Unlocking Pipelines one gForce FX5600 Ultra

[newParadigm]

I have a gForce FX5600 Ultra that I bought the card about 6 mo ago. Its a PNY Version with 128mb of RAM and TV-OUT.

I am curious, i"ve heard many people say that u can unlock 4 additional Pipes on a Radeon 9800se and turn it into a 9800np, can a similar MOD be done to the GF FX's, say turn my 5600 into like a 5800 or sumthing?

Much help apreciated,
newParadime

 

[Matthias99]

No. The 5600/5700 cards only *have* 4 pipelines, just like the RADEON 9600 cards. Only cards that are built on high-end cores with some pipes disabled (such as the RADEON 9500, RADEON 9800SE, and RADEON X800Pro) can be softmodded. It may be possible to softmod the GeForce 6800 NU -- but that is the only NVIDIA card that has disabled pipelines.

 

[VIAN]

No, because the 5600 is different chip than the 5800.

Some ATI chips can have pipelines unlocked because the chips are similar to the unlocked version and the PCB is what's keeping them locked.

The 5600/5700 is a 2x2 pipeline architecture not 4x2 are you claim matthias99.

 

[Lonyo]

Originally posted by: Matthias99
No. The 5600/5700 cards only *have* 4 pipelines, just like the RADEON 9600 cards. Only cards that are built on high-end cores with some pipes disabled (such as the RADEON 9500, RADEON 9800SE, and RADEON X800Pro) can be softmodded. It may be possible to softmod the GeForce 6800 NU -- but that is the only NVIDIA card that has disabled pipelines.

I think the 5700 has 8 pipelines, but I could be wrong, and the X800Pro can only (currently) be hardmodded, I believe.

But yes, nVidia cards are generally unlockable, as they have different cores.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Other than Quadro mods and BIOS flashing, I don't think its possible to unlock hidden pipes on any Geforce FX cards as all GFX GPUs don't have disabled pipelines. I may be wrong though.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Lonyo

Originally posted by: Matthias99
No. The 5600/5700 cards only *have* 4 pipelines, just like the RADEON 9600 cards. Only cards that are built on high-end cores with some pipes disabled (such as the RADEON 9500, RADEON 9800SE, and RADEON X800Pro) can be softmodded. It may be possible to softmod the GeForce 6800 NU -- but that is the only NVIDIA card that has disabled pipelines.

I think the 5700 has 8 pipelines, but I could be wrong, and the X800Pro can only (currently) be hardmodded, I believe.

I just looked up the specs; they're 4x1 cards in hardware (at least as far as NVIDIA is saying). No modding (hard or soft) should be possible. Yes, the X800Pro can only be hardmodded.

But yes, nVidia cards are generally unlockable, as they have different cores.

Huh? I think you mean "unmoddable", not "unlockable".

 

[VIAN]

evidence that the 5700 is a 2x2 pipeline design

Come on matthias99, do you really believe that the FX has 8 pipelines.

A common misconseption and stupidity of Nvidia.

The True NV30/35/38 architecture goes as follows. 4x2 architecture, but when doing stencil/z/colorless pixels it can pump out 8 pixels, they call this system 8x0. They aren't real pixels, it's just for calculations and stuff.

And the 5700 has half of this, so it would be 2x2.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Originally posted by: VIAN
evidence of pipelines

EDIT: So the 5700 is a 2x2 design?...Hmm.

 

[VIAN]

Sorry it was confusing, but I fixed it.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Ignore this post please.

 

[kylebisme]

Originally posted by: VIAN
evidence that the 5700 is a 2x2 pipeline design

Come on matthias99, do you really believe that the FX has 8 pipelines.

A common misconseption and stupidity of Nvidia.
.

the link you posted has two contradictory statments:

Like the FX 5600 before it, the 5700 only has half as many pipelines as the top model. That means the chip has four pipes (Color + Z) running at 475MHz.

the truth is that the nv36 is a 4x1 setup. http://www.beyond3d.com/misc/chipcomp/?view=chipdetails&id=29&orderby=release_date&order=Order&cname=

 

[Gamingphreek]

The 5700 Ultra and co. are indeed a 4x1 architecture. Even stratching way back to the Geforce 2TI's they were 4x1.

