leave the artifact tester going for more than an hour or two unless you want your card fried.

The most popular drivers are whatever the latest ATI has put out. Some people use the hand tweaked Omega drivers instead of the stock ATI ones.
 
I don't plan on ocing & I probably won't do the mod to my card as I really don't want to risk anything.
 
if you are carefull then there is no risk at all, its really very easy :)
 
can't the BIOS flash fail or something & your card gets really fubar?

checking the core speeds will be easy & checking the core is just more of a pain than anything else
 
Yes, the BIOS flash can go wrong but that's a rare occurance. If the flash goes wrong, 90% of the time all you need to do is boot your computer with a PCI graphics card (make sure your BIOS is set to initialize video on the PCI bus first before you flash) and flash it back to the old BIOS, changing the flash command to use video adapter 1 instead of 0.
 
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