Hard Modding a NVidia 6800.... Collective Tiny Soldering Knowledge required!!

pseudonympseudonym Michigan Icrontian
edited October 2004 in Hardware
Ok guys, I need a little expertise here.

I just bought a NVidia 6800 and after a bit of searching I've found a hard mod that will allow me to turn it into a 6800 Ultra. Basically it opens up the 4 pipelines that are closed (going from 12 to 16) and you'll get the core right, but you won't get the ram speeds because the ram is slower on the low end cards. Anyways, the problem is breaking the resistor bridges and connecting the others. Steps are shown here

http://www.pcunleash.com/bbs/zboard.php?id=MyItemReview&no=39

Now I know what I need to do, but I've never done any of it before.

Basically I need to know a good way of breaking these bridges, and then connecting the other ones. I know soldering is the best way, but I do not have the equipment nor the expertise to do something this small. I figure the best way to do this is in a non permament manner off the bat to make sure all the pipelines are good (I'm assuming they will be because this is a Gainward Golden Smaple card and I know they are supposedly picky about what goes on these boards, so no bad cores hopefully) and then a permament manner after I see if there is no artifacting. I'd like to do the non-permament setup myself just to make it easier to check, and then for a more permament solution I might have to call on SMs local "whos your daddy" of soldering MicroMan.

I've also attached a picture of what the area looks like. Basically the bridges need to go from This (Letters representing resistors, = representing bridges)

A B C = D
E F G = H
X = Y O P

to this

A = B C = D
E F G = H
X Y O P

So it requires the breaking of 1 and then the soldering of another. Any help will be appreciated guys. Thanks!!
07.jpg 40.4K

Comments

  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Personally I'm using the newest version of RivaTuner to softmod mine and it works like a charm, the older version wouldn't do it but with this one all 16p and 6v pipes are open and my warranty is still intact.
    I would really advise you to at least try the softmod before you hardmod it and void your warranty that way if the extra shaders are in fact bad you won't be stuck with a rather expensive paperweight.
    Just my 2 cents worth.
  • pseudonympseudonym Michigan Icrontian
    edited October 2004
    madmat wrote:
    Personally I'm using the newest version of RivaTuner to softmod mine and it works like a charm, the older version wouldn't do it but with this one all 16p and 6v pipes are open and my warranty is still intact.
    I would really advise you to at least try the softmod before you hardmod it and void your warranty that way if the extra shaders are in fact bad you won't be stuck with a rather expensive paperweight.
    Just my 2 cents worth.

    You are very correct. I hadn't found that the new RivaTuner had the option till after I posted that. I was coming on to annoounce it was running right now with 16x1 and 6VP. Results to come ;)
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Good deal...:) I wish you luck in your endeavor and the only advice I can give in regards to the soldering part is to use a good brand of solder-wick to remove the old solder from the pieces you need to take off and to use an exacto handle with a small diameter spike point with a small blob of bees wax to position the piece for soldering. Make sure that your iron has the tip ground to a long tapering sharp conical point and always tin the tip.
    Don't touch the iron to anything until you have the piece in place then touch the iron to the piece to be soldered, make sure you're putting pressure on the piece with the exacto handle or it could float because the bees wax will melt off in a heartbeat, the resistor will drop into place on the end you heat first as the solder ball there melts so expect it. Then quickly move the iron to the second point.
    Good luck on the hardmod if you decide to pursue it.
  • pseudonympseudonym Michigan Icrontian
    edited October 2004
    Ugh, I don't think I will ;D So far no artifacts here and an improvement in scores. I can now surpass my OC'ed scores with stock speeds and the 16 pipes open. Pretty sweet!! :)
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Sounds like a winner to me man, congratulations on beating the system ;)
  • pseudonympseudonym Michigan Icrontian
    edited October 2004
    madmat wrote:
    Sounds like a winner to me man, congratulations on beating the system ;)

    Why thank you. As of now I've managed to beat the system 3 times. Come to think of it the last time I bought a card and never tried to surpass its stock setup was my dual Voodoo 2s ;D As of now I've had a softmodded 9500, a bios flashed 9800np->pro and now a Geforce 6800->Almost Ultra. Heres to never paying full price!!

    edit// I'm floored by the scores this thing is putting out right now. I think I'll write something up in the morning on this, but it looks like the softmod and an OC put my scores up over 10000 in 3dmark03. I'm getting very interesting results though from 05 and Doom3. There are some quirks to this mod I think... Bed time though.
  • dak125dak125
    edited October 2004
    Can you guys point me in the right direction to try softmodding my new 6800 GTO to enable all 16 pipelines? I have Rivatuner and I'm just not finding the option.

