Voodoo5 5500 on K8T800Pro ( AGP 4x )

[m14radu]

Hello,

Well, taking into accout the information and advices from Komponent and by reading the mod that the Italian dude did it ( on forumzone.it) , I decided to try myself this mod.
Because a Skt.939 board  and a Venice 3500+ CPU were layng around, I decided to try the mod on this platform.

Test System:
Athlon 64 3500+ - Skt.939
Mobo: MSI K8T Neo2-F V2.0
Voodoo5 5500 AGP
512 DDR RAM ( only 266 MHz FSB )
40Gb HDD
Enermax PSU


So, I decided not to Modifiy the AGP Slot on the Motherboard – Reason: if the Mobo get burned, i can change it any time on warranty  
So that the next step was to cut the noch on the Voodoo5 card.
After a closer look an the AGP pinout, the pins from 42 to 44 came into discussion.

Pin            Side A           Side B

42       Reserved            3.3Vaux      
43       Ground            Ground      
44       Reserved            Reserved
     
After a closer look at the voodoo5 card, at these pins, I found out that:

Pins 42 ( both sides ) and 44 are not connected.
Pins 43 are connected to ground – this was confirmed by measuring them !
Well for the pin 43 there is a soldering point, witch is for every situation available. ( I thought that in the worst case when the card don't start in the skt.939 Mobo, remains  the possibility to rescue the voodoo board by sodering this points to ground – luckely this step was not necessary )

The cutting operation mus be done with very much attention and patience !
Don't hurry up ! Take care to eliminate every metal pieces and any rest that can later cause a electrical shortcut.
You will need the following Tools:



In the Foto you can see the modified card:



The area for Pins 42,43 and 44 was cuted. Unfortunately I was afraid to cut deeper in the card, in order not to damage some traces.
This lead to the following problem: the card did not stay very well in the AGP Slot.
This is a problem that should be fixed . ( The AGP Slot on the Mobo can be slightly modifyed....)
So, after this operation, I tried to start the card in my old Epox 8K5A2 board with universal slot. The card started without problems... it was a very happy moment for me   . my voodoo card was alive !
Then, the Skt 939 Board must be prepare for the voodoo5.
I started the Mobo with an agp4x card. Then the AGP Voltage in Bios was modified to 1.85 Volts, and the AGP to AGP4x. ( This settings remains available with the moded Voodoo5 card ! )





Then I pluged the voodoo5 card into the Mobo and .....
The card started !!!!

It was for me a glorios moment.
See the pictures.







The board is running from about 24 hours – continuously. No freeze, no BSOD...
The K8T800Pro is not hot; no components on the Voodoo board or on the Mobo are excessively hot...everything seems to work fine.
But...

3dmark2001 is hangig up in dual mode.
In single mode there is o problem !



I manage to start some games:

Call of Duty – no problems.
Start Treck Armadia – no problems. Even 4xFSAA is working well.
Edie Hard – Nakatomi Platza – no Problems.
Flatout2 – no Problems.
The Benchmark "Final Reality" also run without Problems.

Two Remarks:

1. I did not supply the Pin A34 with 3.3Volts like the italian dude did it – I don't agreed with this. Even the card is not rock stable in all application, I'm sure that Komponent will come with a solution.
I now, that the VSA100 must now operate with 1.5Volt signals.( the AVR Pins Problems..) Now they are probably working still with 3.3V signalling.
2.I did not connect the Pin2 from the Voodoo card on ground. ( TYPEDET ).

Many thanks to Komponent for his advices / informations and to the Italian dude ( ciacara ).
With theyr support / ideas / advices  this Projekt was possible.

Please, fell free to comment my experiment.


Regards.
Radu.

[Raff3DC]

Wow, nice. But the card still doesn't get AGP4x bandwidth, I assume. Is it really necessary to set 1,85 VAGP? It's far out of spec, so maybe something may burn after a couple of weeks ...

Greetings from Germany,
Raff

[ggab]

more replies at:
http://www.falconfly-central.de/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=general;action=display;num=1185303152

EXCELLENT WORK!! i really hope u can get SLI mode (dual)

i guess u should supply the Pin A34 with 3.3Volts.....

but i would connect
pin A43 and B43 to     Ground            Ground
and B42 to  3.3Vaux  


BYE!

[Obi-Wan Kenobi]

well he did get SLI working otherwise FSAA x4 wouldn't work in the games he tested

[Knuckles]

Nice Work... but what about you actually carefully remove the AGP slot's notch instead of cutting the video card? There would still be nothing connecting those pins....

[m14radu]

You have tree possibility to use the V5 card into an AGP4x/8x board.

1 - by cutting the noch on the AGP Mobo Slot.
2 - by cutting the V5 card.
3 - by using an AGP riser

The second possibility allow you to use the card also in other Mobo's.
I choose the first solution becouse of the above mentionated reason.
But the most ellegant solution remain of course an AGP riser.

Br.
Radu.

P.S. Fell free to start your own experiment, and please keep us informed about the result.

