HD4870 1Gb to FirePro V8700 BIOS Flash?

[karl_eller]

So one of my friends is starting to get into 3D CGI work like Maya and the like for uni and as a future job, and is enlisting me to help build her a rig some time early next year. Now one problem is that Maya has hella issues with just about every mainstream card brand (ie Radeon and GeForce), and all the workstation cards are stupidly expensive (already fairly high prices plus the usual "not in the US" mark-up PLUS the "Not a high turn-over item" mark-up that Aussie retailers put on anything server or workstation oriented). I've heard about people soft-modding the HD4870 1 Gb cards to FirePro V8700's (Hardware is identical minus the two DisplayPort's) using driver modifications to get the FirePro drivers installed, but they look fairly complicated, and my friend isn't computer nerdy enough to pull it off, especially whenever she had to update the drivers.

So I was thinking, why not try a somewhat easier (maybe?) if more permanent approach, and force flash a FirePro V8700 BIOS onto the HD4870 1Gb card? Now unfortunately I'm not hugely wised up on GPU BIOS's, but since the hardware is pretty much identical, would the BIOS flash be possible? Or else mod an existing HD4870 1Gb BIOS so that the drivers thought it was dealing with a FirePro V8700?

Unfortunately I don't have an HD4870 on hand to do any tinkering with, but has anybody heard of someone doing something like this? Might take a bit more work in the short term, but in the long term it'd make life a LOT easier, even if it was just modding the HD4870's BIOS to say "Hey, I'm a FirePro V8700, not an HD4870! Honest!" so that the FirePro drivers would install.

And if I did need to mod the BIOS... well where would I start? :shrug: Obviously I'd need an HD4870 1 Gb BIOS and probably a V8700 BIOS to compare the two, but what tools would I be needing to first turn the BIOS into something vaguely human readable, and then make any changes to said BIOS?

Eller

[zanzabar]

the new workstation cards have display port so u cant cross flash the reference card

u can use the driver though

[karl_eller]

So the Display Ports make that big a difference to cross-flashing it? There wouldn't be some way to disable that part in the V8700's BIOS?

Like I said, most of the driver mods are too complicated for her to do on her own, don't always work, and it's not particularly convenient for me to go visit to update the GPU drivers (She's 2+ hours away). If there was a once-off method that'd trick the FirePro drivers into thinking they were being installed for a V8700 instead of an HD4870, that'd save a LOT of hassle over the long run. Even if it's just something like changing a few lines in the HD4870's BIOS so that it says it's a V8700 instead of an HD4870.

Eller

[B.E.E.F.]

Can you post a link to the driver mods please?

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

you could get her a 3870 which has great performance in those apps and is easy to flash... I'm pretty sure it's equivalent WS card is expensive as anything still :)

[zanzabar]

Can you post a link to the driver mods please?

u just dload the fireGL driver and add your card to the INI, or replace the GL with your equivalent card

but amd dosnt limit the driver or workstation appability on the normal cards they work in workstation apps and there is only about a 5% difference atleast from what i tried

[karl_eller]

u just dload the fireGL driver and add your card to the INI, or replace the GL with your equivalent card

but amd dosnt limit the driver or workstation appability on the normal cards they work in workstation apps and there is only about a 5% difference atleast from what i tried
The performance difference is a fair bit more than 5% in most stuff. Plus, a lot of programs (Maya is a big one) have a lot of issues with the desktop brand cards. Basically, trying to use Maya with a GeForce or Radeon card is an exercise in frustration and bugs.

If it's just a modded .ini file, then that's probably do-able (I've done them all the time for my laptop GPU drivers, and it's easy enough to walk someone through it if I mod the .ini file), but a lot of the walk-through's I've seen on Guru3D and the like talk about using Patchscripts and the like which looks like a fair bit more work.
Edit: Also, there are currently only XP patch-scripts, while I'd be needing Vista x64 scripts.

Eller

[B.E.E.F.]

u just dload the fireGL driver and add your card to the INI, or replace the GL with your equivalent card

but amd dosnt limit the driver or workstation appability on the normal cards they work in workstation apps and there is only about a 5% difference atleast from what i tried

Awesome. Now if only there were some kind of program to be able to switch drivers on the fly. :D

Seriously.

[zanzabar]

Awesome. Now if only there were some kind of program to be able to switch drivers on the fly. :D

Seriously.

if u have vista u can do it on your own (device manager) and reinitialize CCC

and so long as u have stereoscopic 3d viewing dissabled there is no problem with maya or solid works


if u want no problems find a 2900pro, its directly flashable and 1GB

[STEvil]

You can use Radeon Bios Editor to change the DeviceID then reflash your bios. I'm tempted to do it with my 4870X2 :D

[karl_eller]

You can use Radeon Bios Editor to change the DeviceID then reflash your bios. I'm tempted to do it with my 4870X2 :D
Yeah, I was having a bit of a look around at BIOS editors today, and it looked like changing Device ID is a fairly standard feature. You should change the HD4870 X2 to the FirePro equivalent and tell us if it'll allow installing of un-modded FirePro drivers ;) Would be a hell of a lot easier than modding the drivers every time you need to update :P

Eller

[B.E.E.F.]

Yeah, I was having a bit of a look around at BIOS editors today, and it looked like changing Device ID is a fairly standard feature. You should change the HD4870 X2 to the FirePro equivalent and tell us if it'll allow installing of un-modded FirePro drivers ;) Would be a hell of a lot easier than modding the drivers every time you need to update :P

Eller

Yes. But then you can't use Catalyst drivers.

[eximious]

I wasn't aware that the HD 4XXX series had been softmodded into a V8700 successfully yet. Could you post a link? Not that I don't believe you, I'd just like to see their system settings and new benchmarks.

Thanks!

[ownage]

I don't think a FireGL bios will work because of various different components. Changing the device-id might work.
I'm gonna try software modding my hd3850 to an V6850.
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=542&card2=546

If it works it also should work with hd2900 and Hd3870.

[simri]

FirePro 8.543 V7700 UNTEST For HD3800s
FirePro 8.543 V8700 UNTEST For HD4800s

http://www.newdisk.cn/mypane.aspx?Path=wesley8/NEW ATI MODs/

[T2k]

the new workstation cards have display port so u cant cross flash the reference card

u can use the driver though

Powercolor offers 4850 with Display Port and HDMI...

[Jor3lBR]

FirePro 8.543 V7700 UNTEST For HD3800s
FirePro 8.543 V8700 UNTEST For HD4800s

http://www.newdisk.cn/mypane.aspx?Path=wesley8/NEW ATI MODs/

What are the gains in performance to flash a 3870 into a FirePro?

[Jor3lBR]

FirePro 8.543 V7700 UNTEST For HD3800s
FirePro 8.543 V8700 UNTEST For HD4800s

http://www.newdisk.cn/mypane.aspx?Path=wesley8/NEW ATI MODs/

Link is broken :shrug:

[simri]

http://www.newdisk.cn/mypane.aspx?Path=wesley8/NEW ATI MODs/

[B.E.E.F.]

Still nothing. Any development on this??