Just for grins and giggles, i dont think the 5800Ultra even had 8pipelines. I think that came with the 5900. That was one of the main reasons, along with a lack of a 256bit memory, that the 5800Ultra/leafblower was so horrible.

-Kevin

 

[VIAN]

the truth is that the nv36 is a 4x1 setup.

According to Nvidia's pfd document FX technology overview which can be found on their site.

Pipelines are as follows -

5900 - 8

5700 - 4

5200 - 4

Now, everyone is supposed to know that according to this article, 8 pipelines only happens when doing z or stencil, the details are in that entire page. If it's not doing z or stencil, then it is using 4x2. And this is how the entire FX architecture is done. The 5700 is based on the 5900, so this would not change. They just cut the pipelines in half, where Nvidia could still retardedly say that there are 4 pipelines. They have learned how however, because the newer 6800 says 16 pipelines instead of the FX deception, in which they would have said 32. It was all a marketing ploy to make it seem like the FX was just as powerful as the R3x0. If fact it did have 8 pipelines, they just weren't used most of the time, so how is that useful.

The FX architecture will to me forever be known as follows -

5900 - 4x2

5700 - 2x2

5200 - 2x2

Because it doesn't render the game using 8 (5900) or 4 (5700/5200) pipelines.

Just for grins and giggles, i dont think the 5800Ultra even had 8pipelines. I think that came with the 5900. That was one of the main reasons, along with a lack of a 256bit memory, that the 5800Ultra/leafblower was so horrible.

The 5800 ruled and it almost made no sense to release the 5900 because they perform so close according to VGA charts III at tom's hardware. The only problem with the 5800 was the heat that it put out due to the RAM being DDRII.

 

[merlocka]

Ya. 52xx, 55xx, 56xx, 57xx are all commonly referred to as 2x2.

B3D review illustrates this.

Specifically,

One thing to note with all these boards is their pipeline organisation operates as a 4x1 in only a very few specific cases - to our knowledge this is only in Z/Stencilling and single texturing cases - in all other cases, which includes when any multi-texturing is required or when pixel shaders are used, the chips act as a 2x2 pipeline.

 

[VIAN]

I reread Anandtech's article and I will explain it for you so you can understand.

It is a 2x2 architecture.

you can perform 2 things in one pipeline at the same time. Z and Color (Color is a normal operation of the pixel pipeline in which a pixel would be drawn on the screen). But instead of the Color, you could substitute it for another Z unit. So in one pipeline, you could do 2 Z units, but draw no color onto the screen. In effect, compared to other cards where it can only do Z and Color only. Theoretically this one pipeline is performing like 2 for Z only.

So there you have it. I will attempt to illustrate it.

pipeline 1-----pipeline 2
|z+color|-----|z+color|

instead of that, you can do:

pipeline 1-----pipeline 2
|z+z|----------|z+z|

So you are doing 2 of 1 operation where previously you could only do only 1 per pipeline normally, but remember you have to stop drawing pixels to do this.

This is the biggest marketing gimmick I have ever seen because physically there aren't 4 pipelines, just 2.

It should be more like it is 2 pipes, but does twice the z cacluations when not calculating color.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: VIAN
Because it doesn't render the game using 8 (5900) or 4 (5700/5200) pipelines.

video card comparison guide

GF2 = 2x2
GF3/GF4Ti = 4x2
GFFX 5700 and lower = 4x1
GFFX 5800/5900 = 4x2

The 5600/5700 have four pipes, but can only process one texture per clock. This is what I've always seen reported.

here's a review of the 5700U with the same thing listed

Edit: hmm, B3D disagrees. Man, I hate this marketing crap.

Edit 2: Wait, no they don't.

One thing to note with all these boards is their pipeline organisation operates as a 4x1 in only a very few specific cases - to our knowledge this is only in Z/Stencilling and single texturing cases - in all other cases, which includes when any multi-texturing is required or when pixel shaders are used, the chips act as a 2x2 pipeline.

