7800GS+Sonoma = King of AGP

[Samurai Blade]

you will have to rip out the lower memory locks to fit a 7800gs to that board i should know as my siggy shows , i think i was one of the first to install a custom air heatsink to my 7800gs (destroyed a few titanium drill bits in the process) gratz on getting a watercooled solution on yours!. ive got to get the side door upgrade to my machine before i can push the memory on the card up anymore as all the air passes through from front to back atm without much air blowing on the mobo or gfx card . that will change though.

 

[Maviryk]

Lower memory locks? Eh? I just used a low profile HS for that one ram chip, they don't get that hot anyhow.

That pic is of my SECOND P4C800-EDLX.

Update: My Sonoma setup is up and running, I'll have pics this afternoon. I just finished adding the Vdimm and Vdroop mod to the second mobo. I stuck my extra 2gb kit in there, along with my extra 250gb HD, and my extra 480watt PSU. Took out one of the CDROM drives from my main rig to attach to this Sonoma setup so that I could install windows to test OC speeds. It is currently using an old GeForce 2 MX400 AGP card I had lying around. Pics to come after I get off from work today.

So far with a 3:4 divider, I have my FSB at around 175Mhz, with the ram at around 232Mhz, CPU clocked at 2.605Ghz from 1.86Ghz. Currently running at, 1.4volts (I think?) It is running Prime95 for stability tests at the moment. I won't be swapping it out for the rig in my sig YET. I still have to buy sinks for the Mosfets and caps for the CT-479 mods (the adapter is currently stock).

Even with the adapter stock, it's already beating my OC'ed P4 3.2e OC'ed to 3.84Ghz at SuperPi 1m by 6 seconds, and that is on air, before the Hipro5 mods.

I just did all this last night, having stability problems in Clockgen when increasing the FSB past 175Mhz. At first I was starving the CPU of voltage. After some research I believe I can give it up to 1.55 volts safely, so that will be tonight's test. 2.6Ghz might be the stock limit for the adapter though, but I'm already impressed by it's performance.

Oh yea, ran 3dMark01SE with the MX400, 1700 3dmarks! Woot!

 

[-aDaM^]

im impressed, great job man keep up the good work

 

[Maviryk]

Well, I had a surprise when I got home today. I left my main rig running in the same room as the Dothan rig, which was burning in/stability testing with Prime95. The air conditioner was off.... apparently my main rig overheated and started rebooting!

But all is well! After a few CMOS resets my main rig is up and running again. Whew! For a moment I thought I had a dead rig on my hands. Here is a picture of the Dothan setup as it sits on my desk right now, excuse the mess, I just put it together last night and it is waiting for more mods as soon as the mosfet sinks and parts for the CT479 come in. I have a TT Smartfan ducted with duct tape on the stock cooler for improved cooling. Not sure how accurate the readings for ASUS Probe is though, it's reading 75°C load but the HS isn't even warm.


1M SPI in 29 seconds! I can't wait until I get it under water and coupled with the 7800GS!

 

[-aDaM^]

Well, I had a surprise when I got home today. I left my main rig running in the same room as the Dothan rig, which was burning in/stability testing with Prime95. The air conditioner was off.... apparently my main rig overheated and started rebooting!

But all is well! After a few CMOS resets my main rig is up and running again. Whew! For a moment I thought I had a dead rig on my hands. Here is a picture of the Dothan setup as it sits on my desk right now, excuse the mess, I just put it together last night and it is waiting for more mods as soon as the mosfet sinks and parts for the CT479 come in. I have a TT Smartfan ducted with duct tape on the stock cooler for improved cooling. Not sure how accurate the readings for ASUS Probe is though, it's reading 75°C load but the HS isn't even warm.


1M SPI in 29 seconds! I can't wait until I get it under water and coupled with the 7800GS!

wow those Dothan's are something else... 29 sec 1M SPI not even overclocked.....

 

[Maviryk]

Actually that IS overclocked. sorry if I didn't make that clear. Stock(1.86GHz) it is 44 seconds. Currently it is running at 14 x 186MHz (2.61GHz) with ram at 233MHz with 3-3-3-8 timings. Tightening the timings from 3-4-4-8 made the SPI faster by one second.

Edit: Just messed with some more timings, CPU clocked at 2640MHz (240x11), FSBRAM 1:1 3-3-3-8 timings, 1M SPI now at 28 seconds... on AIR!

Additional Edit: Did some more research, apparently these chips can handle upwards of 1.8volts with proper cooling... so.. wow. I've only put 1.535 volts on the chip so far.

 

[brint]

hehe, nice. Keep us updated.

