Are you having troubles with your Sapphire X1950PRO 512MB AGP?

I'd like to get a consensus here. This is not another "how do you like the X1950PRO agp" thread. Clearly everyone knows these things are selling like hotcakes. This thread is to weed out the prob-post-phenom (that is: the tendancy for it to seem like there's lots of problems because only people with problems are posting, while others are not posting because there happily using their cards problem-free...)

If you're anything like me, you've read up on all you could find regarding the X1950PRO agp cards (ie., 256mb or 512mb?, which brand?, adequate cooling?, will my PSU run it?). I've come to the conclusion (like some of you) that the Sapphire 512mb agp card seems to be the best bang for the buck - however, it also seems that these cards are causing folks problems - anywhere from not booting to weird artifacting.

[Edit: Any X-1950PRO AGP user is invited to post in this thread - just please specify your model. Thanks.]
So, I'd really appreciate only those who've bought and installed the Sapphire X1950PRO 512MB AGP card to post whether or not you're having good experiences with it. And if you've had problems - what are they and have you been able to rectify it. Please.

Thanks.

Also, I do not have one yet but I expect it to arrive once ExcaliberPC sends it...

Picked one up on Wed, after my wifes BFG 6800GT died. She is using a Dell XPS Gen 2 ( bought in 2003? p4 3ghz/2gb ram/dvdrw/sblive) which I want to keep working hopefully another year before completely replacing it. Needless to say after seeing the power requirements for the x1950 Pro I was worried that the PSU in the Dell wouldn't power it. The PSU being says 470w but 240w max output, 16A rails 32a combined?

Anyhow, this is also my first ATI card, having owned 3dfx and Nvidia solely, I wanted to try something else besides Nvidia and this product came out at the right time. I was a little worried by reading horror stories previously about the Catalist Control Centre, but I was pleasently surprised that it was easy to navigate and the help files fully described the different settings that I wasn't used to having come from using Nvidia for so long (Cat AI heh)

My wife uses the machine it went in to play EQ2 mostly, besides surfing and email. We have no problems with it thus far, and she was actually able to upgrade her settings in the game, which were quite low with the 6800GT, which also seemed to stutter. Her case has pretty crappy airflow I must say, and after myself playing on it for about 9 hours today and checking the cards temp frequently, it never showed the temp beyond 61c, vs the GT was very high 60s/low 70s.

I couldn't be more pleased with my purchase and the fact that it is working with such a crappy PSU I'm sure the fact that machine has only 1 HD, the sound card and dvdrw is the reason I can get away with it, adding something else would probably be too much.

The only problem I have is that for some reason if I reboot from windows, the Dell bios screen doesn't even load and the system hangs. I must turn off the machine everytime I want to reboot. I'm not too sure how I can rectify that or what exactly is going on. In any case I consider that minor and so far I am happy to extend the life of that machine a little longer until hopefully the end of the year before completely replacing it.

I didn't vote but I couldn't get my VisionTek 256mb ever stable just for the record. I tried just about everything(par from a reformat snd buying a new PS, mine 520w) and this is the first time I ever had an issue with a ati card. I've been buying them for a long, long time. I took it back and am personally waiting for the HIS 512 model with the silent cooling(looks like a AR cooling unit).

Copied from my post in another thread:

Pentium 4 Prescott 3.0e OC'd to 3.71
Abit IC7-G motherboard
1GB (2X512) Kingston HyperX PC4000 Ram
Sapphire X1950pro 512MB AGP
Thermaltake Toughpower 750W Crossfire/SLi Certified Power supply

Just to restate, my Sapphire X1950pro 512MB AGP card definitely seems to have failed. I have tried underclocking (from its stock settings) even, but it will just lock up my system. I am getting major artifacts at POST, constant crashing in Windows and games.

I even set my processor back to stock (no overclocking) just to check, but still had the same problems. Looks like I need to get the RMA process started...

Really interesting , mine wont reboot either. I had a bit of flashing but think that may be due to improper driver install.. (did ones on disk then the ones on website) .. havent noticed the flashing (sort of like lighting bolts) but still wont reboot.

well at least Im not the only one!

