XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

And that's what really threw me out of it. Kind of like Batman's "evil" voice .

Making reference to Christian Bale's "Batman" voice? I didn't find his vocal interpretation necessary either.

Nope. Fan is connected straight to 12V rail on AGP connector.

The fan is unusually quiet for running at full speed then, even whilst brand new. Granted I can heard it, but it's certainly no screamer, it just makes a quiet but somewhat high toned whirring noise (unless the fan is totally dry, then it starts making all sorts of growling and moaning sounds). Well, if those ADDA hyprobearing fans are running at full speed on those cards, no wonder they seize so quickly being so scantily lubricated. As I understand it, though, some of the Radeon cards do have thermal sensors which regulate the speed of the fan, but those cards have three pin headers and three wire fans. I guess the GPU die would overheat if the fan was running at much less than +12V.

Now, if you want to go down the chute, you might as well pick Buffalo. And no fried wings included with that order!

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

The OEM ATI ones come with ADDA hyprobearing fans. AD0512MX-G70 is the model number (rated for 4300RPM, 50x50x10mm). Some of them come in 7 blade variants, others 9 and 11 blade variants.

doesnt enermax like using adda fans on their power supplies too? at least on the liberty, galaxy and infiniti line... something to be careful of as i had an adda fan in an enermax psu make rattling noises on me before.

hynix = Hyundai?

yes. hynix is short for hyundai electronics or sumthing. u take the "hy" and the "nics" in electronics and u get hy-nics or hynix. check it out on wikipedia

unless the fan is totally dry, then it starts making all sorts of growling and moaning sounds

waaa a fan that sounds pornographic when its dying hahaha~ now u're making me regret tossing out all my 9800 stock heatsinks...

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

doesnt enermax like using adda fans on their power supplies too? at least on the liberty, galaxy and infiniti line... something to be careful of as i had an adda fan in an enermax psu make rattling noises on me before.

I meant 7 blades and 13 blades, not 11. Many OEM manufactures use ADDA fans because they're cheap. Once well lubricated, and once you maintenance them, they perform quite well.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Make sure to use flux too.

errr what type of flux do i use and is best for reflowing video card bgas? non-acidic non-activated (R) rosin flux? will the use of mildly activated (RMA) flux or activated (RA) flux damage/corrode the board?

Probably not a good idea to bake in the oven since there are too many SMD electrolytic caps on the board that could pop.

errr, i thought most smd caps are wave or reflow soldered in an industrial production setting. therefore, they are made with some tolerance/resistance to reflow soldering heat. they should be fine just as long as u dont heat for too long like longer than 10 mins right? diy reflow guides on the web say not to heat for too long like longer than 10 mins as heating for too long will form a bad joint, cause heat dmg to the solid state components and have a high chance of popping the smd wet caps?

I suspect the audio and SATA ports on mine died because of BGA issues with the SB. Both the NB and SB run extremely hot on the 939Dual-SATA2. This is actually the reason I now have the 120 mm fan there. Originally, I just ran the board as is and with my Radeon 9700 with its replica 9800 heatsink. It wasn't until the board severely started crashing that I noticed how hot the NB and SB ran. But by that time, it was too late. I probably have to reflow it someday.

ah ok. so it is overheating that is causing those chipsets to fail. hope u get it reflowed someday and slapped on with a giant heatsink! i really wanna know if the agp card woes are caused by an overheating SB.

However, a large container of Acetone is about the same price here. Plus, Acetone is useful for other stuff too. We always have some in the garage, so I never find a need for the ArctiClean stuff myself. Only used it at a repair shop I worked in a long time ago.

good point cuz acetone is also great for removing excess flux after soldering.

Once well lubricated, and once you maintenance them, they perform quite well.

ok, i will make it a point to lube my adda fans regularly. ok that sounded inappropriate. i will stop making dirty jokes now...

[momaka]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

The fan is unusually quiet for running at full speed then, even whilst brand new.

Some fans are designed to run at a lower speed, even on 12 V. You can *usually* tell by the current (I have seen a few exceptions, though).

I suspect the original fan of this XFX 6800 was like that - designed to run at a higher voltage and not run too fast. Again, when I put the green Delta fan there that you see now, that thing was literally screaming even when the video card is throttling it down in 2D mode. In 3D mode, I swear the card could take off and fly away.

