Lucid

This article will involve flashing your video card's BIOS to that of the Radeon 9800XT which will void any warranties which you may currently have on your card. I do not take no responsibility if you kill your video card.


Let The Action Begin

Before we flash our 9800's we need to prepare ourselves with what we will need to flash the BIOS. Below is a list/link to everything you will need:

• An ATI Radeon 9800NP or Pro capable of 412MHz core clock and 365MHz (730MHz DDR) memory clock
• Flashrom v2.40 (Can be downloaded here )
• A copy of the ATi Radeon 9800XT BIOS (Can be downloaded here or here)
• A bootable floppy disk (Can be downloaded here )
• The desire to have a 9800XT for a fraction of the cost

Now that we know exactly what we need lets begin to flash this bad boy, shall we? Ok, you will begin by creating your bootable floppy disk and placing the extracted flashrom files (DOS4GW.exe, FLASHROM.exe, FLASHROM.rom). Once you have moved these files over to the disk you can place the BIOS file (The one you downloaded) on the disk and prepare to flash. Once you restart your PC with the floppy disk in the drive you should see "Caldera Dr.Dos 2.xx" on your screen. Once everything is loaded you are ready to flash. Before you flash however, I recommend backing up your current BIOS by typing " flashrom -s 0 original.bin" at the A:\ prompt. Your BIOS is now saved to the floppy disk and you can use this in case of a bad flash.

Now you are finally ready to flash. After the BIOS has been saved to your floppy type "flashrom -p 0 9800XT.bin". Flashrom should begin to flash your BIOS and you should see a final message saying "6xxxx of 6xxxx bytes verified". Once you see this message your 9800 is successfully flashed with the Radeon 9800XT BIOS. Now restart your system and continue to install the drivers of your choice. A word of caution, after flashing your monitor may flicker off while loading windows. This is normal and your monitor should return in the on mode within a few seconds. Also when you are installing your video drivers the same thing will take place. Do not worry people, this is normal.

If you have followed these steps you should now have a fully functional Radeon 9800XT.

If you have problems using the method above try the method below which I have tryed and tested sucessfuly

First of all take flashrom & the bios you will be flashing and put them into "C:\flashrom"

Make sure you have the bootdisk read, boot into dos, once in dos itll say "A:"

type "C: <press enter>"

then type "cd flashrom <press enter>" that will take you into "c:\flashrom"

once in there backup your bios by typing "flashrom -s 0 ORIG.BIN <press enter>" that will make a copy of your original bios and it'll put it into "C:\flashrom" as "ORIG.BIN".

after you've done that load the XT bios by typing

"flashrom -s p 9800XT.BIN <press enter> "
after you've done that it should tell you that its done and restart.


-Lucid

DeathONator

Thanks for posting this! For everyone here, I did the softmod yesterday. Pretty easy. Just one suggestion: after downloading the new bios file, rename it something shorter like 9800XT.bin .

Here are my results w/ the card clocked to 450/366mhz, and ATI's CAT 4.1 drivers. My system was not at all maxed out, just overclocked to what I run it at on a daily basis.

9800 Pro before soft-mod:
3DMark01SE: 18807
3DMark03: 6504

After soft-mod:
3DMark01SE: 18566
3DMark03: 6895

So, for some reason I lost points in 01SE, but gained alot in 03.

__________________
Fold for the cure & team 37726!!
H2O cooling: Chevette heatercore, 172mm 258CFM fan, Apogee GT, and Ehiem 1250. Load temp @ 1.45vcore 41C.

GuardianX

Hi Death,
Since i have the same card as you do, and since you already did yours. Which BIOS did you download for the 9800XT? I can't find one that is 128 9800XT. Only 9800XT 256MB.

Thanks.

DeathONator

BBA (Built By) Radeon 9800 "XT" 128MB Samsung E-Die bios



BBA 128MB XT BIOS

__________________
Fold for the cure & team 37726!!
H2O cooling: Chevette heatercore, 172mm 258CFM fan, Apogee GT, and Ehiem 1250. Load temp @ 1.45vcore 41C.

GuardianX

Hi Death,

have a problem here.
I downloaded all the files, including the BB BIOS that you posted previously for me.

Rename the BB BIOS to ATI.BIN
copy all files to A drive
re-start computer, go to DOS

go to A:
run:
flashrom -s 0 ORIG.BIN
flashrom -s p ati.bin

result:
Format : flashrom -s <adapter num> <filename> [kbytes]

????? did I do anything wrong? nothing happen.

GuardainX

GuardianX

On his second paragrahp saying:

flashrom -p 0 nameOffile.bin

at the bottom of his steps saying:

flashrom -s p ATI.bin

? Use -s or -p? which one is it?

GuardianX

DeathONator

If booting to DOS from a floppy, use "flashrom -p 0 name.of.the.bios.bin". And remember, capitalization DOES MATTER.

The second paragraph of steps is for if you're flashing from a file in a folder on your HDD, but you're using a floppy.

__________________
Fold for the cure & team 37726!!
H2O cooling: Chevette heatercore, 172mm 258CFM fan, Apogee GT, and Ehiem 1250. Load temp @ 1.45vcore 41C.

GuardianX

Thanks Death LOL.

ARE YOU ON 24/25hrs a day? LOL ... thanks again. I'll try it later.
Will let u know.

GuardianX

Aceistheplace

i have a 256 mb pro do i still use the 128 mb bios sry new to the whole mod thing

DeathONator

Nope, use the BIOS for the 256MB card.

__________________
Fold for the cure & team 37726!!
H2O cooling: Chevette heatercore, 172mm 258CFM fan, Apogee GT, and Ehiem 1250. Load temp @ 1.45vcore 41C.