**Update**
- (4/11/06) Image hosting back online. Thanks RockHydra for the temporary space!
- HEAT ISSUES (3/10/06) I figured out why many of you are reporting heat increases. The latest versions of RivaTuner enabled the capability to slow down your GPU fan... unfortunately it defaults to "53%" on each: 2d, low 3d, and intense 3d. So if you guys are seeing heat increases, navigate to here and up the sliders to 100%. Your heat issue should go away.
- (1/17/06) This procedure can be followed for the unlocking of the pipes on a 6800GS, in addition to a 6800nu and 6800le.
- Changes made to reflect newest build of RivaTuner (16)
- 2nd method for unlocking pipes if this method is unsuccessful added. See bottom of this post.
VERSION 15.6 AND UP ENABLES 64-BIT USERS TO BENEFIT FROM THIS UNLOCKING
So you've been surfing these forums and everyone who has a 6800 seems to have theirs "unlocked" and you see that the performance benefit of unlocking is pretty good. You search and search for HOURS trying to look up information on how to do it... but you're out of of luck in finding a walkthrough. So you download RivaTuner, you check the settings and you start clicking on buttons that you THINK will do it but then you get an error that says "This may screw up your computer and your card entirely." So you stop.. and you wonder what the heck to do.
Sound familiar? Well wonder no more. Here is my step-by-step guide on how to work with RivaTuner to unlock those pipelines and vertex processor to help you get that performance boost you've been looking for.
NOTE: This, to my knowledge, will NOT work with the NV41 (PCI-Express) version of the 6800. The NV40 (AGP 8x) is the only version able to unlock.
Step 1:
Obviously, download and install RivaTuner RC 16. This newest release candidate will unlock many cards that were previously unable to unlock with versions 15.2-15.8. Make sure you get this one. Install it, and then move on to Step 2.
Step 2:
When you first run RivaTuner, you will probably get an error message that says something about your drivers not being supported. Don't worry, your softmod will work (provided successful) regardless of your driver version. Hit OK, uncheck the box if you'd like, and you should get to the main menu screen... which will look something like this. Go ahead and move on to Step 3.
Step 3:
Alright, now that you're at the main menu, click on the little arrow beside the word customize (pic). This will open a menu to which you should click on the first one to the left (pic). This configures the Low Level System Settings. Once you're at the next menu, move on to Step 4.
Step 4:
Okay, so far so good. Next, navigate to the NVStrap tab. On it, toward the bottom, you will see a check box that says "Allow Enabling Hardware Masks." Go ahead and check it, and you should get a warning box like so. Go ahead and hit Yes. Step 5 time!
Step 5:
Once you hit OK in the warning box, click on the dropdown box beside "Active pixel/vertex units configuration" and select Custom (pic). The "Customize" box below it should then become available. Click that and a new window will appear (pic). Next step!
Step 6:
In the next menu is where you will actually enable your pipelines and vertex shader. What you're going to do is look underneath the "HW masked" column for those that say "yes." There should be 2 of them. On the far left side of the row in which they say "yes," click once to make a check mark appear. (pic of whole process). Go ahead and hit OK. Final step!
Step 7:
After checking the rows that were masked and hitting OK, it should take you back to the previous screen. It should now say "custom (16x1,6vp)" in the dropdown box. (pic). Hit OK and it should prompt you to restart (do so). After restarting, open up RivaTuner again and your menu should now look like so.
Congratulations! You've now successfully enabled 4 more pipes and 1 more vertex processor on your 6800.
This doesn't however, guarantee they work properly. Run some graphics-intensive programs and look for artifacts. If there are, indeed, artifacts or any other corruption, just go back to the NVStrap tab and change the dropdown box back to "Determined by VGA BIOS." That will bring you back to normal.
Most, however, have reported that if there were artifacts, you could usually lock back just the pipes and keep the vertex shader open and the artifacts will go away. If you'd like to try that, simply uncheck the pipe (labelled Pixel Unit x in the customize screen) and don't uncheck the Vertex Unit.
Much luck to you all!
