Ati 4870 baking success.

[Maurice]

Sorry couldn't help but start a new thread.

I baked it at 425f for 8 minutes facedown.

It's working flawlessly so far. Here are some pics resized.

I never thought this would work, as I am never lucky, but it's working.

[Bootes]

Face down eh? You're lucky the GPU didn't fall off!! lol if you have to rebake it, i suggest you bake it face up so that the GPU doesn't fall off.. just to be on the safe side

[buttons]

Cool, its always nice to see success stories.

[Maurice]

Ya, I was totally stoked.

I now have both of them running in crossfire, but I had to take my xonar out because it would have been sandwitched, and nothing would have gotten any air.

I'm a little bummed out about using onboard sound, but it will have to do for now.

[K31TH3R]

Good to hear baking is still saving cards.

But next time bake with the GPU facing up! A little too long in the oven and you'll hear a "plop" on the tinfoil, and when you pull it out to your horror the GPU will have fallen off the PCB

Also, 425 is a little on the hot side. 375 for 10 minutes has pretty much become the standard but glad that setting worked out for you.

[f-man]

Originally Posted by K31TH3R

Good to hear baking is still saving cards.

But next time bake with the GPU facing up! A little too long in the oven and you'll hear a "plop" on the tinfoil, and when you pull it out to your horror the GPU will have fallen off the PCB

Also, 425 is a little on the hot side. 375 for 10 minutes has pretty much become the standard but glad that setting worked out for you.

just proof how sturdy everything is

[Maurice]

Originally Posted by K31TH3R

Good to hear baking is still saving cards.

But next time bake with the GPU facing up! A little too long in the oven and you'll hear a "plop" on the tinfoil, and when you pull it out to your horror the GPU will have fallen off the PCB

Also, 425 is a little on the hot side. 375 for 10 minutes has pretty much become the standard but glad that setting worked out for you.

I thought that the gpu was epoxied on?

The only reason I did 425, is that I read several times where ati cards use different solder than nvidia, and needs the extra heat.

[Prozium]

IT WORKED! sweet!

[Maurice]

Ya bro it worked. baked the heck out of it, and am currently running them in crossfire.

Thanks again

[Perkomate]

excuse me, but what is baking and what is it meant to achieve?

[Prozium]

Originally Posted by Maurice

Ya bro it worked. baked the heck out of it, and am currently running them in crossfire.

Thanks again

NP, hope it stays fixed for you.

Originally Posted by Perkomate

excuse me, but what is baking and what is it meant to achieve?

Bakeing is literaly putting the bare card in your oven and heating it up. what it does is re-wick(melt) the solder on the PCB so if the problem is a bad solder point it could fix it.

[Perkomate]

i see. thanks for that! i saw baking and thought, "what? this isn't a cooking forum!"

[K31TH3R]

Originally Posted by Maurice

I thought that the gpu was epoxied on?

The only reason I did 425, is that I read several times where ati cards use different solder than nvidia, and needs the extra heat.

That very well could be, I haven't heard about that myself but I doubt that nVidia and ATI use the same solder since both of them had to research their own alternatives when lead based solder was put to a stop a few years back.

But I can't say for sure, I haven't researched it enough.

Originally Posted by Perkomate

i see. thanks for that! i saw baking and thought, "what? this isn't a cooking forum!"

Thousands of heat cycles tend to make non-lead based solder develop microfissures on the GPU to memory interface. This will cause obvious artifacts on boot up and most likely will crash in windows. Baking the cards melts the solder enough to reflow the card and fill the tiny fissures that have over time slowly made the resistance higher and higher.

[Maurice]

Ya, it's pretty slick. I am now getting 55-60fps in Witcher 2. Sweet.

Additional Comment:

Well, It was fun while it lasted.

It seems that it is artifacting again, but only in games, and only after I play for a little while. I will probly try baking it again, but I don't know.

It's weird that it's doing this as both cards are barely breaking 70c.

[K31TH3R]

Yeah I'd give it another bake. My 8800GTS 640 has been baked twice. 2nd time around it and now it has even started overclocking higher than it used to

[AdamV]

Originally Posted by Maurice

Ya, it's pretty slick. I am now getting 55-60fps in Witcher 2. Sweet.

with what video settings? I was running dual xfx xxx 4870s and couldn't run the witcher at that fps on 1920x1080 with a few options turned down.

[ORL]

I love it when baking works! And be glad you didnt get the plop as was mentioned! I have a 9600 I really need to try and bake to use as a physics card... maybe some day I will get to it.

[Maurice]

Originally Posted by AdamV

with what video settings? I was running dual xfx xxx 4870s and couldn't run the witcher at that fps on 1920x1080 with a few options turned down.

These are the settings I used

Hopefully the second bake will take.

[Pistolp]

why do people bake graphics cards

[ORL]

Basically Pistolp, as your GPU heat cycles through its life, the solder tends to eventually fail just due to expansion and contraction. In turn when the card dies people will bake it in the oven and when done right it will melt the solder again and in some cases repair the card.