As I understand it, though, some of the Radeon cards do have thermal sensors which regulate the speed of the fan, but those cards have three pin headers and three wire fans.

Probably the 9800 XT and newer Radeons. 9800 Pro is basically the same thing as the 9700 Pro, except the GPU core is made on a smaller micron technology and thus able to run faster.

now u're making me regret tossing out all my 9800 stock heatsinks...

Hey don't throw stuff like that out! They can still come handy for lower power video cards (for example, my Radeon 9200 SE runs scorching-hot with its small stock heatsink and no fan. If I put a fan to blow on it, it is much better).

errr what type of flux do i use and is best for reflowing video card bgas? non-acidic non-activated (R) rosin flux? will the use of mildly activated (RMA) flux or activated (RA) flux damage/corrode the board?

Kingbo RMA-218 (so yes, RMA). It's a cheap generic Chinese flux (even though it says "Tokyo, Japan" on the label... but not "Made in" ). That said, it is still quite popular for BGA work due to working well, despite being generic.

I'm not sure if Rosin flux will work - it might evaporate and/or dry too quickly before the chip has had a chance to reach proper reflow temperature. I used to use it for my first Radeon 9700 reflows. Didn't have a temperature probe back then, but it seemed to boil and harden very quickly - probably way before I hit even 150C.

Definitely AVOID activated (RA) flux or anything that says "plumber's flux". That will indeed eat board traces away.

errr, i thought most smd caps are wave or reflow soldered in an industrial production setting. therefore, they are made with some tolerance/resistance to reflow soldering heat. they should be fine just as long as u dont heat for too long like longer than 10 mins right?

Both wave soldering and hot air won't heat components as much as an oven. That's because in an oven, the components are heated both by the heating elements and the hot air inside the oven. With simple hot air, the heating is localized and with wave-solder, the components get exposed to "fresh" cool air very quickly after the soldering is done. Thus, they don't overheat.

diy reflow guides on the web say not to heat for too long like longer than 10 mins as heating for too long will form a bad joint, cause heat dmg to the solid state components and have a high chance of popping the smd wet caps?

I think 10-15 minutes was the limit. I remember reading it in a datasheet for an IC somewhere. Will have to loog again. But it was very interesting because it showed the whole reflow profile and how the board should be heated.

ah ok. so it is overheating that is causing those chipsets to fail. hope u get it reflowed someday and slapped on with a giant heatsink! i really wanna know if the agp card woes are caused by an overheating SB.

Yes, *someday*, I will do that. Right now, though, that board is still semi-working and I use it quite a bit to test "unknown-condition" hardware in it. So it may not be that soon until I get to it.

good point cuz acetone is also great for removing excess flux after soldering.

It does, but I prefer >90% IPA (rubbing alcohol). Acetone can damage some plastics and make the board finish "dull". So I use it sparingly.

ok, i will make it a point to lube my adda fans regularly. ok that sounded inappropriate. i will stop making dirty jokes now...

Also, make sure to take the fan apart (err.. strip it naked? )... and clean the shaft ... ah screw it, this thread is no longer G-rated

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Some fans are designed to run at a lower speed, even on 12 V. You can *usually* tell by the current (I have seen a few exceptions, though).

Okay, I'm baffled. Are the fans on the R300s running at full speed or not? The AD0512MX-G70s are usually rated for 4300RPM with either 0.07A, 0.09A, 0.10A, or 0.12A of current being fed to the fan @ +12V, with accordance to the datasheets. ADDA give a bunch of random "worse case scenario" or "typical/average" values.... if they're not running at full speed, any idea how far they are from it? The fan speed does not seem to change as the temperature rises or decreases.

I understand that you can use a NTC or PTC thermistor to limit the current going to the fan (as one may guess, the former has a negative temperature coefficient, and the latter a positive one). You can also lower the voltage going to the +12V wire to lower the fan speed, or you can use a PWM controlled fan which is an entirely divergent animal. But I understand that this is not the method that the R300, RV350s, RV360s, and R350s use to alter the fan speed?

