R9800P Sapphire black PCB vmods help, please...

[bachus_anonym]

hi to all modders,

let me get straight to the point...

so i have this R9800P from Sapphire... 9700-style black PCB OEM Sapphire's own design (not ATI OEM Sapphire) with Samsung 2.86ns memory rated at 350mhz and capable of 400mhz.
i finnaly took zalman heatsink off this thing to prepare it for mods...

http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/back_all.jpg

unfortunately, as us see, it has different layout...

can u guys help me with modding this thing and finding vagp a vmem checkpoints...

i have some close-up pics here:

left side (http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/SC1175CSW_left.jpg), middle (http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/SC1175CSW_right.jpg), right side (http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/mem.jpg)

under quite loud air-cooling with delta 80mm this board does 450core/400mem with absolute minimum of artifacts but i would like to make it work a bit harder :)

any help would be greatly appreciated

EDIT: I know i can solder wire to pin20 as ground and then pin18 to trimmer (for vagp) and pin5 and pin7 respectively (for vmem) but i would rather avoid that as my hands are shaky and i'm not a soldering-pro...

[bachus_anonym]

oh man, that sucks...
i just started tracing in search of vgpu and vmem alternate soldering points.
good news is that vmem seems to be the same as on reference board...
bad news that vgpu seems to disappear under that stupid heatspreader with sticker or whatever that is! i wonder if i can remove it safely...

but still looking for voltage checkpoints... guys, please, help me out here...

[bachus_anonym]

i think i got it figured out..
too bad that alternate vagp soldering point definetely sits under that aluminium plate/heatsink.

ok, went thru all exposed caps' legs on the board and measured voltages...


here's what i got for voltage checkpoints

http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/vagp_diag_small.jpg

it looks like default vagp is 1.71v. three caps show same voltage. is fan ground good idea?
also it seems like vmem checkpoint (2.80v) is also here.

and here's on vmem side...

http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/vmem_diag_small.jpg

i assume that 1.397v is vref since it's exactly half the vmem, right?


i guess i'll be preparing for some soldering very soon...

see ya guys later... :)

[Bra!nFreeZe^]

Nice work d00d ! I will be waiting eager to see how high you can clock this card! :)

[Stang_Man]

that vmem spot, the solder pad. the pad all the way to the left of the 4 in a row, that can be used as ground too.

[bachus_anonym]

Originally posted by Stang_Man
that vmem spot, the solder pad. the pad all the way to the left of the 4 in a row, that can be used as ground too.

ok, i'm done so far...

vgpu

http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/done_left_small.jpg

vmem

http://www.speakeasy.org/~michasmisiek/R9800P/done_right_small.jpg

unfortunately, other ground points thatm pin on those chips didn't work? anybody knows why?
fan header at vgpu with VR maxed out on resistance gave me 1.38v... decreasing resistance gave me decreasing clock speed... and eventually not been able to boot to windows at 1.06v

weird thing is that vmem checkpopint shows always 2.80v no matter how i turn the trimmer (need help here please) but after i decrease resistance (about 6 turns) screen gets corrupted and icons dissapear.. so seems like i raised voltage...


FIRST impression with vmem VR maxed out and vagp at 1.75v i need to clock down my memory to get rid of artifacts.... i'll get some more testing there...

[Malves]

That check point you read 2.80v is not the VDD (mem), that's VDDQ.

[bachus_anonym]

Originally posted by Malves
That check point you read 2.80v is not the VDD (mem), that's VDDQ.

yeah, i know there's something wrong here.... could you tell me where this vdd checkpoint is.... i raise vdd to get rid of artifacts but don't know how high it is...

[Malves]

that point you read 3.335v. That's the one for VDD.

[bachus_anonym]

Originally posted by Malves
that point you read 3.335v. That's the one for VDD.

wow... so this thing was doing 3.35v stock??? damn, no wonder it went to almost 390mhz artifact-free when i got it... so this checkpoint reads 3.70v now...

unfortunately i can't go back to my previous mem clock of... even at 3.7v i need to lower to 350 to have no artifacts... how to fix this thing... ? if i remove vdd mod would that work ?

[Malves]

Well, you may try the vddq mod. That should help you mem clock. You'll have to remove the plate from the back of the card to get ot the chip for the vddq mod. Be very careful when removing that - see pic below why.

The area highlited in the pic is the chip for the mod. solder pin 1 (look for the mark on the chip - the small hole) to pin 4 via 50k trimmer. Lower resistance for more volts. You have 2.8v now, you may try 3v.

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/attachment.php?s=&postid=351901

[bachus_anonym]

oh man, that sucks coz i have those trimmers glued to it (well to electric tape so i got lucky here) and wires are very short... is that gonna help, have u tried it and succeed ?

[Malves]

I haven't tried it yet, you see why. :) I'm just waiting for the new chip to get here, then I'll do it. I am modding the whole thing: vGPU, VDD, Vddq, Vref. :D

[bachus_anonym]

oh, i remember that post... your chip came of with the plate. i know it's glued on two chips... i'll try that anyways... i'm off today so plenty of time to experiment...

[LikwidKool]

also one thing I have learned is when you mod your vgpu the extra heat also heats up the ram, and will lower your ram clocks. That is probably why you had to lower your ram clocks to get rid of artifacts.

Also I can't believe that ram is at 3.3V stock! On a BBAti 9800pro the ram is at 2.68v That is just incredible.

Just be careful though. Going to high on the ram is one of the biggest killers of cards.

[bachus_anonym]

what i was thinking that maybe vddq is gonna help... i'll give it a go next week and see what happens...