(9800 Pro->XT) cooling

padlad

Hi,

I've invested in a saphhire 9800 Pro and was going to flash it to a 9800XT. I'm waiting for it to arrive and I was in a certain store today and bought a artic-cooler VGA silencer (rev 3) . Now will this do the job of cooling my 9800XT or will I have to bring it back and wait for komplett to have the ATI Silencer 2 back in stock?

angelofdeath

i got the vantec iceberq for my 9800pro and its decent but yeah the arctic-cooler looks great

edit:// though the ati silencer looks pretty impressive too, hmm im definitly getting me one of these

padraigf

Does it say that it's compatible with the 9800pro on the box ? I used to have a 9800pro with a vga silencer on it. Can't remember which Rev it was though. It definately cooled it adequately thought.
The ATI Silencer is made by the same crowd as the VGA Silencers, they just decided to split their products into ATI and Nvidia models.
Just one thing about flashing to XT. A lot of people have reported that they got just as good performance by sticking with the card as a 9800 pro and finding their maximum overclock. AFAIK, flashing to XT only increases voltage to memory and core, which may or may not help you get higher clock speeds. I got very slightly better results with the card flashed to XT, but you might get different results. Good luck with it

padlad

cheers. I'll probably just run it in oc mode without flashing the bios for a while. The artic cooler box says it is compatible with
-Boards based on ATi 9500-9800 (PRO, AIW,XT,SE) except 9800XT !!

Probably should have read the box first!

Calibos

padlad wrote:

cheers. I'll probably just run it in oc mode without flashing the bios for a while. The artic cooler box says it is compatible with
-Boards based on ATi 9500-9800 (PRO, AIW,XT,SE) except 9800XT !!

Probably should have read the box first!

Eh?? but you don't have an XT, you have a Pro which you are going to flash to XT. What you quoted off the back of the box just means that the artic cooler variant you have won't fit a 'Real' XT PCB. It'll fit yours though.

On the subject of flashing, when you take the stock cooler off and wipe of the old thermal paste/pad, check what GPU you have. If its R350 there is no point flashing. If its R360 then flash away. It might be worth picking up some memory heatsinks too.

Definately worth while project IMO though. I've a Dell(don't shoot me!!) with a 2.8ghz (400FSB) P4, 512mb Rambus and a Sapphire Atlantis 9800pro, with copper heatsinks on the Mem and VGA Silencer Rev1 and flashed to XT with an OC of 412/365(ie standard XT clock). Got very playable framerates on FarCry/D3/HL2 at 1024x768 with all settings bar AA and AF maxed out.

padraigf

Yes, your card is a 9800 Pro, not a 9800XT. The problem isnt that it isnt goot enough to cool an XT, just that it physically cant fit an XT. It will fit your card and cool it enough, for definite.

padlad

yeah thats what I thought. I'm going to go ahead and stick it on the 9800 board. That is whenever gls actually deliver it!

Cheers lads

Loobz

On the subject of overclocking a non flashed 9800 pro, what do ye guys use? I have ATITool which seems ok. Im unsure how long to leave the Max memory and max Core running. As far as I can see I could leave it running all day. How long should I leave it run? I have the Artic Cooler (a snip at 15.99 in PC World)

Also, when I do find max Memory for instance, then run max Core, the max Memory drops slightly. I understand this is to compensate the max overclock and will stop my card from overheating. It frustrates me cos then I say to myself one I find the max Core, I have to run max Memory all over again for a few hours. Sorry if this sounds confusing. What I would like is a guideline as to how long I should let each one running.

Thanks all