ATI 9800 Pro into XT, worth it?

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Bob
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ATI 9800 Pro into XT, worth it?

Post by Bob »

I've got a Radeon 9800 pro that looks like it's the kind you can flash into being an XT. I've already upgraded the cooling on it (to reduce the noise factor, it was the loudest fan in my case.)

Think it's worth it to chance something going wrong?
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SirReal
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Post by SirReal »

I wouldn't do it. You'd get, what 1-3 fps more?
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Bob
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Post by Bob »

That's what I'm wondering. I'm seeing 10 fps differences in some of the stock Pro vs XT comparisons. Even that doesn't seem worth it to me. I'm wondering if there's any visual differences.
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dangerballs
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Post by dangerballs »

The whole flash upgrade thing is very iffy. It is true that they are built using the same core, but most of the Pros have those pipelines shut off for a good reason (i.e. they don't work). What happens is basically that a chip from a certain XT pressing gets tested to see if it function correctly. If it does, it gets turned into an XT. If it doesn't, depending on the extent of the problem and the need for other chips, it can get turned into a Pro or maybe an SE.

Of course, some of the chips that get turned into Pros will work perfectly fine as XTs. Maybe ATI just needed some Pros to meet demand so they went and underclocked some XTs and turned off some pipelines. But there is also a distinct possibilty that the chip on your Pro was indeed faulty and turning on those pipelines will screw it up. So that is the chance you have to take if you choose to flash your Pro.

It might work, and then it might disable your card. I would think that the small gains that you will see wouldn't be worth the chance.
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