I suspect the original fan of this XFX 6800 was like that - designed to run at a higher voltage and not run too fast. Again, when I put the green Delta fan there that you see now, that thing was literally screaming even when the video card is throttling it down in 2D mode. In 3D mode, I swear the card could take off and fly away.

I'm sure that one is temperature controlled. The loudest fan I have is not a Delta fan, it's a Minebea fan. Ever heard what a 92mm Minebea sounds like spinning at 5700RPM? If you haven't, brace your ears for the worst.

Probably the 9800 XT and newer Radeons. 9800 Pro is basically the same thing as the 9700 Pro, except the GPU core is made on a smaller micron technology and thus able to run faster.

IIRC, the Radeon 9800 XT/Pro was still fabbed on a .15 nanometer micron process. The last of the Radeons to be, for sure. The Radeon 9600 cards were fabbed on a .13 nanometer process, and had 76 million transistors compared to the 107 million of the R300s... and cut the pixel shaders, vertex shaders, ROPs, and TMUs in half. So they drew MUCH less power (about half) and didn't even need an additional connector. And they didn't use that horrid Infineon RAM (IIRC Samsung in place of it).

i really wanna know if the agp card woes are caused by an overheating SB.

I'm fairly certain that the Northbridge is the controller for the AGP slot.

[momaka]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Okay, I'm baffled. Are the fans on the R300s running at full speed or not?

They are running on 12V at full speed, all the time, indeed. (That was a mouthful there. )

What I am trying to say is that in general, fans of the same size and same voltage rating don't always run at the same speed. Take, for example, a bunch of standard 80 x 25 mm fans from various brands and run them all at 12V. Some will runs slower and some will run faster. The ones that have a lower current draw usually run slower. Of course, it also matters who made the fan. Delta and the like will have pretty good efficiency - that is, they will run at a reasonably fast speed even with low current. The cheap fans, on the other hand, could draw as much current but not spin as fast.

I'm sure that one is temperature controlled.

Maybe. But its speed doesn't seem to vary at all, unless I switch between 2D and 3D mode (i.e. viewing desktop and paying games, for example). In 2D mode, it runs at one speed and at 3D mode, it runs at another speed, regardless of the temperature, it seems.

The loudest fan I have is not a Delta fan, it's a Minebea fan. Ever heard what a 92mm Minebea sounds like spinning at 5700RPM? If you haven't, brace your ears for the worst.

Yeah, I can imagine a thing that big spinning that fast being quite loud. Keep your fingers away from it!

I have ran PS3 fans at full throttle outside of their cage before... and they are quite scary too . Then again, they are rated for something like 1.x or 2.x Amps, so that's expected.

The Radeon 9600 cards were fabbed on a .13 nanometer process, and had 76 million transistors compared to the 107 million of the R300s... and cut the pixel shaders, vertex shaders, ROPs, and TMUs in half. So they drew MUCH less power (about half) and didn't even need an additional connector. And they didn't use that horrid Infineon RAM (IIRC Samsung in place of it).

... and they were also slower than the 9500 . But yeah, the 9600 was a hit, nonetheless.

I'm fairly certain that the Northbridge is the controller for the AGP slot.

Not on the 939Dual-SATA2. Board traces for the AGP seem to be running to the SB. Only the PCI-E 16X slot (and 1X slot?) traces are running to NB.

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

They are running on 12V at full speed, all the time, indeed. (That was a mouthful there. )

I don't understand why they would sound quieter on the card's header than when connected straight to the PSU then... maybe it has to do with acoustics.

What I am trying to say is that in general, fans of the same size and same voltage rating don't always run at the same speed. Take, for example, a bunch of standard 80 x 25 mm fans from various brands and run them all at 12V. Some will runs slower and some will run faster. The ones that have a lower current draw usually run slower. Of course, it also matters who made the fan. Delta and the like will have pretty good efficiency - that is, they will run at a reasonably fast speed even with low current. The cheap fans, on the other hand, could draw as much current but not spin as fast.

To complicate things further, there's usually a 10%-20% tolerance for the RPM rating at any given voltage and current draw. So an AD0812HS-A70GL (for an example, the one that you will usually find seized in PSUs ) could spin as high as 3300RPM and as low as 2700RPM. To complicate things even FURTHER (), Sunon claim to have "intelligent motor design" - their fans can spin faster and slower based upon temperature, at any one voltage and current draw. And I think Yate Loon fans are fairly efficient for their speed too.