Just curious if those who are having troubles are overclocking.

Well I reinstalled all the ATI Drivers and CCC, and reinstalled just the graphic drivers, w/o CCC. Doing much better now. Used 6.11 drivers (need it for folding) instead of the ones that came with the CD. I might try overclocking later on, but this card is awesome.

Just moved this from the other thread. Seems more appropriate here ....

Right after I ordered my card , I saw some posts on Sapphire's Forum which talked about the possibility of the VRM's overheating on the PCI-E verison of the Sapphire. I didn't worry for long however, when I also read how a few users fixed their problems. Someone looked at the BIOS and figured out that Cooler Fan was not ramping up as it should when entering 3D, so they used ATI Tray Tool to turn up the fan speed in 3D and it fixed the issue. This fix has worked for a number of people with PCI-E cards with some just setting the Fan for always-on 100% of the time and others working with temps and percentages.

On a personal note, I have had zero issues with the my Sapphire X1950 Pro so far and I have had it installed since December 27. It's a decent overclocker as well, although I reverted to stock clocks. I also follow the the posts over at Guru3D.com and the biggest issue there seems to be who can overclock their card the highest

Well crap! I thought I had scored a decent deal on the Sapphire 512mb X1950 Pro AGP for $234. My card is in route to be delivered on Tuesday. I'll report back when I install the card and let you guys know (I did not vote cause I don't have it yet). I don't plan on O/C this vid card so maybe I won't have the same issues as others.

My system
P4 3.0 HT Northwood @ 3.5 Ghz
2 GB (2x1gb) DDR GSkill HZ PC4000 Ram
Abit AI-7 mobo
Antec Trupower 550 watt

Glad I bought from NewEgg, as they are pretty easy to deal with on returns (have to pay the shipping though). <Sigh>

I purchased my card from Allstar Shop and received it on Friday. After installing card and 6.12 ccc I ran some prelim benchmarks in 3dmark 03, 05, 06. Good improvement in scores over the Visiontek 256mb card (I returned it because it didn't have a temp sensor and therefore no overdrive). 05 needed a reinstall to run properly (a taste of thongs to come??). Saturday it began artifacting and died on reboot. Am waiting for my RMA now.

I have an Antec Neopower 550 PSU with 18amps x 3. This unit is Crossfire reccomended and should be adequate.

Wind said:

The only problem I have is that for some reason if I reboot from windows, the Dell bios screen doesn't even load and the system hangs. I must turn off the machine everytime I want to reboot.

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Aha!!!

I had/have the same problem on my P4 2.4B @ 3.13GHz/ Asus P4PE system, although only intermittently. I swapped around my power connectors so that the card had it's own single feed (to the 2 Molexes) from my Antec Neo 430 PSU and things became more stable. I think it may be power related, but I also wonder if RIALTO doesn't really like being a 3.3V AGP 4X card, and prefers the lower voltage of an 8X slot.

Is your mobo an 8X or 4X?

It's AGP x8. I'm not totally familiar or have the knowledge of what power demands are happening on a system on boot up. I would expect if it was a power problem that it would also show itself more under full load in gaming, but I haven't experienced anything like that yet while gaming.

I am keeping an eye on this thread as my Sapphirre is due to deliver to me on Tuesday. I have a 4x agp motherboard, so hopefully I have no issues. I am more worried about my power supply. My x800xt pe card is a sapphirre, and it has been rock steady for me. Not a very good overclocker though that doesn't bother me too much. I'll let you guys know good or bad this week.

Sapphire X1950 Pro 512MB AGP card working within normal parameters, Cap'n.

Been using it for about two weeks, no discernable problems. Doesn't seem to like overclocking though, but even at stock it's a more than decent improvement over my old 6800GT.

Hey JoeBob, just curious, what kind of power supply do you have?

An older model Thermaltake 680W. Three rails that deliver a mediocre 15+15+8A. But it seems enough for my rather humble rig. P4 2.8 @ 3.5, 2GB PC3200 RAM, two optical drives, three harddrives and the X1950 Pro.

