Turn a GTX into a GTS?

[thegoonden]

Based on previous experience with Nv cards, and seeing the way the various 88nn cards are equiped and clocked, it seems reasonable to assume that you can get higher clocks if you have fewer stream (or on my venerable 6800, shader/pixel) processors enabled.

Certainly when you unlock the extra channels on ye olde 6800, the overclockability all but vanishes.

And, again, my 8800GTS could do downright silly speeds, but the 8800GTX, with the extra 32 processing channels, pretty much chokes at anything above BFG's default overclock of 626.

Given the relative performance of GTX and GTS in certain games, I thought it would be fun to try and disable some of the channels, and clock the danglies off the thing.

Trouble is, I turned the wrong ones off in rivatuner and had to go through a rather lengthy and nerve-jangling process to get my card working again. (safe mode, remove drivers, reboot, safe mode, reinstall drivers, fire up rivatuner before rebooting and set card back to default....and breeeeeathe).


SO my question, oh clock-obsessed wise ones, is....
Can you actually switch off the right combination of stream processor banks, to make the GTX emulate a GTS?
And, obviously, if so, which ones.


(yes, I am aware it's probably pointless, but I do note that some of the later cards with fewer processing channels and higher clocks do very well against the GTX in CERTAIN tests).

Cheers.

 

[The Asgard]

Can't see the GTX running any faster with less SP's. I have had a few GTS's ( 2x 320, 1x 640 ) and they all seemed to clock around the same as my GTX. 630-650

The only way to get more speed is by using a volt mod but this would void any warranty you may have with BFG.

 

[gurusan]

yeah disabling shaders will not allow you to clock higher.

Are you talking about the 8800GTS 512mb? Because that has a higher clock because its made on a 65nm process vs the 90nm of the 8800GTX

 

[The Asgard]

// oops, sorry. delete

 

[gurusan]

ah sorry I was referring to the OP actually

 

[thegoonden]

Ah well, was only a thought.

It was a 340GTS BTW.

Ran at 650 comfortably and 680 at a push.

 

[gurusan]

Yeah that would be cool, because if that were the case then GTS owners could "unlock" 32 extra shaders to become a GTX.

but sadly that isn't the case.

 

[thegoonden]

Well, you can unlock them in rivatuner, it just achieves nothing because they are diconnected in hardware too.

It DID work on the 6800Pro I had, you could unlock a bunch of extra banks, which increased performance a little bit at stock speeds, but any overclock was artifact city (though it didn't actually bail out), which is what really gave me the idea.

 

[cavemanoc]

The old 6800LE and 6800NU both had disabled pipelines (16 was the full wack) You could open them up in groups of 4 IIRC so you could access 12 or 16, but normally one set was borked - I got 12 out of mine (no artifacts), my mate got all 16 - awesome cards and clocked like a demon under my pelt. The Ati x800 cards were much better (GTO) as they weren't quality binned, but just 'we need to shift these' binned, so you were guaranteed the unlock and overclock - now that was quality Oc'ing (in fact - that's what is in my sig) - neither of those were limited in overclock by the unlock - but then it sounds like you opened up damaged pipelines (hence the artifacts) which would seriously hamper you

 

[thegoonden]

Could well be that.
Tis fine at stock with them unlocked though.

Should really turn them off again and clock it, it's in the GF's machine, so I'l keep that as a reserve "upgrade".