Maybe. But its speed doesn't seem to vary at all, unless I switch between 2D and 3D mode (i.e. viewing desktop and paying games, for example). In 2D mode, it runs at one speed and at 3D mode, it runs at another speed, regardless of the temperature, it seems.

Sounds like the card has an activation threshold rather than a gradual increase in fan speed.

Yeah, I can imagine a thing that big spinning that fast being quite loud. Keep your fingers away from it!

Well, it's plastic and isn't very sharp. So I don't think it could really do that much damage to my fingers. It does move copious amounts of air with unfathomable speed... at least unfathomable to my puny hands.

I have ran PS3 fans at full throttle outside of their cage before... and they are quite scary too . Then again, they are rated for something like 1.x or 2.x Amps, so that's expected.

Between the NEC Tokin proadlizer and nVidia's bumpgate defect, the PS3s were quite a mess as reliability goes. Not that the Xbox 360s were much better, but their only issue was that they ran far too hot (too many thermal cycles) for BGA RoHS solder. Oh, and that cursed Qimonda RAM again. And maybe those Toshita drives too.

... and they were also slower than the 9500 . But yeah, the 9600 was a hit, nonetheless.

Yes, much slower, especially in shader intensive games. The 9600 XT and Pro only had the advantage of memory bandwidth - 9.6GB/s vs. 8.64GB/s, and that only really helped it in fill rate tests from synthetic benchmarks. I think the 9600s ran quite a bit cooler at least.

Not on the 939Dual-SATA2. Board traces for the AGP seem to be running to the SB. Only the PCI-E 16X slot (and 1X slot?) traces are running to NB.

You're right. That's an exception. I meant that the NB is usually the controller for the AGP slot on boards that don't have AGP and PCI-Express slots on the same board (the NB also controls the RAM).

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Hey don't throw stuff like that out! They can still come handy for lower power video cards (for example, my Radeon 9200 SE runs scorching-hot with its small stock heatsink and no fan. If I put a fan to blow on it, it is much better).

yea i thought of using the 9700/9800 heatsinks for the radeon 5450 i mentioned earlier, but decided to go with the bolt-on fan instead. i got quite a shock when the 5450 reached temps of 80-90°C during load when running passive. quite unbelievable considering it has only 19w tdp.

now with the fan, it doesnt get hotter than 50°C during load. so even if its a nvidia card with the bumpgate problem, it will still run for quite a long time.

As I understand it, though, some of the Radeon cards do have thermal sensors which regulate the speed of the fan, but those cards have three pin headers and three wire fans.

Probably the 9800 XT and newer Radeons. 9800 Pro is basically the same thing as the 9700 Pro, except the GPU core is made on a smaller micron technology and thus able to run faster.

iirc, only the XTs had built in temp monitoring on the die. the pros could only do temp monitoring if it was an r360 or rv360 chip on a 9800 pro or 9600 pro card. (they prolly did this due to better yields for the top-end XT chips and insufficient stock for the regular pro ones)

ppl wud then flash the XT bios on those pro cards that had the r60 chip to turn it into an XT and thereby also enable the temp monitoring but i dont think the fan throttling part works tho cuz the pro boards only had 2 pin fan headers.

IIRC, the Radeon 9800 XT/Pro was still fabbed on a .15 nanometer micron process. The last of the Radeons to be, for sure. The Radeon 9600 cards were fabbed on a .13 nanometer process, and had 76 million transistors compared to the 107 million of the R300s... and cut the pixel shaders, vertex shaders, ROPs, and TMUs in half. So they drew MUCH less power (about half) and didn't even need an additional connector. And they didn't use that horrid Infineon RAM (IIRC Samsung in place of it).

i'm posting a link on wikipedia that lists all the cards from the r300 family. great link to reminisce on the good ol' days. i sometimes occasionally stop and stare at the list. then scroll down to the newer cards and hiss and spit at the temperatures and power draw these new things run at!

it also matters who made the fan. Delta and the like will have pretty good efficiency - that is, they will run at a reasonably fast speed even with low current. The cheap fans, on the other hand, could draw as much current but not spin as fast.

yes im quite partial to gentle typhoons due to the very low current draw but still spinning at 1850rpm. very energy efficient fans due to the low-friction bearings and low current draw. i noticed when shutting down my system, the gentle typhoons take quite a while longer to spin down compared to the other fans.