Cool. hopefully my true blue 480 will be enough.

I know a few people from a forum I hang out at, some of them also have the Sapphire card and they're working. Only one other person so far reported a problem with his card. (Rig not POSTing with the card in).

Their PSUs are as follows: 550W Antec True Control, 500W Mist, 480W Tagan, 380W Antec Truepower, 350W FSP, 300W Soltek (barebone system).

Dunno if the last guy may be really pushing it, but it's apparently still working after over a week.

Edit: Asked him, and it delivers 8+14,5A on the 12V rails.

thanks JoeBob for the confidence booster!!

I've had my Sapphire X1950 Pro AGP for almost a week from allstar...I have problems with it booting up. As if my motherboard isn't detecting it. After a range from a few shut downs (2 to 4) to get it to detect it and boot (everything else turns on and runs fine just nothing comes on the screen and no beep from the motherboard that the video card is detected).

And then tonight I turned off my pc for a second and then it took me almost 2 hours to get my motherboard to detect the video card by shutting it off and turning everything back on again (not the best thing to do to your pc I know, but I couldn't think of anything else to do).

It looks like others are having this same problem after doing some searching on the Sapphire tech forums.

I mean, when everything turns on it runs fine - no problems with that - a 30 fps boost in my main game that I play (CS:Source) so I'm not noticing any discernable performance issues.

Any ideas why this might be happening would be greatly appreciated!


Edit: I'm running a OCZ Modstream - 520watts/620peak says on the psu that there's a combined 28amps on the 12v and checking Sapphires website looks like this recommends 30amps on the 12v...could a 2amp difference really be causing this problem?

Has anyone noticed that this card is no longer listed for sale on the Newegg website? I ordered the card from Newegg and should get it Wednesday of this week. I’m getting a bad vibe about this card. Ratz!

pchs said:

Has anyone noticed that this card is no longer listed for sale on the Newegg website? I ordered the card from Newegg and should get it Wednesday of this week. I&#8217;m getting a bad vibe about this card. Ratz!

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NewEgg constantly pulls video cards completely off their site when they go in and out of stock, all makes, all types. No big deal, it's just something they do. Yeah, I know, the Diamond and Powercolor card are listed with auto-notify by them. Perhaps they were accumulating to many orders for the Sapphire and didn't want to keep people waiting for months waiting for supply to catch up with demand. Imagine all the emails and phone calls they would/were/are getting asking when the Sapphire will be in stock because at the moment, this seems to be the most popular flavor of the X1950 Pro AGP out there.

EternityZX9 said:

I've had my Sapphire X1950 Pro AGP for almost a week from allstar...I have problems with it booting up. As if my motherboard isn't detecting it. After a range from a few shut downs (2 to 4) to get it to detect it and boot (everything else turns on and runs fine just nothing comes on the screen and no beep from the motherboard that the video card is detected).

And then tonight I turned off my pc for a second and then it took me almost 2 hours to get my motherboard to detect the video card by shutting it off and turning everything back on again (not the best thing to do to your pc I know, but I couldn't think of anything else to do).

It looks like others are having this same problem after doing some searching on the Sapphire tech forums.

I mean, when everything turns on it runs fine - no problems with that - a 30 fps boost in my main game that I play (CS:Source) so I'm not noticing any discernable performance issues.

Any ideas why this might be happening would be greatly appreciated!


Edit: I'm running a OCZ Modstream - 520watts/620peak says on the psu that there's a combined 28amps on the 12v and checking Sapphires website looks like this recommends 30amps on the 12v...could a 2amp difference really be causing this problem?

Click to expand...

How's it going Eternity. It may not be the quantity of amps, but the quality. Read several reviews on that OCZ model and one thing they have in common is they all say the +12v rail sags more than it should and is not quite as stable as it should be either. Of course your problem could be a number of things, just thought I'd throw this out there for you.

Below is an excerpt from one review from 2004 ....

