X800GTO2 > X850...Questions..?

[TheBlueChanell]

I have a friend wanting to build a new rig for under 700, he already has a Samsung DVD Burner. I picked a rig out for him.

Aspire Qpack - 85
Venice 3000+ - 150
Biostar Tforce - 65
1gb of Corsair Value - 85
Hitachi Deskstar 160gb - 75.

So, I wasn't sure what card to pop in there. He'll be playing at 1024x768. I was going to get a 6800vanilla/GT or maybe a X800pro, buy If I can get the x800GTO2 and have him flash it to an X850 he would be spending the best $200 Ever. This leads me to my next question, what are the dangers of doing this. I would hate to advise something and having him fuck up his card. He is working at McDonalds, so I suggested this rig to him because eventually he can upgrade to an X2, and a better card. Should I have him get a 1gb module instead of dual 512, nvm I will do that.

He wants to play GUN, HL2, Doom3, Far Cry, FEAR, you know all the main fps'. High quality would be nice.

 

[TheBlueChanell]

Bump, come on peeps.

 

[name]

Problems he could have trying to make the GTO2 into an x850xt:

Bios becomes corrupted during a failed flash attempt, video card is screwed if the proper steps aren't taken (pretty easily avoided if you back up your original bios first). He could also burn the card up trying to overclock it to xt speeds, though that too can be avoided with proper precautions and monitoring of temperatures.

The chances of either of these things happening are pretty slim with the GTO2, though, because it was pretty much "designed" to be altered in this way - the core and memory should comfortably run at xt speeds because they are xt parts. The cooler on the card is xt grade, as well.

Here is a link to a guide describing the correct way to flash a video card BIOS, so that it goes well and so that you can fix it if it goes downhill:

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1633&page=1

 

[banGerprawN]

If you/he does screw the BIOS, it's easily fixable by reflashing using a PCI card.
On the heat issue, an extra 4 pipes will rarely add much more than a few degrees to the core temperature, it's really the speed increase that will do it. Easiest way to make sure that one doesnt happen (and it shouldn't, from what everyone seems to be achieving) is to simply modify the X850XT BIOS to use lower clockspeeds (use Rabitor), like 400/500. Then, find out what the max stable overclock is in Windows, and re-edit the BIOS as needed.
It's what I did with my X800pro -> X800XTs.