I think Yate Loon fans are fairly efficient for their speed too.

yes, i like yate loons too. cheap and efficient. perfect for my "cheap and good" type of spending habits. some ppl dont like yate loons tho...

Maybe. But its speed doesn't seem to vary at all, unless I switch between 2D and 3D mode (i.e. viewing desktop and paying games, for example). In 2D mode, it runs at one speed and at 3D mode, it runs at another speed, regardless of the temperature, it seems.

Sounds like the card has an activation threshold rather than a gradual increase in fan speed.

QFT. the gf 6 series only have 2 fan profiles in the bios. one for 2d and another for 3d. i have attached a screenshot of the 6800 ultra and 6600 gt bios in nibitor showing the fan speed settings in 2d and 3d mode. u can customise the fan speed for each mode in the bios to your liking (which i did) then flash the modded bios onto your card. great way to customise the fan noise in 2d and 3d mode!

Yeah, I can imagine a thing that big spinning that fast being quite loud. Keep your fingers away from it!

oi, fan grills 4tw! cheap 1-2 buck investment on those "finger chopping fans" to keep that expensive medical bill away for reattaching a severed finger! and no guarantees they can reattach it either! depending on where it is severed.

[momaka]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Between the NEC Tokin proadlizer and nVidia's bumpgate defect, the PS3s were quite a mess as reliability goes. Not that the Xbox 360s were much better, but their only issue was that they ran far too hot (too many thermal cycles) for BGA RoHS solder. Oh, and that cursed Qimonda RAM again. And maybe those Toshita drives too.

Well, I briefly worked in a repair shop around 2012 or so, and the main thing we fixed was Xbox 360s and PS3. Between the two, I would rather take an Xbox 360 any day (for repair, that is). The 360 is easy to take apart and easy to work on. With the PS3, you have like 3 or 4 board revisions *and* case revisions - so disassembly is a lot more annoying. Not to mention the CPU and GPU in those, which had a huge heat spreader and made reflowing/reballing extra hard. I never had good success at fixing any of the PS3s.

i got quite a shock when the 5450 reached temps of 80-90°C during load when running passive. quite unbelievable considering it has only 19w tdp.

People underestimate what 20 W of power can do. I put 25W on a P4 Northwood CPU heatsink before (dissipating heat with a MOSFET in a linear circuit). With no fan to move air, that heatsink reached 40C after just 5 minutes. Thus, I will say this: no matter how huge your passive heatsink is, always provide it with *some* airflow.

yes, i like yate loons too. cheap and efficient. perfect for my "cheap and good" type of spending habits. some ppl dont like yate loons tho...

Yate Loon is okay by me as well. But when it comes to cheap but decent fans, I really like Power Logic.

QFT. the gf 6 series only have 2 fan profiles in the bios. one for 2d and another for 3d. i have attached a screenshot of the 6800 ultra and 6600 gt bios in nibitor showing the fan speed settings in 2d and 3d mode. u can customise the fan speed for each mode in the bios to your liking (which i did) then flash the modded bios onto your card. great way to customise the fan noise in 2d and 3d mode!

Yup, that's one way to do it. Or if you don't want to risk bricking the card with flashing the BIOS, you can always resort to Riva Tuner and do most changes there. That's what I used on the 6200 in my other thread to unlock 4 extra vertex pipes and turn it into a 6600.

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

i'm posting a link on wikipedia that lists all the cards from the r300 family. great link to reminisce on the good ol' days. i sometimes occasionally stop and stare at the list. then scroll down to the newer cards and hiss and spit at the temperatures and power draw these new things run at!

That's hilarious, and you're right. And we're honestly supposed to believe that newer cards are more efficient and "green" (whatever that's supposed to mean) when they reach such inanely high temperatures and added to that such extreme temperature cycles? And the ever increasing power draw? Yeah, right. More efficient and "green" my behind...

People underestimate what 20 W of power can do. I put 25W on a P4 Northwood CPU heatsink before (dissipating heat with a MOSFET in a linear circuit). With no fan to move air, that heatsink reached 40C after just 5 minutes. Thus, I will say this: no matter how huge your passive heatsink is, always provide it with *some* airflow.

