"80% of all 6800 ULTRAS using 2.0 ns memory???"

PRO VIVOS use the XT PE chip. They just don't reach the clock speeds of a XT PE. MAybe they can't test the chips before they are on the PCB with the memory? (I don't know the methods how they test max clocks on a chip)
My assumption is that they produce them as XT and those cards not reaching it are branded as PRO VIVO.

Only guessing here though.

Edit: Before some uninformed or just lazy people came here and post: The VIVO are no relabeled XT PE cards. My card has the XT sticker on the Stock cooler even. They didn't even bother to remove it. Powercolor just put another sticker ont he old one showing it as a x800 PRO.

 

Low board-level yields would've been my guess, too, however, I imagined that they'd get a grip on that given enough time. But ATI's partners still ship Pro VIVOs that unlock and they're available in much higher quantities than the XT PEs, making me wonder whether the 'PE' is really a 'Pure-luck Edition'. :?

cu

incurable

 

pure luck ???


my x800xt pe hits 620/580 easily with stock cooling.

80% of the vivos unlocked hit 520/560 with stock cooling (x800xt pe speeds)

That is not pure luck .

 

How do you come to that numbers? 80% on the vivos. I highly doubt that. I thinkt hat number is WAY lower.

 

There are several NVDA AIB partners (including Asus, Albatron, and Leadtek) that are openly using 2.0ns modules on their 6800 Ultras. I guess it's up to the customer to make sure they're buying from a vendor who uses the faster 1.6ns modules if this is a concern.

While it sounds like an appealing explanation, if the shortage of 600MHz modules were the primary reason for the scarcity of retail XT PE boards then ATI would theoretically be sitting on thousands of these boards waiting for Samsung's memory shipments? Unlikely. They would have marketed and sold them as vanilla XT's (with the same specs as the Dell PCI-E cards) or something like that. More likely that they just don't have more 16-pipe cores to sell because of the OEM demand, and this despite renewed assertions about yields being better than expected.

And if Dell is selling XT PE cards in their AGP systems, this must be new as the option has never appeared on their online configurator.

 

Like I said before, eVGA is using 1.6ns memory. Their marketing materials specifically list the memory as 1.6ns and when I removed my card's heat sink to check it clearly was marked gc16. The good news is that eVGA is pumping out these cards at a decent clip, so if you want one, it’s not that bad of a wait.

I can also confirm that the eVGA 6800GT is using 2.0ns ram. I had one of these before stepping up to the Ultra.

 

Yes, pure luck. As in: Lets put all these pieces that we know adhere to our specs for use on an XT PE on a PCB and if we get lucky, it'll qualify for XT PE. If we ain't, add another one to the Pro VIVO pile.

1) Where do you get your numbers from?

2) Ask yourself, if all (or a decent number of) boards that are sold as Pro VIVOs work fine as XT PE, why did they fail in qualification?

cu

incurable

 

I don't know if it's a proof or anything, but in the 66.00 drivers we can find:

 

Of course, i was just talking about competing in that price range.

 

that is not how they test the chips .

from polls on various forums discusing the mod. Check rage3d and teamradeon.

Who said they all failed ?

Have you though its the other way around. That to many chips are passing at x800xt pe speeds thus they are being used for pros ?

What i believe happened is that ati planed for yields to be bad and thus made the x800pro a 12 pipe line card instead of 16. But they found the yields were very good with 16 pipelines and 500+ mhz . So they were forced to take the 16 pipe line chips and castrate them.

I believe with the refresh we are going to see the x800pro lvl card drop to the 300$ price point. Perhaps sooner. With a 500mhz 16 pipe line card replacing it and a faster 16 pipe line card replacing the xt pe .

 

The question is then, how do they know that the pipelines works flawlessly in all games, without any IQ problems whatsoever ?

 

Don't you think the one or another anomaly should've shown up by now? This VIVO mod is around for quite some time now.
I for myself tested it with several benchmarks, techdemos and at least 10 different games. If a quad would be defective it would've shown up by now.
Some of the utils/games i tested: Ruby Doublecross, 3dmark03,Aquamark,Doom3,FarCry, many many more

 

just like reporting overclocks, the people who are successful are generally more inclined to talk about it. that greatly skews the results of any poll.

 

This makes no business sense to me at all. Why sell a fully functional, speed-qualified 16-pipe chip for $399 when there is a huge, unfulfilled demand for retail XT boards and you can sell them for $100 more?

 

I agree there. I am quite sure that there's quite a lot VIVOs that can't go past 480mhz core. If all VIVOs would do 500/500 easily i am sure AT would sell them as XT.

 

Well, perhaps, but seeing the number of people complaining about availability of XT PEs, i don't think it's right

 

Well my Vivo is going 520/560 no probs whatsoever, from what my noobish mind can read from the Vivo mod threads it seems like you got to use the right kind of bios to get the oc right. The gigabyte one isnt so good. I'm using a retail X800 XTPE bios.

 

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