Video Card Thread (Mostly Gecube x1950xt)

As far as I'm aware, it solely relies on the CPU.

 

I updated the chart which is now on page 40.

 

Cool. So, anybody want to buy my card?

 

If you buy an 8800 we're disowning you from this thread! lol

 

Haha, don't worry I'll be switching to another ATI card. Seriously though, I'm open to offers.

 

What are you planning on getting? the Viper 2900?
I'd be interested to see your 3dmark with that!

 

Naw just a rev1 X1900 GT. Higher core clock, and software adjustable voltage.

EDIT: You know what, scratch that. Too much work just for a little bit of voltage. The memory speed is clocked much lower on them anyway. Maybe I'll just do that hardmod later. By the way, what are mosfets?

 

Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistors. (and no I didn't wiki or google that, I know it off by heart. Sad eh?)
They are essentially just versions of transistors, typically used in Voltage regulation, audio amplifiers and so on.

 

I'm afraid I don't get what you are saying? Are you saying that the rev1 cards have those? Also why do you know that by heart? lol

 

A Level in Electronics, I'm afraid.
To my knowledge, all graphics cards have them, along with motherboards and various other components.

Take a look at this picture

Just beneath green capacitors, there are the old style Power regulators (the arches with copper wire wrapped around them), Inductors.
Underneath those, the black squares are MOSFETS which are what we use now.
Power regs are needed because the CPU is connected (indirectly) to the 12V rail. Since the CPU uses far less than 12V, it needs a power supply unit of its own to drop the voltage down to the correct level.

On your X1900GT it's the same thing. Your core doesnt use anywhere near 12V, but thats what powers the card, so VRegs are required.


Here's an X1900GT.
See the red heatsinks at the back? What's underneath them?

 

Oh, I'm dumb!

I didn't realize you were defining Mosfets.

 

See above post for more info.
Now you realise why they're important for voltage control.

One of the other issues you have with MOSFETS on graphics cards is when you start taking the passive cooling route.
This is what my X1900XT looks like

See the red heatsinks again? Now you'll notice there's no fan pulling air round there, but yet the heatsinks are still the same tiny ones as before. Consequently, unless you have a large amount of airflow in your case, the temperature of your Vregs can easily exceed 100C in games.

 

Yeah but mine doesn't look like that though. This is what mine looks like.


Also can you explain to me in normal terms what is to be done here. I don't understand the penciling part.

http://www.vr-zone.com/articles/X1900GT_Rev_2_Voltage_Mods/4151.html

 

I'm afraid my knowledge runs a little on the thin side here. I never pencil mod my stuff, so I don't have any personal experience. I understand what it is he's telling you to do, but I don't see how you can pencil half the resistance off a resistor like that. As long as you're careful, soldering a variable resistor sounds like a better idea.

 

But what the hell is pencil modding?

 

Ah well, I do know that much.
Pencil modding involves using a conductive pencil (i.e. a pencil that doesn't lay graphite, but an electrically-conductive material) to short two points on a PCB.

 

Well the Crysis demo is released today, so I think I'll download it and see what happens. The demo is said to be more "stable" and I think I'll get better performance with it than with the beta. I might post some benches up later too.

 

Alright! So I just sold my 85 dollars card for 120! The guy will be picking it up tomorrow! This is what I'm getting now.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131055

Double the Ram and also faster! It also has the Arctic Cooling Accelero(sp?), so it probably overclocks better.

 

looks good abuzar. I wonder what frames you'll get in Crysis with that.

Anyway, I played the demo for about an hour and a half, and this is what I got:

http://img98.imageshack.us/my.php?image=91791002ev0.jpg

I played on medium/high settings at 800x600, got around mid teens to 25fps, which wasn't bad actually. I really enjoyed it and I am looking forward to the real thing.

 

Tell me exactly what setting you played on so I can try the same.