It depends on your cooling. For an example, some very old GPUs (like the GeForce 2) ran cool enough that you could run them without a heatsink, fan, and thermal compound and they wouldn't overheat (at least in 2D mode). However, the totally passively cooled GeForce 2 MXs (with TV out) that came in older Dell clamshell desktops actually ran very cool even without a heatsink, dedicated fan, and thermal compound because Dell's CPU fan shroud not only exhausted hot air from the CPU but acted as a case fan, pulling hot air up from the add-in cards downward of it. So the hottest part of those GF2 cards was the underside - the GPU die itself actually ran really cool (lower than 40*C). And that is without the CPU fan running at full speed.

Take that card and put it in a machine with no case fan and it quickly reaches 60*C at idle, after less than 10 minutes, at room temperature. So I guess the crux of the matter is, it's all about the cooling and how clever you can be with it.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

And maybe those Toshita drives too.

did u mean laptop drives specifically? they used laptop drives from toshiba in consoles? i would expect them to use desktop drives for consoles instead as they are basically mini-pcs in essence.

i've seen toshiba laptop drives get plenty of hate in many forums cuz of their high failure rate. too-shit-aaaah is among some of the many names its been called.

their desktop drives are a different story tho. its "borrowed" tech from hitachi and hitachi makes the most reliable desktop drive at least according to a cloud storage provider who has tens of thousands of drives.

And we're honestly supposed to believe that newer cards are more efficient and "green" (whatever that's supposed to mean) when they reach such inanely high temperatures and added to that such extreme temperature cycles? And the ever increasing power draw? Yeah, right. More efficient and "green" my behind...

its only "green" if it doesnt spoil and end up in the landfill. there are a lot more toxic chemicals/metals than lead that they put in IC chips these days. but nooo, we have to play along with rohs and the green hippies and myths.

politicians just want to be seen as doing something for the environment and to get re-elected then wash their hands off it and tell their children we have tried. when in fact, rohs is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth, if i may borrow a quote from the matrix.

very off-topic, i have managed to come to the attention of a well-worn and dusty 9800 pro for sale on fleabay for 8 bucks. its used but still working apparently. the item is in castle rock, colorado, usa.

it looks quite dusty as if a powerful fan had been blowing at it during use. so i'd say the card still has some life left in it despite running (and overheating) on the stock heatsink. looks like another great cleaning job for u, momaka!

i also want to bring to your attention, the hynix video ram being used on that card which is the best video ram used for that card imo. im hoping one of the pros here can bring in that well-worn card to a better home and not let it end up in the trash bin.

i would have bid on it myself if it wasnt for that lame 25 buck international shipping fee. thats too much for me and i cant believe it costs that much to ship something that small halfway across the world. i would pay 10 bucks at most for this type of shipping fee and i feel its fair. damn cutthroat fleabay...

i sincerely hope someone here can save that card. 4 more days to go to bid on that item...

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

did u mean laptop drives specifically? they used laptop drives from toshiba in consoles? i would expect them to use desktop drives for consoles instead as they are basically mini-pcs in essence.

Yes, the Xbox 360s use removable 2.5" laptop drives from either Toshiba, Western Digital, Seagate, or Hitachi. As you can imagine, the Toshibas have the highest failure rate by and large.

their desktop drives are a different story tho. its "borrowed" tech from hitachi and hitachi makes the most reliable desktop drive at least according to a cloud storage provider who has tens of thousands of drives.

True. I was mostly referencing Toshiba's laptop drives.

its only "green" if it doesnt spoil and end up in the landfill. there are a lot more toxic chemicals/metals than lead that they put in IC chips these days. but nooo, we have to play along with rohs and the green hippies and myths.

You don't need "green" products to know how to recycle them properly. And yeah, PB/lead, PVC, whatever "toxic" materials that were in older products, leech into the environment so slowly that it really doesn't matter unless one tries to extract copper or gold from the materials, or unless these older electronics are exposed to earth shattering conditions which would cause the lead to "leak" out faster.

politicians just want to be seen as doing something for the environment and to get re-elected then wash their hands off it and tell their children we have tried. when in fact, rohs is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth, if i may borrow a quote from the matrix.

