6200 softmod to 6600?

I was looking at some other video cards in here: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?p=3599319#post3599319

When I was informed about softmodding a 6200.

I did a fair deal of reasearch on this, and I hear if you want to softmod, the Turbo Cache version does not work well, or does not work at all.

Does this look like a card I would have a good chance softmodding?
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?p=3599319#post3599319

Any recomendations on cards I can get? Also, is it more like a 50-50 chance on the success of the softmod or is it a fair chance it will work? And finnally, how exactly do you softmod it? From my reasearch someone said to go to some Chinese website and download a custom driver. This doesn't sound like the way it is done to me, but then again, what do I know, I am a video card newbie.

i didn't know there was a permanent softmod for it yet, i thought people were just re-enabling pipelines every boot (you do have to do this every bootup, right? i've never had a card i could unlock before, i just go by what i read). i keep my machine up for about 30 days straight at a time, so i wouldn't mind having to do that once a month.

some searching is turning up that flashing a 6600 bios onto a 6200 doesn't unlock the extra 4 pipes, so unless anyone has some updates you might have to keep doing the rivatuner unlock. there's a huge 6200 thread over on xtremesystems, if you read through it you might find something good. me, i'm just going to buy a $75 refurbished 6600 off newegg

i'd say the chances of a fully-unlockable 6200 are better than 50/50 - i've only read about 3 people who get artifacts after unlocking. i'd conservatively guesstimate that the ratio is around 4 unlockable 6200's for every 1 4-pipes-only 6200, perhaps higher.

Interesting, if I can just buy a 6600 for cheaper than the 6200, I might as well do that. I would end up getting the better ram as well.

Oh wait..nevermind. The 6600 I don't beleive is AGP, in fact I didn't see any AGP 6XXX series that are refurbs.

AHHAH! I found an AGP refurbed Chaintech 6200!

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-145-110R&type=Refurbished

Do you guys think this should work?

EDIT: For 20 bucks more it is almost worth it to get the new version of it because that is how much the S-video adapter alone costs. I was looking into getting one for a laptop.

i'd advise against that card if you're looking to unlock - when 6600's are returned, it's more likely that they're review models or people mistakenly bought them for agp boards. the 6200's however have unlocking potential - that's a big purchase reason and cards that fail to unlock are very likely to find their way back into the system (aka refurb).

i can't really figure out a clear way to say what i'm meaning here.. a 6200 refurb is very likely to not be unlockable, a 6600 refurb is more benign - you're buying a full-featured card, whereas the 6200 is only possibly that good, and if it isn't many people will return it.

yeha said:

i'd advise against that card if you're looking to unlock - when 6600's are returned, it's more likely that they're review models or people mistakenly bought them for agp boards. the 6200's however have unlocking potential - that's a big purchase reason and cards that fail to unlock are very likely to find their way back into the system (aka refurb).

i can't really figure out a clear way to say what i'm meaning here.. a 6200 refurb is very likely to not be unlockable, a 6600 refurb is more benign - you're buying a full-featured card, whereas the 6200 is only possibly that good, and if it isn't many people will return it.

Click to expand...

That is a VERY good point! It makes perfect sense....doesn't unlock, return it.

Also seeing as how there are a view Chaintech cards as refurbs, maybe I shall shy away from new Chaintech 6200's as they may not be unlockable cards.

I can't beleive I didn't think of that. Smart thinking my freind!

neweggs cheapest 6200 http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProdu...price=&maxprice=&mfrcode=0&DEPA=1&Order=price
$93
neweggs cheapest 6600 http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?submit=property&DEPA=1
$112, isnt it worth $21 more for the 6600?

I got a refurbed 6600 for $85 awhile back. It's probably better to play it safe and spend a little extra for the 6600. The 6200 does appear to oc a little better, but can't make up for the missing pipes, unless you get lucky. It was a chaintech got it up to 500/610 with stock cooling (no ram sinks). About 7500 in 3dmark 03,3200 in 05, 48.5k in aquamark. As for the motherboard to take advantage of the pci-e I got an Asus i915 refurbed for $65. Spent $80 (I got mad when tigerdirect had a deal on their celly's for $50) on the cpu and oc'd it to 3.5ghz. My system costs less than a 6800gt.

a refurb chaintech got up to 500/610? i guess that validates what a few people suggested in a thread a while ago - the huge number of non-gt 6600 refurbs are there because they were sent out to websites to review, then got sent back to newegg (and therefore sold as refurb since they're not new), or people bought them expecting an agp card.

there's nothing wrong with these cards, and now they're down to $70! for a card that can do 500/600 (some as high as 600/700) with 8 pipelines, you can't touch that for value. i'm not going to try the 6200, even though memory clocks always seem higher with them than 6600 models, it's just not worth the risk seeing as the price is the same for refurbs.

Sevin7 said:

neweggs cheapest 6200 http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProdu...price=&maxprice=&mfrcode=0&DEPA=1&Order=price
$93
neweggs cheapest 6600 http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?submit=property&DEPA=1
$112, isnt it worth $21 more for the 6600?

Click to expand...

The problem is, I would need AGP. That 80 something dollar refurb Chaintech 6200, is about 40 dollars cheaper than the 120 something dollar Chaintech 6600 (the cheapest new 6600 I could find).

Unfortunatly it is incredibly hard to find AGP refurbs. I think there are so many PCI-E refurbs and hardly any AGP because people with AGP systems make the mistake of buying the PCI-E card. Unfortunatly, in terms of refurbs, it isn't the other way around because the AGP's cost more, meaning it is unlikely a PCI-E user would make the mistake of buying an AGP card, because since the AGP cards are more expensive, they may not even consider it in the first place.

This is seeming like a wee bit too much money at the moment. Do you think if I waited a while I would still see AGP 6200 and 6600's?

If you want a 6200 that has a very good chance at unlocking get the one made by Leadtek. Most of the unlock easily.

Thanks Irish! I will keep my eyes peeled for a good deal on either a 6200 (preferably a Leadtek), a 6600, or an ATi equivilent.