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Radeon 9800 SE 256 MB 128 bit - BIOS needed!

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First post, by Danger Manfred

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Hello, I was hoping anyone here might have a BIOS for an ATI Radeon 9800 SE 256 MB 128 bit with 5ns Hynix memory.

Apparently, the former owner of my 9800 SE messed with the BIOS, unlocked the pipelines, but they were defective, so it artifacts in 3D mode.

So even with regular, non-Omega drivers, the card always attempts to use all 8 pipes, the only way to get it artifact-free again is to flash an unmodified BIOS and then use drivers that do not attempt the soft-unlock.

The next person to make a mistake was me. I found a BIOS I deemed compatible, since it said Radeon 9800 SE 256 MB Hynix (although the manufacturer said Peak, not ATI, like mine), and flashed it. Without making a backup of course because I was multitasking and I am bad at that.
Anyway, not the right BIOS, the picture is too messed up to read anything even in 2D and text mode now.

I can still fix this, either by booting with a PCI graphics card or headless with an autoexec usb boot stick and flashing the correct BIOS onto the AGP card, but first I have to find the correct BIOS for it.

So again, if anyone here might have the same card or coincidentally know where to get that BIOS, that would be great, as it would help me make that card useable again.

I was in the middle of benching a lot of AGP cards against each other, picture related, and this is a real blocker for me, since I do not have a spare 9800 SE 128 bit.

Reply 2 of 5, by Danger Manfred

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Pino wrote on 2025-03-10, 20:58:
Have you checked here? […]
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Have you checked here?

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/?model=9800+SE

They have a decent collection of 9800SE BIOSes

Specifically this one, it says Hynix:
https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/525/peak- … 56-hynix-040622

Yep, that's the one I used and it bricked my card for the time being, which is why I'm looking for another BIOS to flash.

Reply 3 of 5, by Grem Five

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Something doesnt sound right.... even a 9800 SE should have memory of 3.3 to 3.6 ns to reach its correct memory clock speed. 5 ns memory without over clocking is 200 MHz, the memory should run between 270 - 290 MHz. The pics I have seen of 9800 SE had 3.3 or 3.6 ns memory chips.

Post a picture of the card?

Your card sounds like a version of whatever this thing is Re: 9800XT low score in 3DMark03 on WinXP with a 3700+

Reply 4 of 5, by Danger Manfred

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Grem Five wrote on 2025-03-11, 02:08:

Something doesnt sound right.... even a 9800 SE should have memory of 3.3 to 3.6 ns to reach its correct memory clock speed. 5 ns memory without over clocking is 200 MHz, the memory should run between 270 - 290 MHz. The pics I have seen of 9800 SE had 3.3 or 3.6 ns memory chips.

Post a picture of the card?

Your card sounds like a version of whatever this thing is Re: 9800XT low score in 3DMark03 on WinXP with a 3700+

You're totally right.

I think I misread the print on the memory, it's actually 4ns, but that's still only 250 MHz effective clock. But it should have been a first giveaway that all real 9800 non-Pro, Pro and XT cards use BGA DDR2, where this is apparently using TSOP DDR1. I didn't think much of it, I figured this would just be a cheapo 9800 SE that wasn't meant for ever reaching the clockspeeds of its full siblings.

Anyway, enjoy the pictures of this abomination:

Reply 5 of 5, by Danger Manfred

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Managed to find a compatible BIOS and it works as expected now. Unlocking pipelines in software leads to artifacts, so it just stays this way.

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