These results are interesting for a number of reasons. Firstly, the power levels between idle and load seem to be less scattered than with the PurePower, most likely because the ModStream can sustain more of a load before being stressed. Secondly, while every rail but +12V is either equal to or better than the PurePower, the +12V rail under load sunk to the same 11.80V value. This is slightly disheartening, as a high-end 520W power supply shouldn't be sinking to the same low as a 350W power supply under the same load. As mentioned in the previous review, 11.80V is still well within the +/- 5&#37; variation allowed on the +12V rail.

It would be interesting to see whether the +12V rail would sink any lower had we stressed the power supply with another hard drive, optical drive, and some USB devices.

In general, with the exception of +12V, these results are impressive, but alas, we have to take into account all of the results when making a judgment. To be honest, the 11.80V is slightly worrisome, especially considering that the power supply was not nearly being stressed to its full potential. In the worst case scenario, a slight tuning of a potentiometer in the power supply could do the trick, at the cost of voiding your warranty.

Sapphire card, installed, ran for a few hours then started pixelating and getting artifacts then died. Temp on ccc showed 51 so that doesn't make sense.

Its been RMA'd so will let you know if card 2 fairs any better.

Thr0tt said:

Sapphire card, installed, ran for a few hours then started pixelating and getting artifacts then died. Temp on ccc showed 51 so that doesn't make sense.

Its been RMA'd so will let you know if card 2 fairs any better.

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Wow. I've cancelled my order from ExcaliberPC. It looks like Sapphire needs to start working on "edition 2.0"...

Just got home and the Sapphire X1950 Pro AGP 512 mb is here... wish me luck!

I think I'm a little nervous

Edit: Ok now I look at this card there is a thermal pad on the backside card on the chipset. Just a bare thermal pad what the hell? Was a heatsink supposed to be on there?

Lantano said:

Just got home and the Sapphire X1950 Pro AGP 512 mb is here... wish me luck!

I think I'm a little nervous

Edit: Ok now I look at this card there is a thermal pad on the backside card on the chipset. Just a bare thermal pad what the hell? Was a heatsink supposed to be on there?

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Heres a pic of the thermal pad

Lantano said:

Heres a pic of the thermal pad

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Maybe this was a card someone RMA'd back to them - but not before trying to cool it better by applying a heatsink on the back. I do not think that the back side is supposed to have any additional cooling. See the newegg pics - they show both sides of the card I think.

Let us know how it goes...

Straferj said:

Maybe this was a card someone RMA'd back to them - but not before trying to cool it better by applying a heatsink on the back. I do not think that the back side is supposed to have any additional cooling. See the newegg pics - they show both sides of the card I think.

Let us know how it goes...

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This card looks brand new, wouldn't most used cards would have scratches on the gold connectors, this ones clean... oh well time to give it a shot!

Lantano said:

Heres a pic of the thermal pad

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That's the way they all are, no worries mate.

Well I got my Sapphire card from Allstarshop, booted up my PC, and everything looked like it was going great. I first decided to load up WoW, the game loaded fine, and the performance increase was definitely noticeable, hitting well over 130FPS in some areas. Next I decided to try Vanguard Beta, a little bit more intesive game graphics wise. I got to the character selection screen and then all hell broke loose. The graphics began to tear, and the screen eventually became all artifacts leading to my system freezing. I figured it was my PSU as it was only 400W, so I went out to the store and bought a 500W PSU. Swapped out the PSUs, and to my suprise the same exact problem happend again. I decided to run ATItool's scan for artifacts, and noticed that there was pixelation all over the place. After about 30 seconds my system froze again. Needless to say I have put an RMA Request in, *sigh* back to the x800

Dakn said:

Well I got my Sapphire card from Allstarshop, booted up my PC, and everything looked like it was going great. I first decided to load up WoW, the game loaded fine, and the performance increase was definitely noticeable, hitting well over 130FPS in some areas. Next I decided to try Vanguard Beta, a little bit more intesive game graphics wise. I got to the character selection screen and then all hell broke loose. The graphics began to tear, and the screen eventually became all artifacts leading to my system freezing. I figured it was my PSU as it was only 400W, so I went out to the store and bought a 500W PSU. Swapped out the PSUs, and to my suprise the same exact problem happend again. I decided to run ATItool's scan for artifacts, and noticed that there was pixelation all over the place. After about 30 seconds my system froze again. Needless to say I have put an RMA Request in, *sigh* back to the x800

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Sorry to hear of your troubles mate. What 500w power supply did you try? Because it's not the watts that matter it's the amps on the +12v rail. You'll find plenty of 500w power supplies with specs that aren't much different than some 400w PSUs when it comes to the +12v rail. My apologies if you were already aware of this, not trying to insult your level of technical experience, I just don't know it.

