It has occurred to me that everyone is trying to unlock the MR9800 by just changing the bios or changing the driver id to implement the MX800. These steps maybe key, but it appears that we are missing one thing. (I believe) the XPS A03 was the first bios needed to actually run MR9800 if you all recall. This may mean that we may need a bios hack for our system and may or may not need a bios hack for the MR9800 and a hack for the video driver id. It seems to me we need to work on the system bios before anything.

The MR9800 is not an X800 core. The MR9800 is built on X800 technology. (Edit: Now doubting myself)

The keyword is built

The higest I have been able to OC is 480/442 that is when ATI Tool detected an error. If I put some Artic Silver 5 on the memory and core it would probably go a little higher, but this is my work PC.....

My 3DMark05 score at I think 457/430 was 3197.... The record holder cant OC his memory past 400

I guess you've never read this article http://www.beyond3d.com/previews/... . It is possible to unlock the pipes people. Don't give up. I still believe it all boils down to the XPS bios

I don't think it has anything to do with the system bios. Vid card flashing has never had anything to do with the system bios.

The problem is that is all other cases of modding ATI cards, you had another card with the same core that you could flash too. X800 to X800 XT or 9800SE to 9800 or 9800 XT. There are no higher performing MR9800 cards, so we have nothing to flash too. THE x800 desktop variant doesn't output to the LCD correctly and the mobile x800 uses the PCI-E bus and not AGP.

My personal opinion is that if we had someone that really knew their stuff and had experience with bios modding then it probably isn't too hard, we just have no idea where to start.

That is the sad thing, it may just be as simple as changing the deviceID and a few other parameters and flashing, then installing the mobile x800 drivers. But we can't test a million different things because some of the changes may kill your m9800 card.

I agree with most of what you are saying bdork, except for the system bios situation. If you recall that when A03 came out it was pretty much dedicated to support the MR9800 alone with no other system fixes. Maybe all the system bios since are dedicated to restrict pipelines. It only makes sense that the system bios has some connections with the function of the MR9800 settings. Let me ask you this, why aren't we able to run the MR9800 with XPS A01 bios if all we need is the vid card bios to operate independently.

Small correction from A03 rear.me file
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Added support for newer video cards.
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It doesn't say it's for support of MR9800 specifically. But I agree that nobody took system BIOS in consideration. Is it important or not - nobody knows. I doubt if anybody knows if there are some locked pipes at all... But we believe...

If the MR9800 is indeed an X800 core it should look like this.

Now the question is does the MR9800 have the laser cuts or not?

This picture is limiting 4 pipes and there is no bios mod that can unlock them. The MR9800 would have to have another laser cut blocking 4 more pipes for a total of 8 (if it is indeed laser locked)



If it the MR9800 doesn't have the laser cut then it should look like this. This is what a 16 pipe card looks like. ATI can bios limit the pipes with out the laser cut. Basically a bios flash can unlock the pipes on the card..but they could be faulty (rare instance).



Now the X800SE is a 8 pipe card with DDR1 memory clocked at 450/400. I do not know if it is laser locked or bios locked.

X800SE 8 pipes 450/400 DDR1 memory
X800 Pro 12 pipes 475/450 GDDR3 memory 2.0ns for the non VIVO and 1.6ns for the VIVO(X800 Pro VIVO can only be flashed to the X800XT or X800XT PE becaue it does not feature the laser lock) The regular X800 Pro non vivo is laser locked at 12 pipes.
X800XT 16 pipes 500/500 GDDR3 memory 1.6ns
X800XT PE 16 pipes 520/560 GDDR3 memory 1.6ns
MR9800 8 pipes DDR1 memory>>>>more like an X800SE but the X800SE is way more powerful then the MR9800

So can anyone take a picture of the MR9800 core to compare it to the X800 core?

Here is the link to the site: http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=188

Here is a full shot of the X800 core, if you look in the upper right you can see were the pipes are located.



Here is a pic of a X800 Pro non vivo that has been hardmodded to unlock the extra pipes (not recommened)



I myself have an X800 Pro VIVO. I have done the bios mod to the card and successfully unlocked the 4 extra pipes. My card is offically an X800XT Platinum Edition. It has been running as an XT PE for over six months.

how was the above card hardmodded with? a soldering iron and solder or some form of jumper?

It appears to be of the same core of the x800 w/o laser cutting like your exaple above.

You can run the mr9800 on pre-A03 BIOSes. I've run it on A01.

In that picture it appears to be bios locked if it is actually an XX pipe card (I cant really see the laser lock). What we would also have to do is volt mod the card to get more mhz out of it. It most likely is running at a lower voltage then the X800 core.

Since the card is laser cut a hard mod would have to be performed.

http://forums.limitededitionsolution...p?showtopic=34

Even if a hardmod was performed I don't belive the card would register more pixle pipes.

Did the guy that was trying to unlock the 9800 realize that the card is laser locked?

If laser cut bridging is needed it can be done. Check here http://www.pcunleash.com/bbs/... . I am willing to implement this bridging technique after consulting the schematics to make sure I am making the correct jump. I will use the Mobility X800 bios unless anyone else thinks a modded desktop bios might be better.

Looks to be that that memory is rated at 450MHz

K4D55323QF
2M x 32Bit x 4 Banks Graphic Double Data Rate Synchronous DRAM with Bi-directional Data Strobe and DLL

General Description
FOR 2M x 32Bit x 4 Bank GDDR SDRAM
The K4D55323QF is 268,435,456 bits of hyper synchronous data rate Dynamic RAM organized as 4 x 2,097,152 words by 32 bits, fabricated with SAMSUNG’s high performance CMOS technology. Synchronous features with Data Strobe allow extremely high performance up to 4.0GB/s/chip. I/O transactions are possible on both edges of the clock cycle. Range of operating frequencies, programmable burst length and programmable latencies allow the device to be useful for a variety of high performance memory system applications.
Features
1.8V ± 0.1V power supply for device operation
1.8V ± 0.1V power supply for I/O interface
SSTL_2 compatible inputs/outputs
4 banks operation
MRS cycle with address key programs
- Read latency 3, 4, 5,6
- Burst length 4 only
Starting column address : Even address only
- Burst type (sequential only)
All inputs except data & DM are sampled at the positive going edge of the system clock
Differential clock input
No burst stop
No interrupt function
4 DQS's ( 1DQS / Byte )
Data I/O transactions on both edges of Data strobe
DLL aligns DQ and DQS transitions with Clock transition
Edge aligned data & data strobe output
Center aligned data & data strobe input
DM for write masking only
Auto & Self refresh
32ms refresh period (4K cycle)
144-Ball FBGA
Maximum clock frequency up to 450MHz
Maximum data rate up to 900Mbps/pin

http://www.samsung.com/Products/Semi...K4D55323QF.htm

Can anyone conferm those numbers?

...doesn't surprise me... my mr9800 (which has not been modded in any way, shape, or form) clocks to 445/425 (GPU/RAM) without artifacting or any errors in ATITool...

Werd, same here!

I think the main obsticle is trying to find a bios that will work before the hardmod is performed. Of course if the hardmod is performed and the extra pipes just work........

Or the next scenario could be, the hardmod is performed and the pipes end up being defective you will have a corrupt display.