The first Matrix is a good movie. Not quite a masterpiece IMO but a film to remember. The sequels not so much. And yeah, even though it may sound apathetic on my part, there are many reasons for me to stay away from the cesspit that is politics (and organized religion, but I don't want to disabuse people of their beliefs so I won't get into that), at least to refrain from talking of it. The last thing I want to do is turn this into a political thread so I'll stop there.

very off-topic, i have managed to come to the attention of a well-worn and dusty 9800 pro for sale on fleabay for 8 bucks. its used but still working apparently. the item is in castle rock, colorado, usa.

Looks like a good card.

it looks quite dusty as if a powerful fan had been blowing at it during use. so i'd say the card still has some life left in it despite running (and overheating) on the stock heatsink. looks like another great cleaning job for u, momaka!

The fan could be seized or starting to. Looks like a 52x52x9 13-blade ADDA hyprobearing fan manufactured in October of 2003 (the 4th week) going by the date code on the label. Don't know about overheating if the fan still works and presumably runs at full speed (unless all these cards somehow limit the current going to the fan through the ground wire) - do the Radeon 9800 Pro temperatures really qualify for "overheating" since it's leaded solder? I wonder what that extra heatsink is for on that card.

i also want to bring to your attention, the hynix video ram being used on that card which is the best video ram used for that card imo. im hoping one of the pros here can bring in that well-worn card to a better home and not let it end up in the trash bin.

Yes, the Hynix RAM is good. It's BGA, but still good.

Sorry momaka. I feel like I've derailed your thread beyond hope at this point, for no discernible reason.

[momaka]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

very off-topic, i have managed to come to the attention of a well-worn and dusty 9800 pro for sale on fleabay for 8 bucks. its used but still working apparently. the item is in castle rock, colorado, usa.

it looks quite dusty as if a powerful fan had been blowing at it during use. so i'd say the card still has some life left in it despite running (and overheating) on the stock heatsink. looks like another great cleaning job for u, momaka!

It would be, indeed. However, my room is just too full of projects that need finishing. I know that if I get this one, it would be a quick fix and back to working again. But I just really need to stop (or severely limit) my influx of PC stuff and electronics because my room is borderline a hoarder's site (if not there already, though I don't have trash anywhere). So I will have to pass.

im hoping one of the pros here can bring in that well-worn card to a better home and not let it end up in the trash bin.

I think people still do buy those Radeon 9800's on eBay, so I'm sure someone will bid on it. Hopefully someone that will mod it with proper cooling.

The first Matrix is a good movie. Not quite a masterpiece IMO but a film to remember. The sequels not so much.

Agreed.
Then again, that goes for many movies with sequels.

And yeah, even though it may sound apathetic on my part, there are many reasons for me to stay away from the cesspit that is politics (and organized religion, but I don't want to disabuse people of their beliefs so I won't get into that), at least to refrain from talking of it.

Same here. I just don't get it. I always feel I can spend my time better on something else. After all, I've experiments to run. There is research to be done....
(^ I suppose you know where that is from )

Sorry momaka. I feel like I've derailed your thread beyond hope at this point, for no discernible reason. :razz:

Meh. Who cares. It seems like it's only you, me, and ChaosLegionnaire here that are active in this thread... so I think we can go as off-topic as we wish.

Also, when I get some work done on the dead fan from this 6800, I will post the results here. Just to make it look like we were on-topic the whole time .

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Same here. I just don't get it. I always feel I can spend my time better on something else. After all, I've experiments to run. There is research to be done....
(^ I suppose you know where that is from )

Haha, that's from Portal. I always found it fascinating how Aperture Science fits into the Half-Life story arc. Speaking of which, Half-Life 3 needs to come out already or at least be announced on VALVe's behalf.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

do the Radeon 9800 Pro temperatures really qualify for "overheating" since it's leaded solder?

well, i vaguely remember a review many years ago that compared the stock heatsink temps using a temp probe to the temps after using an aftermarket cooler. i remember the stock heatsink can get as hot as around 70-80°C in a closed case environment.

however, that was 11 years ago and my memory of it is surely fuzzy by now and i also cant find that review on the web anymore. so dont quote me on that...

however, i clearly remember testing this out on myself and my own card by touching the stock heatsink while the card is under load during benchmarking and it was hot enough to trigger a reflex action to pull my hand away. what i can recall from my medical knowledge is that any surface hotter than 60-70°C can trigger a reflex action to pull one's hand away, so i guess its true it runs at at least 70°C during load with the stock heatsink.