I have a question for you honestjon, are you using two separate +12v rails to power your Sapphire x1950? I found that the 12v rails for your psu add up to 36a combined. That would seem to be one possible reason you have not had problems with that card since its been stated the card needs a 30a min. I have seen pictures of included equipment for that card and it looked like a molex splitter was included. That would lead people to believe one 12v rail could be used for both connections on the card. If people split the power of a single 12v rail, rather than using two separate rails, the card would be in most cases under powered. Any thoughts on this theory? My card is on the truck to be delivered today.

Well I'll try loading up a more intensive game. I have an OCZ GameXStream 700W PSU (overkill? maybe) with 72Amps (4x18A) and I have no issues here. I also cranked up the fan speed to 100&#37;. I'm also doing Folding@Home w/ GPU, so the card is getting worked. No issues here. I think the main issues here is the heat and the need to kick up the fan speed to cool the card.

honestjohn said:

Sorry to hear of your troubles mate. What 500w power supply did you try? Because it's not the watts that matter it's the amps on the +12v rail. You'll find plenty of 500w power supplies with specs that aren't much different than some 400w PSUs when it comes to the +12v rail. My apologies if you were already aware of this, not trying to insult your level of technical experience, I just don't know it.

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I bought the Antec SmartPower 500 2.0 and was using the Antec SmartPower 400 before. Honestly, I dont know much about power supplies so no worries about insulting me there. Now one thing I noticed that artifacting was taking place right away in ATI Tool, Is this a sign of the graphics card failing or the the amps on the rail?

pchs said:

I have a question for you honestjon, are you using two separate +12v rails to power your Sapphire x1950? I found that the 12v rails for your psu add up to 36a combined. That would seem to be one possible reason you have not had problems with that card since its been stated the card needs a 30a min. I have seen pictures of included equipment for that card and it looked like a molex splitter was included. That would lead people to believe one 12v rail could be used for both connections on the card. If people split the power of a single 12v rail, rather than using two separate rails, the card would be in most cases under powered. Any thoughts on this theory? My card is on the truck to be delivered today.

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Yes, and this is why I upgraded my Power Supply before I got my card. Here's a long-winded explanation on how I wound-up with the Enermax Liberty 620w which might be of interest to some of you...

Before the Sapphire was out in the US there was a lot of confusion on specifications. So, I initally went over to Sapphire's Support Forum to just clarify the specifications of the Sapphire X1950 Pro and just casually mentioned I'd be using a 480w Antec Neopower PSU. Well, it didn't take long before multiple Sapphire Mod-Gods came down on my ass when I said that. They said my Power Supply was under rated on the +12v rail and strongly advised on upgrading the power supply. Their slight attitude actually pissed me off to begin with, but later on realized where it came from. As many of you my first reaction was, hey it was working great with my old X850XT card, why not the Sapphire X1950 pro? Hey, it even worked with the Visiontek X1950 I had, but I only had it for 4 days before I returned it for the Sapphire. Well, after I actually started "listening" to them instead of getting pissed off, I realized that they knew what they were talking about and that their tech-level regarding power supplies was far, far, greater than mine. One of the things they said that bothered me the most was, that yes the X1950 might work today with my current Antex 480w PSU, but in the future it may cause damage to the Motherboard or Video Card. So I asked them what their recommendation was for a good PSU and they said the Enermax Liberty 620w which is how I wound up with this Power Supply. At first I thought this was overkill for my Rig, but then I figured what the hell, it could be moved over into the next box I build. Also, the Antec 480w I had always had a low +12v rail anyway. And if anyone is interested, Enermax also makes a Liberty 500w PSU which also has 22a on each of it's +12v rails. The Mods said this was also a good one, but probably wouldn't cut it in a Crossfire or SLI setup.

