I can´t believe it!!!!!!!!!!
I rma´ed my sapphire 9500np 128Mb non modable and a very bad overclocker and unstable because it crashed and they have sent me a new radeon 9500np 128Mb with etrontech 3.3 memory (the worst) and it´s modable, I have modded it to a 9500pro!!!!!!
Also I have overclocked it from 275/540 to 371/540(the mem displayed artifacts if I o/c it. Then I have updated the bios with the version 8.004 (from 8.003) and voila, I have it running rock stable to 384/580!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have gained a lot of performance and the scores that I have got in 3dmark are in my signature, very good results for the rest of my system specs ;D
I´m very happy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
and all with stock cooling :o

Well, be very careful with OC'ing the hell out of the poor System there.

I've heard of the first modded Radeons that lost some of their normal Pipelines (non-recoverable), or stopped working all together.

While Overclocking seems a "sport for the masses", it hits many as a catastrophy when their Card is ruined after a while. (leaving them with the wisdom that a non-overclocked Radeon is still worlds better than a dead one :P )

Yes, but they´re dead because of overheating and when I am playing games, I touch the memory and the gpu and it´s only warm not so hot, so it´s difficult to stop working for that, surely for summer I´ll have to decrease the o/c as it´s known that it´s very hot here in the south of Spain ;)

That's not entirely true...

If you operate it close to it's theoretical Maximum, internal thermal stress (unpredictable and uncontrollable speedpathes and Hotspots) and eventually electron Migration will do their job, regardless of cooling efforts.

Those small Capacitors used on about all Hardware also tend to exhibit a reduced lifetime (if one of those 50Cent pieces blows or bends its Cap, the Hardware is at least disfunctional for a while, or worst case toast  :-/ )

It's just a consideration. If you could by another Radeon tomorrow right out of your Pocket (sufficient money to waste is the Overclocker's best insurance), not a factor anyway.
But otherwise, I'd recommend to refrain from Overclocking, until the Card really needs it to be useful (which shouldn't happen within the next 2 years if you set it up correctly ;) )

...the road of Overclocking is plastered with destroyed CPU's, Motherboards, RAM's, PSU's and GFX Cards. But usually, people don't speak alot about their failures, thus creating an athmosphere of 'apparent but false safety'...
...after all, success and OC Records sell better than failures ;)

Thanks for the advice :D
I´ll have in count and surely, I put it in a lower overclocking at least at pro speed which is 325 instead of the related 384!!!!! :o
I´ll have the memory to 290 as it´s certificated to 300Mhz (3.3ns)
I think it´s a good and safe o/c ;)

;D

?
Don't know who of us you meant, but either Case, he can OC whenever he wishes by the movement of a Mouse, anytime ;)

I can only give advisory, nothing more, just a little consideration before "instinctively moving that slider into the Hot region"... 8)

and I´m glad for read your opinion Falcon ;)

Hey Fantasma,
Did you 'burn-in/run-in' the video card for a couple of days before you decided to overclock?  ???

Any CPU/GPU OC should be accompanied by sufficient cooling.  Increasing the core voltage too much 'to improve stability' will cause damage no matter what the cooling though.

I think the same as Micha and I don´t want to increase its voltage because it´s too risky.
Also, I have separate my pentium 2 fan from its heatsink and I have put it over the back of the gpu, it runs quite well as I now can overclock 10Mhz more both in core and memory but I´m not going to overclocking it much as I only wanted to be sure that the cards don´t get overheated

All respect to your Radeon and well done, but,

What does this conversation have to do with this forum!? ATI??

Radeon Defector!  >:( Burn him at the stake! :P ;D

LOL, just talking a bit, as I am a supporter of the 3dfx cards and I defend them in lots of places.
Although this is a 3dfx forum, I think that it´s more tolerant with other cards than the ati or nvidia forum and also, I have posted this in the section This and That as I think that this part of the forum is about talking lots of things and not just voodoo´s anyway if I have mistaken tell me and sorry if I could offend to someone for this :)

Nope, just jokin with you Fantasma  ;D

You totally justify your topic, and yes it is in This & That, and you are probably free to talk about whatever you want!!

So how much did you pay for the card!?

My friend at work bought a 9600 Pro (I think it's a Pro, I definetely know it's a 9600).  He says it's a dream at running games, but cost him £170.00GBP

My girlfriend has a 9000 Pro, even that runs quite fast. Only thing I hate about these ATI Radeons is the drivers.  I find them a b*s***d to install!

I personally paid around £160 for my Radeon 9500... ;)

Then I modded it to a 9700 Pro!!! :D

THIS CARD KICKS MAJOR A$$! 8)

Nuff said! ;D

It cost me about 200 euros but I bought it last year in march, the new one is a replacement because my card crashed so they sent me a new one because of the warranty ;D

wrote on 17.01.04 at 00:17:53:

I personally paid around £160 for my Radeon 9500... ;) Then I modded it to a 9700 Pro!!! :D

How do you mod these cards from one series to another?  I thought with the series numbers being different (9500, 9600, 9700, 9800) that there would be different features and better technology that the lower series card would not have.  :-/

The only mod you can do is on the 9500np.
This are the features of the different cards:
9500np: 4 pixel pipelines, 256bit or 128bit memory
9500 pro: 8 pixel pipelines, 128bit memory
9700: 8 pixel pipelines, 256bit memory
9700 pro: 8 pixel pipelines, 256bit memory but with an higher clock.
Well, this 4 cards have the same gpu, in the 9500np there are 4 hidden pipelines that can be "free", and if you have the 128bit version, you can mod it to a 9500 pro as my case, or if you have the 256bit version, you can mod it to a 9700 which with overclocking, can be a 9700 pro. This can be done by a patchscript that it´s in the rivatuner utility, using the omegadriver, or using w1zzard´s ones. Anyway, for further info you can visit this page:
http://www.ocfaq.com/softmod/faq.php

the 9500 was a rebranded defective 9700, and today the 9800se is exactly the same thing (defective 9800)

it's a full R300/350 chip with 8 pipelines, but 4 pipes are disabled

depending on the memory bus (128 or 256bits) you can mod it to 9500pro or 9700/9800