(emphasis added)

That is, the 5200/5600/5700 can act as 2x2 OR 4x1. The 5800/5900 cards act as 4x2 or 4x1 depending on the situation. Look at the single-texturing fillrate numbers in the B3D review -- the 5700U runs at 475Mhz, and pushes ~1300Mpixels/sec -- that's 2.75 pixels/clock. It has to have four pipes; a 2-pipeline card couldn't push more than 950Mpixels/sec at that clock rate.

 

[VIAN]

Look at my prior article as I have changed it significantly.

GF2 = 2x2
GF3/GF4Ti = 4x2
GFFX 5700 and lower = 4x1
GFFX 5800/5900 = 4x2

The 5600/5700 have four pipes, but can only process one texture per clock. This is what I've always seen reported.

Don't get it confused the GF2 is a 4x2, the MX is 2x2.

This video card copmarison guide also goes against other articles that I've read that claim the the 5700 has the same vertex processing power as the upper levels and it is clear that the vertex engines are cut in half there.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: VIAN
Look at my prior article as I have changed it significantly.

GF2 = 2x2
GF3/GF4Ti = 4x2
GFFX 5700 and lower = 4x1
GFFX 5800/5900 = 4x2

The 5600/5700 have four pipes, but can only process one texture per clock. This is what I've always seen reported.

Don't get it confused the GF2 is a 4x2, the MX is 2x2.

Yes, ok, the GF2 GTS (which is not a very widespread card these days) is a 4x2 design. The GF2MX/GF4MX (which is what I meant) is a 2x2.

This video card copmarison guide also goes against other articles that I've read that claim the the 5700 has the same vertex processing power as the upper levels and it is clear that the vertex engines are cut in half there.

I'm not sure what you're talking about, or where you read that. In *single-texturing*, the 5700U is about the same as a 5900 (at least in terms of pixel fillrate; it has way less memory bandwidth), but in multitexturing, the 5900 will blow it away. I don't know about the vertex shader setup; the rojakpot comparison says it has 2 and the 5800/5900 has 4 (which sounds right), but it could be wrong.

 

[VIAN]

I misunderstood Tom here.

He is saying that it is actually a 4 pipeline card, but that it has "365Vertices/s, the vertex performance is on the same level as that of the bigger models."

But he also says that it has half as many pipelines as the cards in the high end, and we know that they aren't 8 pipelines. They are only 4x2. So he is contradicting himself. I will contact him about it.

 

[VIAN]

Left him this message:

"The link for the article is:

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-06.html

In this article you mentioned in the first paragraph:

"Like the FX 5600 before it, the 5700 only has half as many pipelines as the top model. That means the chip has four pipes (Color + Z) running at 475MHz."

These two sentences contradict each other. The rest of the letter details why.

The FX 5900 doesn't use 8 pipelines, just 4, in a 4x2 architecture. However, when performing z/stencil calculations, it can substitute a color unit for a second z/stencil unit to effectively double the work, a theortical 8 pipelines only for z/stencil operations. This is knowledge according to Anandtech's article found:

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2031&p=2

Here in another article of Tom's we can prove it:

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20030512/geforce_fx_5900-05.html

Notice that for the 5900 Ultra, a fillrate of 1800Mpixels, although he mentions Mtexels, which I think it was an error. 1800Mpixels is achieved with 4*450, number of pipelines multiplied by the clock frequency. An then the texturing rate which I think that was what was supposed to be the Mtexels, he has as 3600. This ensures that it was a 4x2 pipeline card.

Which means that according to your first sentence in your paragraph from which I quoted in the beginning the 5700 Ultra is a 2x2 pipeline card. But then your second sentence contradicts the first one by saying that it uses 4 pipelines to do z+color. But then this means that it no longer uses half the pipelines of the 5900, either that or it doesn't have the feature to substitute color for z.

I would really like to know the truth here, please correct me if I'm wrong and please do respond if you change the article.

Thanks."