VOGONS


First post, by PKFreeZZy

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Since my last purchase of a GeForce2 GTS was a failure, upon finding another deal for a reasonable price I decided to take it. This one is from Leadtek and it's one of the early yellow ones they made, except there's a twist: it has a PRO chip, as well as a label on the back and still gets identified as a GTS. The seller showed images of GPU-Z reporting 183MHz on the memory, though I'm convinced the GTS was clocked at 166MHz and the PRO at 200. Not only that, the memory chips seem to get unreasonably hot in a matter of minutes. Is DDR SGRAM supposed to run hot at all?

https://i.imgur.com/GcuDc8L.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/YKBrJN4.jpg

I've looked all over the internet but could only find 1 blurry image of a similar card, on a random auction re-listing site.

My Windows 98 PC: Slot 1 Pentium III 600 (Katmai) | 256MB PC133 SDRAM | 64MB Leadtek WinFast GeForce2 Pro | Creative SB16 CT2230 | Intel PRO/100+ with Alert on LAN* | 18.64GB Seagate ST320011A | Corsair CX430 | ASUS P2B Rev. 1.04

Reply 1 of 17, by The Serpent Rider

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Yes, early SGRAM DDR tend to run quite hot. Are they 6ns (GTS) or 5ns (Pro)?
Not sure if this is related, but I have Leadtek GeForce 2 Ultra with Leadtek GTS 64mb BIOS flashed for some reason.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 2 of 17, by PKFreeZZy

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The Serpent Rider wrote:

Yes, early SGRAM DDR tend to run quite hot. Are they 6ns (GTS) or 5ns (Pro)?
Not sure if this is related, but I have Leadtek GeForce 2 Ultra with Leadtek GTS 64mb BIOS flashed for some reason.

I'm not sure about the speed, the chips are from ASCEND and they don't seem like they want to be identified anytime soon. Is there an old BIOS archive somewhere?

My Windows 98 PC: Slot 1 Pentium III 600 (Katmai) | 256MB PC133 SDRAM | 64MB Leadtek WinFast GeForce2 Pro | Creative SB16 CT2230 | Intel PRO/100+ with Alert on LAN* | 18.64GB Seagate ST320011A | Corsair CX430 | ASUS P2B Rev. 1.04

Reply 6 of 17, by pentiumspeed

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I am very reluctant to buy video cards with funny sounding vram chips and they tend to be low quality.

Cheers,

Great Northern aka Canada.

Reply 8 of 17, by The Serpent Rider

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ASCEND SGRAM chips were also used by ASUS. They aren't good for overclocking, that's all.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 9 of 17, by Balint83

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Here is the pic, sorry it's early morning. Chip type: Infineon SGRAM HYB39032322TQ-6 0015 U18504

20210422_061116.jpg
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Reply 12 of 17, by Grem Five

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I see the original post is from almost 3 years but Leadtek did make some retail cards with the GTS pro chipset and 5.5ns memory. I have seen some of them labeled GTS and some labeled GTS pro cards although I dont think have have seen any with the early yellow PCB just the later green PCB.

( I guess I have seen this https://hothardware.com/reviews/enhanced-lead … ce-2-gts?page=1 but its unclear if it uses the pro chipset or not and appears to be yellowish )

The Enhanced WinFast GeForce2 Pro is and example of one of these cards. https://web.archive.org/web/20010603225845/ht … k.com/lrusa.htm - I think back in the day this card got some consumers upset with them as they would see the GTS Pro on the retail box and buy it thinking 400mhz ram and not bother to read the box that it came with 366mhz.

Reply 13 of 17, by pentiumspeed

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No mistaking the GTS, which is core of 200MHz same as Pro. The GTS vram is 166MHz, Pro vram is 200MHz.

If the box says GTS Pro, it meant something else in features added to the GTS card.

Asus is guilty of this too in the branding of model name which add much confusion when shopping for straight GTS or Pro and ditto to any cards with MX/MX400 (the device properities shows both) so seller either list MX or MX400, but most list them as MX400 which in reality is MX card, that's little fraud because Asus does not explicitly say which and their PDF data is lacking as I have few Asus cards that were not listed in their PDF.

Cheers,

Great Northern aka Canada.

Reply 14 of 17, by Grem Five

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Yes Leadtek would have been better marketing it as a GTS + or something, I guess in that article I linked from HotHardware the name of Enhanced Leadtek Winfast GeForce 2 GTS would be more appropriate instead of the name Enhanced WinFast GeForce2 Pro.

They could have put the 5.5ns chips on it and gave it a bios clocking it at 166MHZ as an ordinary GTS but they decided to give it a bios clocking it at 183MHZ instead.

So in a way it is kinda a hybrid as the original poster asked about.

Reply 15 of 17, by pentiumspeed

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I have to chime in to this thread about identifying the chip as GTS or Pro, like the original poster, this is exactly same on this Asus V7700Pro/64M.
The DDR says 5ns and the chip is GTS but the "Pro" is rotated besides the Nvidia logo.

Pro or GTS? Poster did ask about that too.

My intent was purchase a true Geforce2 Pro.

Cheers,

Great Northern aka Canada.

Reply 17 of 17, by Grem Five

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I have 3 cards I just ran through some basic tests:

Standard Geforce2 GTS 32MB 4 memory chips Samsung 6.0 ns 200/333 factory clocked
zRBHXx0l.jpg

Leadtek Geforce2 GTS "Pro" (or Enhanced) 64MB 8 memory chips Samsung 5.5 ns 200/366 factory clocked
OJXchapl.jpg

Leadtek Geforce2 GTS Pro 32MB 4 memory chips Ascend 5.0 ns 200/400 factory clocked
G9oFG4ml.jpg

3DMark 2001SE - default settings game tests only

  • GTS 200/333 - 2942
  • GTS "Pro" 200/366 - 3164
  • GTS Pro 200/400 - 3001

3DMark 2000 - default settings game tests only

  • GTS 200/333 - 5904
  • GTS "Pro" 200/366 - 5982
  • GTS Pro 200/400 - 5893

Quake 3 - 1280x1024 High 32bit bilinear

  • GTS 200/333 - 60.2 fps
  • GTS "Pro" 200/366 - 68.2 fps
  • GTS Pro 200/400 - 65.1 fps

Both of the "Pro" (366) card and the Pro (400) card are almost identical PCBs with the Pro being 2842 PCB REV:A ASSY REV:A and the "Pro" being 2842 PCB REV:A ASSY REV:B with the only noticable difference is the Bios chip and the # and brand of ram chips.