 

[Ziggey]

I can't wait to see what this baby does
Subscribed

 

[n0aH]

Man ive got the 7800gs and NOT oced i got 6,200 on 3DM05, and my system istn near as good as yours..wierd

 

[tresmonos]

Gotta love agp 1337'ness. Subscribed!

 

[Maviryk]

Man ive got the 7800gs and NOT oced i got 6,200 on 3DM05, and my system istn near as good as yours..wierd

That's what my system gets stock, max OC'ed I get around 7200, but that's not 100% stable for WoW (BTW, WoW is the best, IMHO, stability test).

Update: Hipro5 just released a couple new mods, and I just got my CT-479 Mod kit in. Will report back this evening. For now, I must go back to work.

Oh, BTW, major components of the rig in my sig are up for sale, please check classifieds in Miscellaneous section.

Can you feel the GHz?

 

[Maviryk]

Oh dear...

I just did the mods to the CT-479 adapter, smallest soldering I've ever had to do and very poor job of it if I might add...

Wish me luck, in about 10 minutes we'll find out if I have a dead Dothan on my hands...

Whoo.....

 

[twoeyes]

LIVE DOTHAN! you've been on such a roll

 

[n0aH]

Oh dear...

I just did the mods to the CT-479 adapter, smallest soldering I've ever had to do and very poor job of it if I might add...

Wish me luck, in about 10 minutes we'll find out if I have a dead Dothan on my hands...

Whoo.....

dont mean to bust on ya man but your not allowed to advertise classifieds outside of classifieds section. Mods will get mad at ya

 

[Blkout]

What's the Ketchup for?

 

[-aDaM^]

updates?

 

[Maviryk]

Well, it's not dead yet!

Modified CT-479

5/8" Aluminum U-channel I'm gonna use to mount my waterblock, along with some 6-32 3" rods.

How the U-channel is suposed to work.

Whew! Almost made a boo-boo, I had to cut out some of the channel so that the Storm would fit.

Mocking everything up, fts great! Also put in some anti core crushing cushion and my temp. probe.

A fully volt-modded 7800GS. Left to right, Vcore, VDDR, and VDDQ, along with accessible read points. The jumper is to turn them all off.

Everything inside the case, first time it's been fully closed in a long, long time!

Benches, etc.

Fastest SPI at 27.026 seconds. I could probably get better SPI time if I had 4 x 512 low latency DDR-500, but that's quite alright, no more money into this AGP rig!

This Dothan Sonoma is AWESOME! Right now I'm at 2.8GHz, it can probably hit 3GHz, except for the fact that I am maxed out on voltage. I was going to do the Vcore on the P4C800-EDLX, but I grabbed a 50ohm resister instead of a 50kohm resistor.... that would have been BAD.

As far as stability goes... not enough. Although it will run benchmarks just fine, they aren't everything. I'd take real life perforamance over benches anyday. The GS will run benches all day at 500/1700, no artifacts. But for reliable BF2 and WoW (2+ hours w/o crashing), I have to bring it down to 470/1500... Stock is 430/1300...

But overall I'm really ecstatic with the results of the entire project as it stands right now. My water temps are great! The Sonoma hasn't seen load temps above 32°C (Ambient @ 23°C)!!! The 3.2 used to IDLE higher than that! And for real game performance, I saw ~50% increase in WoW FPS in Orgrimmar! Usually during peak times it gets as low as 17FPS, averaging at 22. With the Sonoma installed the lowest I saw was 24FPS averaging at 36FPS.

 

[-aDaM^]

Damn nice job dude, looks great!

 

[Maviryk]

I messed my pants, twice.

So when I did the mods to the mobo the first time, I didn't have a 50k Ohm resistor handy to do the Vcore mod. Well I just did it last night.
ZOMG WTFBBQ!

Now I'm running the processor at 2940Mhz (12 x 245) @ 1.775 volts. Nearly 60% OC! Whoo! SPI 1M in 26.420 seconds.

So... close... to... 3Ghz... I gave the PM 1.8 volts but it wouldn't do 12x250 stable...

But wow... I'm amazed by the in-game performance yet again. I turned off Vertical Sync (dunno why it was on in the first place) in World of Warcraft... and my FPS DOUBLED(from my old P4 performance)! I'm now ranging 40-90FPS.

I also installed the Thermalright HR-05 NB heatsink to replace my stock one. It looks good, performs well, and I found a use for the stock 70mm fan that came with the CT-479 Adaptor.

Looking inside the motherboard area... there's wires and pots everywhere! I'll post a shot later. Thinking about putting a white LED strip at the bottom of my case so that I can see the trimmers and adjust voltages w/o a flashlight. Pics later, I'm at work at the moment.

 

[Dreamcaster]

Just gotta say great work! Looks amazing!

Also, i think its worth saying that your case also looks ace, you should have a thread on how you built it, as i think it would be very interesting for some people