- (4/11/06) Image hosting back online. Thanks RockHydra for the temporary space!
- HEAT ISSUES (3/10/06) I figured out why many of you are reporting heat increases. The latest versions of RivaTuner enabled the capability to slow down your GPU fan... unfortunately it defaults to "53%" on each: 2d, low 3d, and intense 3d. So if you guys are seeing heat increases, navigate to here and up the sliders to 100%. Your heat issue should go away.
- (1/17/06) This procedure can be followed for the unlocking of the pipes on a 6800GS, in addition to a 6800nu and 6800le.
- Changes made to reflect newest build of RivaTuner (16)
- 2nd method for unlocking pipes if this method is unsuccessful added. See bottom of this post.
VERSION 15.6 AND UP ENABLES 64-BIT USERS TO BENEFIT FROM THIS UNLOCKING
So you've been surfing these forums and everyone who has a 6800 seems to have theirs "unlocked" and you see that the performance benefit of unlocking is pretty good. You search and search for HOURS trying to look up information on how to do it... but you're out of of luck in finding a walkthrough. So you download RivaTuner, you check the settings and you start clicking on buttons that you THINK will do it but then you get an error that says "This may screw up your computer and your card entirely." So you stop.. and you wonder what the heck to do.
Sound familiar? Well wonder no more. Here is my step-by-step guide on how to work with RivaTuner to unlock those pipelines and vertex processor to help you get that performance boost you've been looking for.
NOTE: This, to my knowledge, will NOT work with the NV41 (PCI-Express) version of the 6800. The NV40 (AGP 8x) is the only version able to unlock.
Step 1:
Obviously, download and install RivaTuner RC 16. This newest release candidate will unlock many cards that were previously unable to unlock with versions 15.2-15.8. Make sure you get this one. Install it, and then move on to Step 2.
Step 2:
When you first run RivaTuner, you will probably get an error message that says something about your drivers not being supported. Don't worry, your softmod will work (provided successful) regardless of your driver version. Hit OK, uncheck the box if you'd like, and you should get to the main menu screen... which will look something like this. Go ahead and move on to Step 3.
Step 3:
Alright, now that you're at the main menu, click on the little arrow beside the word customize (pic). This will open a menu to which you should click on the first one to the left (pic). This configures the Low Level System Settings. Once you're at the next menu, move on to Step 4.
Step 4:
Okay, so far so good. Next, navigate to the NVStrap tab. On it, toward the bottom, you will see a check box that says "Allow Enabling Hardware Masks." Go ahead and check it, and you should get a warning box like so. Go ahead and hit Yes. Step 5 time!
Step 5:
Once you hit OK in the warning box, click on the dropdown box beside "Active pixel/vertex units configuration" and select Custom (pic). The "Customize" box below it should then become available. Click that and a new window will appear (pic). Next step!
Step 6:
In the next menu is where you will actually enable your pipelines and vertex shader. What you're going to do is look underneath the "HW masked" column for those that say "yes." There should be 2 of them. On the far left side of the row in which they say "yes," click once to make a check mark appear. (pic of whole process). Go ahead and hit OK. Final step!
Step 7:
After checking the rows that were masked and hitting OK, it should take you back to the previous screen. It should now say "custom (16x1,6vp)" in the dropdown box. (pic). Hit OK and it should prompt you to restart (do so). After restarting, open up RivaTuner again and your menu should now look like so.
Congratulations! You've now successfully enabled 4 more pipes and 1 more vertex processor on your 6800.
This doesn't however, guarantee they work properly. Run some graphics-intensive programs and look for artifacts. If there are, indeed, artifacts or any other corruption, just go back to the NVStrap tab and change the dropdown box back to "Determined by VGA BIOS." That will bring you back to normal.
Most, however, have reported that if there were artifacts, you could usually lock back just the pipes and keep the vertex shader open and the artifacts will go away. If you'd like to try that, simply uncheck the pipe (labelled Pixel Unit x in the customize screen) and don't uncheck the Vertex Unit.
Much luck to you all!