    I have it running at 410mhz/1110mem which results in 11,453 3dmarks03. Where's the option to try to enable the last 4 pipelines? Thanks in advance.
  • TheSmJTheSmJ
    edited October 2004
    dak125 wrote:
    Can you guys point me in the right direction to try softmodding my new 6800 GTO to enable all 16 pipelines? I have Rivatuner and I'm just not finding the option.

    I have it running at 410mhz/1110mem which results in 11,453 3dmarks03. Where's the option to try to enable the last 4 pipelines? Thanks in advance.


    You have the 6800 GT? If so, the softmod won't do anything for you, as you already have everythign enabled, and the only thing you need to do to make it an Ultra is bump the speeds to 400/1100 (which you have).

    If you really just have a vanilla 6800, then thats one damn-fine oc!
  • dak125dak125
    edited October 2004
    It's a long story.

    Short version:

    The 6800 GTO is a Dell only OEM card. It's either a detuned 6800 GT or an overtuned 6800, no one's really sure yet. So, basically it's showing up in Rivatuner at 6800 specs (12 Pipes and 5vp). I can overclock it just fine but I want those extra 4 pipes enabled. How do I do it?

    I've been looking for a guide all over and haven't been able to find anything. I just tried using a different driver (61.77) but it seemed to have froze. I waited a little under 10 minutes and it still wasn't doing anything.

    I basically want to know how these guys with 6800 NU's are unlocking those 4 extra pipes. Thanks.
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Got MSN or yahoo? If so get with me and I'll walk you through it.
  • dak125dak125
    edited October 2004
    Surely, MSN:

    dak11125[at]hotmail.com

    Thanks man.

    EDIT: Just added you.
  • dak125dak125
    edited October 2004
    madmat you're the man. He just turned my 6800 GTO into a full fledged 6800 Ultra muahah. 12,111 3dmarks03 as of now. More ocing tomorrow.
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Glad to help. :thumbsup:
  • ShortyShorty Manchester, UK Icrontian
    edited October 2004
    Nice work Mat :thumbsup::mullet:
  • JimboraeJimborae Newbury, Berks, UK New
    edited October 2004
    Well done Mat & Dak. That card must have some seriously fast memory on it to be able to o/c to Ultra speeds. Me very jealous.
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    It's sort of like the ASUS 9999GE card which is a 256mb DDR3 card with the 1.1ghz DDR3 onboard but running a crippled GPU, I'm starting to see other manufacturers putting out cards like this including eVGA (newegg had them in stock) and even though the eVGA card is running the ram at 700mhz on their version I'll bet that it's capable of at least 1ghz because I don't think that there's any DDR3 slower than that.
    Thanks on the kudos Shory and Jimborae, I'm just happy to get someone else up and beating "The Man" at his own game, dak's got a pretty sweet card there, not only did he get an ultra out of the deal, his version is PCI-E as well.
  • deepseadeepsea Lancaster, PA
    edited October 2004
    OK, I've got a BFG 6800GT OC running at 370 MHz...will Rivatuner OC it, or how can I push it up to Ultra clock speeds?
  • madmatmadmat
    edited October 2004
    Download and unzip this file (winrar or winzip or even the compressed file handler in XP will do it) then click on it after that you'll have several new options in your driver control panel such as clock frequencies, agp rates and custom refresh rates (not a good idea to monkey with, can potentially bork your system) set the clock frequency option to manual, you will have to scroll down and agree to the fact that you're voiding your warranty when you choose to overclock so just scroll through the EULA first. Hit the drop down box and choose performance and then hit detect frequency. After it finds your clock frequency, check the box to apply on startup, hit OK and you're set.
  • BudBud Chesterfield, Va
    edited October 2004
    which 6800 card was that cause i think im gonn ahave to give that a try
  • dak125dak125
    edited October 2004
    If you're asking me I have the 6800 GTO, Dell only card unfortunately.

    I didn't have any games at the location I was at last night but tonight is game arama. I'm aiming for 1000 FPS+ in the original MOH:AA. And yes it's 16x PCI-x. I played the MOH:PA demo last night. Crazy stuff on the 20.1 inch lcd :thumbsup:
  • deepseadeepsea Lancaster, PA
    edited October 2004
    Sweet...thanks guys. I pushed my 3D Mark 03 to 12191 and my 3D Mark 05 to 4989....using 400 / 1000...maybe I'll try for more tomorrow....
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