I wonder what that extra heatsink is for on that card.

do u mean that silver heatsink surrounded by caps and two inductors near the top left of the card and also near the vga connector? im guessing that is a mosfet heatsink. there's also another black heatsink near the molex connector. however, peering at it under my card, it looks like an eight legged chip under that tiny heatsink. odd to see an eight legged mosfet...? posted a link to a high res pic below anyway.

also, on 9800 cards, there appears to be a switch on the card below the fan connector. it looks like it has "ON KE" and "1 2" written on the switch. anyone have any idea what it does? the only clue i could find is that it could be a switch to switch the tv output between pal and ntsc? however, the source that i got that from is quite unreliable. here is a link to a high-res pic of a radeon 9800 pro.

[Sparkey55]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

also, on 9800 cards, there appears to be a switch on the card below the fan connector. it looks like it has "ON KE" and "1 2" written on the switch. anyone have any idea what it does? the only clue i could find is that it could be a switch to switch the tv output between pal and ntsc? however, the source that i got that from is quite unreliable. here is a link to a high-res pic of a radeon 9800 pro.


I have the Radeon 9600 XT and it has the exact same switch labeled SW1 . Mine is in the OFF position for both sections with a plastic cover tacked on top. What is it for??

[momaka]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

odd to see an eight legged mosfet...?

Not at all. Even the Radeon 9700 had them. In fact, I think all of the VRMs on the video card are done with 8-pin SOIC MOSFETs.

what i can recall from my medical knowledge is that any surface hotter than 60-70°C can trigger a reflex action to pull one's hand away

Yes, 60°C is perceived by many to be too hot to touch. And 70°C+ is considered instant scalding - i.e. anything above that temperature will do damage to your skin cells upon touch.

So if you get a nasty burn from a heatsink (happened to me before from a S3 Savage 4 video card with a small passive heatsink), you know it's around 70°C or more.

also, on 9800 cards, there appears to be a switch on the card below the fan connector. it looks like it has "ON KE" and "1 2" written on the switch. anyone have any idea what it does?

No idea. But now that you mentioned it, I checked my Radeon 9700s, and they have an empty spot on the board for that switch as well (though no switch installed). It seems like the pins on one side are not connect to anything - at least on the Radeon 9700. The other side, I don't know. But when I get some sunlight tomorrow, I'll try to do some tracing with my multimeter. What really interesting is that my HD3870 also has a free spot on its PCB for a switch like that (though it is located near the lower-right corner of the card).

Speaking of which, Half-Life 3 needs to come out already or at least be announced on VALVe's behalf.

Yeah, don't get me started on that. I just played EP 1 and 2 last fall. After EP2 ended, I was like, "WTF?! Is this how they are really going to leave the series to end?"

[Wester547]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Yes, 60°C is perceived by many to be too hot to touch. And 70°C+ is considered instant scalding - i.e. anything above that temperature will do damage to your skin cells upon touch.

55*C, I can't keep my fingers on for more than a few seconds. 50*C is uncomfortable to touch. 45*C is warm but not uncomfortable. 40*C is a tad warm but not unbearable by bounds. Anything below is cool. Of course, it will depend upon everyone's pain tolerance.

Yeah, don't get me started on that. I just played EP 1 and 2 last fall. After EP2 ended, I was like, "WTF?! Is this how they are really going to leave the series to end?"

Well, it's been eight years since Episode 2 came out, which usurps the gap between HL1 and HL2 (six years). So yeah, I'm hoping that HL3 isn't going to become another "Duke Nukem Forever".

[Per Hansson]

Re: XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme – an eBay special (with LONG story)

Wow, I had to look it up, did not believe it could already have been eight years!
I was going to post something lame before like "HL3 confirmed" but refrained from doing so to not go too much OT.
Guess the flood gates have opened now
Good work with the video card momaka, enjoyed following this thread
*Goes looking for Half-Life 2 Episode 3*