[Ralf]

hmm interesting Mod

you voodoo now used only one chipset for all aplications 3d ??
like Voodoo 4500 ??


if you got balls of steel can do RAIL mod
connect from line 3,3v to Agp pin (backside mobo) and hapying agp 3,3v
But ... this mod is only for Card 3,3v like voodoo 5k

[m14radu]

hehe,

i think that for putting 3.3V on the AGP pin, just like that, balls of stell are not enough
I know that the italian dude did like that, but..i'm a little bit sceptical about this...

That's IMHO pure suicide !
Card and Mobo can easly get burned......

For the moment, the projekt status is the same..no news more about..i hope that Hank will came with the salvaging solution !

[Kostas]

Hello there cool mod, do you know how you can increase the volt to the cpu with the current mb?? I have the same board, since i burned my last one,lol, and now i found only this board for 939 and agp and i cant find the cpu volt setting.Does it need a mod or something???

[m14radu]

Well, i did not pay attention to this issue.
The above system is not working anymore ( i give the memory to a frined ), but i will check this as soon as i get it running.

[ciacara]

Hi M14radu,

I wanted to get my Compliments for the change you made on the Voodoo5, works very well!

I have a beautiful new, direct power to do Voodoo5 5500 with 3.3 v!

[



Start video



Come into my Thread, you can speak English

We expect all.

Bye.

[m14radu]

Hi Ciacara,

Compliments to u too !
It was your idea and i just copy and try the mod !

Nice to see that you are making good Progress.
It's a great Projekt, and the result seems to be very nice !
Can u pls post a guide about the entyre mod  procedure ?

You provided directly to the VDDQ Lines 3.3V. It's not to dangerous for the card and Mobo ?
It's the dual mode ( SLI ) working properly ?
In the video is to see only the 3dmark2001 demo !

Br.
Radu.

P.S. Topic on Falconfly Forum: http://www.falconfly-central.de/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=general;action=display;num=1185303152

[ciacara]

Many thanks m14radu

I am preparing the English translation in my thread, I wrote a part

I believe that the mainboard AN7 has an internal system of protection, v 3.3 are limited slot Agp

I tried on a voodoo Asrock 4CoreDual-Sata2 chipset Via PT880 Pro but does not work ....... momentarily

I can not prove voodoo in sli because I have only two 5500 Agp 2x

The video shows the bios settings, you should see the screen

We see that the agp is set to 1.55 v while the screen voltages

Agp Vdqq and 3.37 v

Download Ful Screen Video



However tell me what you want to see, games, Benchmarck, test, Overclock .... I see what you want!

Thanks for the link on Falconfly Topic of Forum

[m14radu]

Hi Ciacara,

I saw the movies and pictures...
To check if the SLI is working properly, you should install the 3dfx utilities.( Or V-Control )
After that you have the possibility to choose between single chip and dual chip function.
Your 3DMark2001 Benchmark result is low, indicating that you are using the voodoo5 card in single chip mode. ( like a Voodoo4 ).
My modded voodoo5 works also well in single chip mode, but when switching to dual mode ( when both VSA are used ) the sistem freeze after short time.
Can u please try this benchmark im dual chip mode ?
The score should be around 2800 points, for a regular voodoo5.

Do u know if the VIA K8T800 has also such a 3.3V protection ? This modding is dangerous, because you exceed the customer specifications....
The best ans safe way will be to force the VSA chip to work with 1.5V signaling - then no additional 3.3V supply will be needed.
Unfortunately, i was not able yet to get the card working with 1.5V signaling.
A Datasheet for the VSA chip is also avalable, and may be useful.
I have to search the link....

Radu.

[ciacara]

Originally posted by m14radu

Hi Ciacara,

I saw the movies and pictures...
To check if the SLI is working properly, you should install the 3dfx utilities.( Or V-Control )
After that you have the possibility to choose between single chip and dual chip function.
Your 3DMark2001 Benchmark result is low, indicating that you are using the voodoo5 card in single chip mode. ( like a Voodoo4 ).
My modded voodoo5 works also well in single chip mode, but when switching to dual mode ( when both VSA are used ) the sistem freeze after short time.
Can u please try this benchmark im dual chip mode ?
The score should be around 2800 points, for a regular voodoo5.

Hi M14radu ,

Tonight set in voodoo sli with v-Contrtol and 3DMark2001 benchmark
Thanks for the info

Do u know if the VIA K8T800 has also such a 3.3V protection ?

I believe that the Via Chipset (400/600/800/880) does not have this protection, I tried all the mainboard freezes...

This modding is dangerous, because you exceed the customer specifications....
The best ans safe way will be to force the VSA chip to work with 1.5V signaling - then no additional 3.3V supply will be needed.

Without Vdqq 3.3 v ram the works?
However, I can say that I have solved the problems of stability with the power to 3.3 v, before I had your same problem ...

Unfortunately, i was not able yet to get the card working with 1.5V signaling.
A Datasheet for the VSA chip is also avalable, and may be useful.
I have to search the link....

Radu.

Ok, I try to look for the link