Sapphire GTO² available exclusively from OcUK and Modding instrutions inside.....

[Gibbo]

Hi there


Arriving early next week we have the:-
Sapphire ATI Radeon X800 GTO² 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) - OEM (GX-100-SP)

Merging the blistering frame-rates of the enthusiast realm with the frugality of the mainstream is where the perfect blend of Hybrid lies, the next generation Sapphire RADEON X800 GTO²! Built upon industry acclaimed tech and tweaked to perfection is the moniker of any Sapphire product and the X800 GTO² does not disappoint with it is 12 Pixel Pipelines (moddable to 16) and 256MB of onboard GDDR3 memory while utilizing a 256-bit memory interface. The only limit to the power you wield is your imagination and the hardware in your PC! Push your PC’s performance threshold and realize the true potential of PCI-Express and the Sapphire RADEON X800 GTO²! These cards are all capable of unlocking to 16 pipelines and have good overclocking potential. Overclockers UK does not guarantee unlocking of cards or overclocking mileage and it is a proceed at your own risk modification.

- 400MHz GPU Clock Speed (Highly overclockable)
- 256MB 980MHz GDDR3 memory accelerates the latest cutting edge 3D applications (Highly overclockable)
- 256-bit quad-channel GDDR3 memory interface
- Twelve pixel pipelines (Moddable to sixteen pipelines, see modding guide below)
- Six programmable vertex shader pipelines
- Early reports indicate that with the modded bios these cards have been overclocked upto X850 XT PE clock speeds which gives a 35% performance boost. (Modding of card and bios does invalidate warranty)

Price: £134.95 (£158.57 Including VAT at 17.5%)

BUY NOW!!!!!


How to flash the bios to 16 pipelines

Link to Techpowerup Guide Here



Performance Gains

By enabling the 4 more pipelines we can get a 10% performance increase.

By additional overclocking to X850XT PE clock speeds we can get an additional 20% increase.

By enabling the pipelines and overclocking the card altogether a 35% performance increase is expected.




Note: Overclockers UK does not guarantee modability or overclocking on these cards and flashing of the bios does invalidate your warranty with Overclockers UK. Though those in the know realise that these cards all do modify to 16 pipelines and overclock very well.

 

[Gibbo]

Welcome to the UK, we always get shafted . Some things can be nearly 1:1 for $:£ .

US pricing is $210 as already mentioned. The dollar rate is falling so at the moment that translates to £120 +Shipping and +taxes and if anything goes wrong then your in big trouble.

So when you add all those cost in the UK is just as cheap on this product as the US if your a UK customer considering buying from the US....

 

[Gibbo]

This has got to be close to the best graphics card deal ever.

Very well done Gibbo.

Hi there

Yes it is a good deal and from looking at US sites the pricing actually varies from $210 - $230 so our price is pretty good in respect to that.

Where we can OcUK will try to go that bit further by offering guides such as this to those who are willing to take the risk of modding their hardware.

 

[Gibbo]

Hi there

Stock has arrived at our warehouse. Order should ship out later today/tomorrow.

Got enough stock to cover all backorders and plenty more spare.

 

[Gibbo]

Thats great to know but ive still got a couple of questions...

first are OCUK going to be adjusting the price to match other e-tailers ? secondly why were these billed as "Exclusive to OCUK" and finally who removed the initial post regarding these matters im asking about and what was their reason??

When you see another Etailor with stock let me know.

Secondly were about £10 more maximum than other places, but whilst other places aint got stock then that argument pretty much goes away and the other place advertising these don't offer the same kind of levels of service as we do, such as these forums and 48 hour turn-around on Sapphire RMA's.

I said that OcUK have an exclusive on these for like the first week or two as that has not changed to my knowledge, as already said if anybody finds a UK E-Tailor with product in stock and let me know but I have a feeling you won't find another Etailor with stock for at least a week or two.

 

[Gibbo]

There is another E-tailor with them. They've had them on their site almost as long as OcUK.

Do they have product in stock? Are they UK based? If they do can you email me where please?

 

[Gibbo]

I found a uk based store with 2 Sapphire ATI Radeon X800GTO 256MB DDR3 TV-OUT/DVI (PCI-E) - Retail in stock for £128 inc vat, are these the same cards ?

Nope, thats the car that OcUK sells for £128 Inc. VAT too as well.

 

[Gibbo]

for £128 it must be a vauxhall nova...
now theres an idea... if OCUK did this i would be more than happy to pay £166 inc vat and delivery im afraid the argument of better service = slightly higher price doesnt work with this particular product Gibbo, everyone who buys this is gonna mod it to death so OCUK will provide no further service beyond that point...

First of all we won't sell pre-modded cards unless thousands become available and at the moment we can only buy a couple of hundred at a time. Then if we did this the price would be more like £150 +VAT.

Secondly the service does stand as anyone with a brain would realise that this is not a true hardware mod, so if things go wrong you just re-flash the old bios back onto the card and basically nobody would ever know it was modified so the warranty still stands.