Sorry for the blah, blah, blah, above. Now to answer your actual question. The Sapphire has a dual molex design and I have used seperate cables from my PSU for each molex connection. On one of those cables there is nothing but the video card and it is isolated. On the second cable, I have the Video Card and just 1 case fan connected to it. I have always tried to isolate my Video Cards on a cable by themselves. Now as far as whether they are on +12V1 rail and +12V2. I don't know seems everyone has a different idea on how to design a dual rail PSU and it's really confusing. There is also nothing about how to distinguish rails in the manual. I'm going to take a quick look under the hood to see if I see anything on the power supply itself.

Ok. Just took a look. Hey I'm not so stupid after all. I remembered what I did as I was checking. My Enermax is a modular with 2 rows of 3 cable connectors. I have 1 cable going from the top-row to a molex on the video card, and 1 cable from the bottom-row to the other molex on the video card. Since was no indication on which +12V rail was which, I "assumed" that the top-row would be 1 and the bottom the other.

Dakn said:

I bought the Antec SmartPower 500 2.0 and was using the Antec SmartPower 400 before. Honestly, I dont know much about power supplies so no worries about insulting me there. Now one thing I noticed that artifacting was taking place right away in ATI Tool, Is this a sign of the graphics card failing or the the amps on the rail?

Click to expand...

I think your problem could be either one, but I just looked up your PSU and it's a dual rail +12v with 17a and 19a. Now you just can't add the two rails together as some poeple do. On mine for example, I have 22a on each rail but my total sustained/continuous output is not 44a, it's 36a. So your combined output is probably around 26-27a which is really close to the recommended amperage. Of course I don't know about the quality of the +12v rail on your Antec. I've had 3 different Antec's and all of them suffered from a low +12V rail.

Personally though, I think your card has a heat issue, I would pop the card out and look at it from every angle and see if all the thermal pads are making contact with the heatsink. On Sapphires Forum 2 Sapphire X1950 Pro AGP users reported that they could see a sliver of light between the heatsink and the mem chips and that the thermal pads were not making contact. I think this could be more of a real issue as opposed to the over-blown VRM overheating issue which has only affected PCI-E cards, at least from what I have read so far.

how do you figure out the total sustained amps?

ive got an Antec NEO HE 550 which has 3 18amp rails.

i would hopesomething this big could run the card.

another-user said:

how do you figure out the total sustained amps?

ive got an Antec NEO HE 550 which has 3 18amp rails.

i would hopesomething this big could run the card.

Click to expand...

ATI's Approved Crossfire Power Supply List. It's alpabetical and your's is on top....

http://ati.amd.com/technology/crossfire/buildyourown2.html

.....and as far as figuring out sustained/continuous amps when combining dual rails, the braniacs over on Sapphire gave me that info and it's also stated on the Enermax site under specs. Mine was about 8 amps under the total amps if you add the two rails together. 22a x 2 = 44a - 8a = 36a. Haven't a clue how to figure it out with 3 rails. Sorry.

I've done some more research on this card and reading up on the Sapphire forums this card NEEDS a single rail psu that provides 30 amps or a split rail (dual/quad rail) psu that provides 22 amps per rail. If you don't meet these requirements expect problems to happen now or in the future! Doesn't matter if you have a 600 watt psu...it needs the amps on the 12v rail that's all that matters!

Just a warning for all of those of you having problems this could likely be the cause.


Here's a link to a Silverstone Zeus 560 with 38 amp continuous SINGLE rail psu for $108 and a review by jonnyguru, looks to be an excellent psu if anyone needs to upgrade their psu like I do.

http://www.case-mod.com/store/silverstone-sst56zf-st56zf-zeus-series-560w-560-watt-power-supply-p-1973.html?src=fr

http://jonnyguru.com/review_details.php?id=30