No Aids Racing

Just ordered my power supply. I never thought I would spend $100 on a power supply. I'll be getting some fan filters for this new case. It sucks because BJ's has a 17" LCD monitor for $299. I could go without the radiation the one I'm using is spewing at me. I guess one thing at a time.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDe ... WSE&depa=0

hmmmm, LCD's are nice, but the quality just isn't as good as a CRT, a friend of mine has a samsung 17" LCD, and my cheapo 17' CRT blows it away as far as pic quality goes

Hey Aaron I've got the Antec 500W Blue LED PSU (it came with my case) and its real nice. I haven't had a problem with it yet, and its got plenty of power to spare. Good choice.

I was going to get the cheaper 450W one but for $20 extra it seemed like a smart choice. They seem to have a very good reputation as well.

You'll need alot of watts for the vid cards these days anyways and as for lcd monitors.They are still stuck with low refresh rates which makes gaming suck big time as you need higher refresh rates for them.My 19"runs 1024x768 at 100hz which makes everything crisp and clear and the colors vivid.I tried f1c on my mothers samsung 17" lcd and it chopped.Most crt's these days have low radiation anyway.If it bothers your eyes too much just lower the contrast a little as it is the big eye killer.oh and here comes the big finacial drain of the year m8's...thats right...christmas...wuu huuu...
carrera

Hey guys I've got a few questions. If I was to upgrade from a P4 2.6Ghz to a P4 3.2Ghz or an AMD 64-bit 3500+, would I see a big performance jump? Since I'm looking to buy a new CPU I've begun researching so I have recently realized the importance of looking at Cache and single/dual channel bandwith and not just speed. Better yet, let me list some of my specs:

P4 2.6Ghz
1 Gig PC 3200 RAM
Sapphire Radeon 9800 Pro 256MB (Soon to be an XT )
120 Gig HD

Now, if I wanted to improve my computer's performance, what would be the best thing to upgrade? I'm guessing its the CPU, because everything else seems to be pretty good.

Also, what does it mean to format Windows? I bought my PC in a bundle so all I have is the system restore disk. I've heard that formatting might help, but I don't know what it is. I've also heard re-installing Windows might help, but I dont have a Windows XP disk, just the system restore disk.

Thanks for all the help,

CART

Oh Steve quick question. You sent me a flashrom.zip file and the bios.bin. In the flashrom folder there is DOS4GW.EXE, FLASHEOM.EXE, and FLASHROM.ROM. What do I need to have copied on the floppy disk to flash? Do I need all 3 files from the unzipped flashrom folder with the bios.bin or just the flashrom.exe along with the bios.bin?

Thanks for all your help.

CART

what you need to do is unzip the flashrom file i sent you, and AFTER you format the floppy to a dos bootdisk,< when you click format, there will be a checkbox that says "create an MS DOS startup disk" > check that box, and click start, after the format is done add the files in the flashrom folder, and the bios i sent ya, just copy and paste them onto the floppy, make CERTAIN when you go to flash the card, that you backup the old bios first m8, JUST in case the flash doesn' take. all you need to know is in that link i sent ya, i would make sure i printed the instructions out before you go to flash

Also Cart, if you need a windows CD, let me know, i have a corporate copy of XP Pro, i'll mail it to ya if you want it, although your system restore cd SHOULD have windows on it, as well as all of the programs that were on the PC when you brought it home, so if you did want to reformat, thats one way you could do it

Well Steve I just had the crap scared out of me. I tried flashing the BIOS and something went wrong. First, I made the boot disk and followed the instructions, using the flashrom and .bin file you had sent me. I put in the disk, rebooted windows and was in DOS. First I backed up the existing BIOS by typing in 'flashrom -s 0 backup.bin' and the backup went fine. I then typed in 'flashrom -f -p 0 Sapphire9800XT256MBHynix.bin' and suddenly there was a flashing red ERROR message saying "Serial ROM 'Sapphire9800XT256MBHynix.bin' File Open Error" So I immediately reflashed the backup.bin BIOS, rebooted, and everything turned out fine. Thank God I didn't have to resort to booting with a PCI card and reflashing the faulty BIOS. Man, what the hell went wrong? I did everything the article said. I think there might be something wrong with the .bin file, because the flashrom program worked fine until I had to flash the XT BIOS. Maybe I have to find another .bin, or maybe theres something different about my card that wont let me flash, even though I'm positive its an R360 core with Hynix 256MB memory. Well, I think I'm going to sleep now, I've gotta relax after that one, LOL.

See ya later,

CART

you forgot to rename the new bios file, just rename it 9800xt and try again, it has to be 8 characters or less to work when you get to that point , type in flashrom -f -p 0 9800xt.bin , also, you're not putting the ' thingine in there are you? lol, no parentheses, comma's etc, just type in flashrom -f -p 0 9800xt.bin and you should be good to go !!!

Oh your right, I forgot to rename it. Ok, I renamed it to 9800XT.bin. I'm going to try it again, wish me luck!!!

make sure if you have the "XT" in caps, thats how you type it in !!! i just used lower case to preclude any confusion, lol

Ok Steve I think it worked!!! Only problem is everything is huge now, and the video card is just recognized as a VGA controller. I guess I'll install the newest Catalyst XT drivers correct? Oh hey, the found new hardware just poped up and it says it found a 9800 XT!! Thats good news! Ok I'm off to install drivers. I know you have something called Omega drivers, are they any different?

Thanks again for all your help Steve,

CART

they're ATI drivers that are tweaked, i have the 2.5.90 omegas, and i love em http://www.omegadrivers.net , they are not quite as good for benchmarking, BUT, they are opromised for games, better look and color, etc

Ok Steve I've got those drivers installed. I think its all works, in the device manager its reading as a 9800 XT, and ive now got the overdrive tab and temp monitoring. So what is an average speed for an XT? My LCD used to read about 45 under load with the Pro, and its now reading 43 idiling with the XT. I had done 3d Mark benchmarks before I did this, so I'm now going to do them again, and if there isnt a significant gain I'm just gonna go back to the Pro BIOS, because I dont want to rick the card if it isnt a big gain. We'll see!

Thanks so much Steve for all your help,

CART

speed? or temp? mine right now , is idling at 65c core, and 44c board temp, but it's hot in this room, lol , that is reading off of the actual sensor on the card, not a probe that i installed, an aftermarket probe would PROBABLY read lower than one mounted from the manufacturer

Ok I just re-ran the benchmark tests. In 3d Mark 2001 SE I gained 702 points and rose to a 14968, I'm guessing its my slower processor thats holding me back in that test. I then did 3d Mark 2003 and gained 822 points and rose to a 6432, thats a pretty big increase. According to the control panel I'm idling at 67 core, but the temp probe I have mounted is reading 44, theres a pretty big gap. Is is safe to be 67 idling? That means it will probably rise to the high 70's when gaming. But then again, the Pro used to idle at 40, so in reality the offset between the two sensors means that the Pro was idling at 4 lower than the XT, or 63. So, I guess there isnt a very big difference in temperature, but a huge difference in performance. Looks like I'm gonna have to make a new invention to cool it down, lol.

does your heatsink have a fan on it Cart? or is it a passive heatpipe?

me i don't have any problems with heat of course...why...because according to the u.s.a i live in an igloo..
carrera