 

[Gibbo]

do u guys still have these in stock?

...and does it need anything special to power it other than the pci-e slot.

My current case is ATX with the 4 pin power leads, will that be okay?

Hi there

We got just over 100 units in stock! We have also taken all of Sapphires remaining stock and as such will recieve a few hundred more over the next couple of weeks. Sapphire inform me that we have taken the last of them and that is it now. Once all sold there will be no more.

Only OcUK has product currently and as we have taken the remaing stock OcUK should remain exclusive on these now.

 

[Gibbo]

OcUK are not the exclusive retailer for these, others should have stock at the end of the week.

So people keep saying. Rather funny though when I can see Sapphires inventry and where its going.

Oh and except for 60 units they all appear to be arriving at OcUK. So looking at things we were first to recieve stock and as I stated right from the beginning we were gonna have approx a weeks exclusive. Just now its got better as we have several hundred and only 60 units have gone elsewhere....

So I guess thats pretty exclusive afterall.

P.S. We shall be having similar exclusivity on the X1800 series too which is also a good reason why were one of the only Etailors listing stock as only ourselves signed the NDAs and OcUK is recieving 75% and more of all UK allocation from the partners were dealing with.

 

[Gibbo]

So if OcUK have/having "all" the stock, why have other retailers bothered to put them on their sites?

To be hopeful they were gonna get stock. But if a manufacturer has the option of dealing with just one E-Tailor on a limited product it makes their life much easier, especially when dealing with a larger E-Tailor who is happy to take all the stock and aint messing about with taking a few cards here and there.....

As I have said 60 units have gone elsewhere and they won't last long and as we have gone and taken all the remaining stock and Sapphire now don't have any more as it was a limited edition I guess that means OcUK will be the only reseller in the long term with product always in stock.

 

[Gibbo]

Indeed I'm aware it's a limited product, I'm just saying that if it was exclusive to OcUK you'd have them all. Those 60 going elsewhere pretty much mean they are not exclusive to you.

Out of interest where did you say they were exclusive to you for a week?

In one of my first post/replies regarding this product.

Out of interest why are you so determined against OcUK not having an exclusive, or trying to prove otherwise?

Though if those 60 units sent elsewhere never show on website due to been used in systems or fulfilling back orders then I guess that does mean we have an exclusive as an etailor.

In all honesty I aint bothered. If you want to buy a GTO2 OcUK is currently the only UK company with product in stock ready to ship and as were getting large frequent deliveries we should have enough stock to keep this product in stock for approx a month unless demands further increases which it no doubt will once more people learn of what a bargain this card is and then to the fact that I suspect it will work fine in Crossfire mode too once modified to an X850 XT PE.

 

[Gibbo]

I only asked as I have yet to see the post saying "exclusive for a week". As for your question, I simply don't like being misled or other people being misled by marketing terms like "exclusive" when in all honesty (from what I've been told by another Uk retailer) you are not. If it turns out you are then I will be glad to apologise.

I'm aware that OcUK is currently the only UK company to have these products ready to ship, but I'd rather wait a few days and save myself some money by buying elsewhere.

As for crossfire, I'd assume you'd have to buy a X850 XT PE master card? As I'm pretty sure (although correct me if I'm wrong) that there are physical changes made by Ati to the standard card to make it a master card. It's not something that can be done to the bios or whatever to make the card a master. So you can't simply buy two GTO2's mod them and get them to work in crossfire. Although again, correct me if I'm wrong.

Well we have had product available now for nearly a week.
The other E-Tailor getting the stock is based further North of OcUK in the Northwest. Regarding saving money we may do a little discount on these later today.

For Crossfire you will indeed require an X800/X850 Master card.

 

[Gibbo]

Hi there

Check out our weekly offers page.

 

[Gibbo]

Hi there

When installing these cards you should first of all do the following:-

1. Make your bios boot disk, use techpowerup guide!!
2. Download latest ATI CAT drivers.
3. Uninstall current drivers.
4. Power off!!
5. Insert GTO2
6. Boot from floppy disk, run bios flash programme as per instructions.
7. Reboot and install CAT drivers and all should be running fine.

 

[Gibbo]

Hey, just wondering which is the best buy between the Powercolor x850xt and this GTO2 card? The powercolor x850xt is obviously better from the start, but it costs about £60 less than the sapphire x850xt, why? Does the GTO2 overlock to the same performance as the sapphire or the powercolor?

The X850 XT is a lot quicker card than any GTO, GTO16 or GTO2 cards.

Powercolor's card is cheaper than Sapphire's X850XT because Powercolor are clearing stock at a bargain price plus the Powercolor card is FULL RETAIL and has a games bundle.

So Powercolor X850XT all the way, in my view its money bad spent if you still buy a GTO of some sorts when you can have the real thing for similar money from OcUK.

 

[Gibbo]

Cheers for the quick reply. I'll be putting my order in for the x850xt, plus the amd64 venice 3500+ and mobo, soon Can you tell me when the offer on the x850xt ends?

Thursday!