Flashing vs. overclocking?

Will flashing your card make more of a difference than raising the cards clock to the flash speed? Why? If you have r350 9800pro then flashing it isnt really gonna do anyhthing because the cards core has no more features to use like the r360 9800pro, is this correct? Isnt the r350 the same core as the 9700pros?

well i havent flashed nor OCed my card yet (its a r350 9800Pro) but after flashing it...u get more optimized shaders...thats all i know about flashing the 9800Pro so far and i hope there is more u get if u flash an r350...cause otherwise i might not do it if there arnt many major advantages.

Yea thats what im wondering about my r350 core, well someone enlighten us.

Flashing your 9800 Pro with an XT BIOS, and just overclocking your 9800 Pro to XT speeds both achieve the same thing. The only difference, is that with the XT BIOS, you get some shaders that won't work with an R350 core, and in some cases, a slight (~300 point) boost in your 3DMark score.

The other difference with flashing your R350 cored 9800 Pro to XT, is that you're using a BIOS that wasn't designed for your video card. It really amazes me that so many people with R350 cored cards are flashing their cards to XT, when they have nothing to gain but some non-functional shaders, and ~300, or less, 3DMarks (when I tried it, I saw no 3DMark gains, and a signifigant loss in my maximum stable memory overclock).

In my experience, the BIOS that you use with your card has a great impact on how your card will overclock. With a BIOS optimized for your RAM, and your core, you will typically get better overclocking results than you would if you were using, say, a BIOS optimized for a different core, and different RAM.

This is purely my opinion, but I think that the only people who should be flashing their 9800 Pro with an XT BIOS, are people who have an R360 cored card, and RAM on their card that matches up with the RAM on the XT card that the XT BIOS being flashed came from.



When you flash your card to XT, your card's "stock" speeds become the stock speeds of a 9800 XT. So, you've effectively just overclocked your video card.



There is a tool called "radedit" that you can download, and use to manually modify your video card's clock speeds, as they are set in the BIOS. Using this tool, you can modify your card's BIOS with whatever clock speeds you desire, flash your card with the modified BIOS, and never have to worry about using ATiTool, Powerstrip, or Rivatuner to overclock your card again.

By doing this, your video card will boot, and load windows with the clock speeds that you have set in the BIOS; your card is effectively overclocked the same way your processor is, through the BIOS (the proper way, if you were to ask me ).

If anyone's interested, you can download radedit HERE . You'll also need a utility that can copy, and re-flash your video card's BIOS.

Can you flash the 9700 pros to newer card bios's? im confused in this post :S

But before you flash your video card, OC and test it first!!!

Jay23 said:

Can you flash the 9700 pros to newer card bios's? im confused in this post :S

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Like a new BIOS for the 9700 Pro?

well i did some reading and it seems that MOST people say the same stuff whats his name said ^^^ but i found something about memory latencys changing...

but i found something about memory latencys changing...

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I have no idea whether this is the case or not. But I highly doubt it.

The only BGA memory latency that would be changed in any case, as far as I know, is the CAS latency. And raising or lowering it past stock (CAS 2) typically results in a garbled post screen


Again, you are much better off using a BIOS optimized for your video card's RAM and core, than using a BIOS optimized for a different core, and/or different RAM. I gained a stable 25 MHz on my memory overclock by simply flashing my video card with a BIOS optimized for the RAM my card has on it.

wow didnt know they had "optimized" BIOS for cores...i prolly wont do that though cuase im still scared of vioding my warrenty or messing up my new card...

wow didnt know they had "optimized" BIOS for cores...i prolly wont do that though cuase im still scared of vioding my warrenty or messing up my new card...

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An example of a core specific "optimization": The newer shader in the XT BIOSes that the R360 core supports, and the R350 core doesn't.

Although R350 -> R360 isn't a huge difference at all, the R360 core is still a newer, and different core revision.



Also, don't be sad that you've got an R350 core on your card; when push comes to shove, R350 cores are known to overclock a bit higher on average, than R360 cores

felinusz said:

An example of a core specific "optimization": The newer shader in the XT BIOSes that the R360 core supports, and the R350 core doesn't.

Although R350 -> R360 isn't a huge difference at all, the R360 core is still a newer, and different core revision.



Also, don't be sad that you've got an R350 core on your card; when push comes to shove, R350 cores are known to overclock a bit higher on average, than R360 cores

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I wasn't aware of these optimised BIOSes either. I've got an AIW Radeon 9800 Pro 128 MB. Neato, need to check this out.

felinusz said:

Also, don't be sad that you've got an R350 core on your card; when push comes to shove, R350 cores are known to overclock a bit higher on average, than R360 cores

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NICE! but as i said i donno if i wanna break ne of my new hardware warrenties yet or shorten their lives in general...but thanks for the good news!

Well that makes me feel a little better about the r350 and i do have 256megs of ram in my card so all is good. Also i just ordered a arctic silencer rev.3 so im excited to oc. Will raising the clock speeds of you card technically do damage to it, if it is nice and cool?

Well what kind of cooling do you have for your card felinusz, i hope to reach speeds of that someday maybe.

flashing gets you arrested, overclocking doesn't

9mmCensor said:

flashing gets you arrested, overclocking doesn't

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What?

I know that on the NV cards the Ultra bios's have looser memory timings which will lower your scores if kept at the same level, however they will alow you to clock it higher.

The flash police. I think they are in the same building with the police that get you for taking the tags off your mattress.

Silmatharien said:

Like a new BIOS for the 9700 Pro?

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ya

Jacobman said:

What?

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flashing = showing displayings ones "private bits" in public

Silmatharien

I wasn't aware of these optimised BIOSes either. I've got an AIW Radeon 9800 Pro 128 MB. Neato, need to check this out.

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Well, don't get too excited. "Core optimized" doesn't neccessarily mean you're going to be seeing monster gains on your Core overclock after a BIOS flash. Perhaps no gains at all. If you started out with an R350 cored card, you've already got an "R350 optimized" BIOS on your card. That said, if you've got an R360 cored 9800 Pro, you'll probably be wanting to flash your card with an XT BIOS. Again, using a BIOS specifically because it was designed for your card's core isn't some rule or anything, it's just my opinion, and my personal practice.


It's really your memory that can benefit the most from a BIOS flash. Many 9800 Pro cards shipped with a BIOS optimized for RAM different than that which the card has on it.

This thread is kinda old, but it's right on the topic of BIOS flashing, for better memory overclocking results: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=295383&highlight=9800+BIOS

Jacobman

Will raising the clock speeds of you card technically do damage to it, if it is nice and cool?

Well what kind of cooling do you have for your card felinusz, i hope to reach speeds of that someday maybe.

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Overclocking doesn't kill or damage hardware. What kills and damages hardware, is too much heat, as a result of overclocking, and overvolting.

Too much voltage can also damage hardware, but typically only where there are unreasonably high overvolts, or where the hardware had a manufacturing flaw to begin with, or where inadequate cooling is being used.


I'm cooling my 9800 Pro with a watercooled Peltier.