# nVidia GeForce 6800 128MB Non-Ultra HOWTO

## bigredgiant1

Recently I've purchased an nVidia GeForce 6800 128MB Non-Ultra AGP 8x video card, and even more recently I've been able to maximize my performance. I'm unable to overclock the GPU, or unlock it to use 16 pipelines because the utilities are only made for Windows, but here is how to maximize your performance.

Firstly, here are my system specifications:

XFX nVidia GeForce 6800 128MB Non-Ultra AGP 8x cooled with an NV5 Silencer

AMD Athlon64 3000+

Asus K8N-e Deluxe Motherboard

2x512MB Kingston PC3200 RAM

Dual NU L921G 19" LCD Monitors connected to the dual DVI heads on the video card, each running at 1280x1024

All binaries are on a Western Digital 80GB 7200RPM 8MB ATA/133 hard drive

(Note that all games/tests are run while both monitors are in use under TwinView with the emulated Xinerama extensions, both monitors being at 1280x1024.)

Secondly, here are my current performance rates:

glxgears -- 14,500 fps

HL2 Stress Test @ 1280x1024 w/ maximum advanced settings and 4x antialiasing and 8x anisotropics -- Average of 65 fps

Counterstrike:Source w/ same settings as HL2 Stress Test -- Average of 55 fps

UT2004 @ 1280x1024 w/ maximum settings and 4x antialiasing and 8x anisotropics -- Average of 55 fps

I don't have Doom 3 installed or I'd post stats for it.

As you can see the performance is on par, but less than that of a 6800 GT or Ultra. If it were possible to overclock the GPU, and unlock the card to 16 pipelines, we would see a great performance increase here. One possibility may be to temporarily install windows in order to run the utilities required to unlock the pipelines and overclock the GPU. nvclock would be an option for overclocking, but it segfaults when run on an AMD64.

Now onto how I was able to manage this performance. I will give software and driver versions, my xorg.conf, and some tips for the nvidia module.

Software and Driver Versions:

I'm running nvidia-kernel, nvidia-glx, and emul-linux-x86-nvidia all on version 6111. I tried 6629, and found that there was an enormous performance decrease in all tests, at least 10fps in all games tests. Switching back to 6111 fixed this issue.

I'm currently running Xorg 6.8.0-r3.

HL2/Steam is running on the version released December 22, 2004 (check their news page, I was unable to find a version in Steam).

UT2004 is installed with the 3339 ebuild.

Here are the relevant parts of my xorg.conf:

```
Section "Device"

    Identifier  "nvidia0"

    Driver      "nvidia"

    Option      "NvAGP" "2"

    Option      "NoLogo" "true"

    Option      "RenderAccel" "true"

    BusID       "PCI:1:0:0"

    Screen 0

EndSection

Section "Device"

    Identifier  "nvidia1"

    Driver      "nvidia"

    Option      "NvAGP" "2"

    Option      "NoLogo" "true"

    Option      "RenderAccel" "true"

    BusID       "PCI:1:0:0"

    Screen 1

EndSection

Section "Screen"

    Identifier  "Screen0"

    Device      "nvidia0"

    Monitor     "Monitor0"

    DefaultDepth 16

    Option "ConnectedMonitor" "DFP,DFP"

    Option "TwinView" "true"

    Option "SecondMonitorHorizSync" "31-81"

    Option "SecondMonitorVertRefresh" "56-75"

    Option "MetaModes" "1280x1024, 1280x1024"

    Option "TwinViewOrientation" "RightOf"

    Option "Xinerama" "true"

    Subsection "Display"

        Depth   16

        Modes   "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"

        #ViewPort   0 0

    EndSubsection

EndSection

Section "Screen"

    Identifier  "Screen1"

    Device      "nvidia1"

    Monitor     "Monitor1"

    DefaultDepth 16

    Subsection "Display"

        Depth   16

        Modes   "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"

        #ViewPort   0 0

    EndSubsection

EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"

    Identifier  "DualDesktopsAndMonitors"

    Option "Xinerama" "on"

    Screen "Screen0"

    Screen "Screen1" RightOf "Screen0"

    InputDevice "Mouse1" "CorePointer"

    InputDevice "Keyboard1" "CoreKeyboard"

EndSection
```

Please take note of the fact that NvAGP is set to "2", and NOT "1". When set to 1 I was getting *horrible* framerates of about half of what I get when it is set to 2. I played with the RenderAccel option, running tests when it was on, and when it was off, and found no difference. If you do not have dual monitors, disregard anything having to do with a second screen, second monitor, second device, Xinerama, or TwinView.

The last part of this howto is quite significant, it boosted my fps in all the game tests by about 15fps under heavy loads, and boosted it as much as 40fps under light loads. Make sure that your /etc/modules.d/nvidia file contains the following line, and make sure the following line is uncommented:

```
options nvidia NVreg_EnableAGPSBA=1 NVreg_EnableAGPFW=1

```

Once you're sure that line is there, save the file.

That should be it! Now a simple reboot should apply all of your changes, and hopefully you're now experiencing better performance in games and 3d intensive applications. If this howto helped you, or if you have any questions about what I've done here, please just post a reply  :Smile:  Best of luck.

----------

## fctk

should i try this howto with my geforce 4 ti4200?

----------

## Need4Speed

 *bigredgiant1 wrote:*   

> I played with the RenderAccel option, running tests when it was on, and when it was off, and found no difference. 

 

RenderAccel is used to enable hardware acceleration for 2d (desktop) things like transparency.  If you use something like transset you will notice a massive improvement.

That sucks that you can't unlock the extra pipes under linux.  I'm not really sure how rivatuner enables them, but maybe you could try enabling them through the video card's bios?

----------

## UB|K

 *bigredgiant1 wrote:*   

> nvclock would be an option for overclocking, but it segfaults when run on an AMD64

 

nvclock-0.7 doesn't support 6800 series but a recent post on nvclock's site says that nvclock-0.8 is about to be "released in the near future" and it will support geforce6.

 *bigredgiant1 wrote:*   

> The last part of this howto is quite significant, it boosted my fps in all the game tests by about 15fps under heavy loads, and boosted it as much as 40fps under light loads. Make sure that your /etc/modules.d/nvidia file contains the following line, and make sure the following line is uncommented:
> 
> Code:
> 
> options nvidia NVreg_EnableAGPSBA=1 NVreg_EnableAGPFW=1
> ...

 

I did that but Fastwrites doesn't work for me: 

```
cat /proc/driver/nvidia/agp/status | grep Fast

Fast Writes:     Disabled
```

EDIT: I've installed nvclock-0.8 from cvs and no luck, still no overclocking, my card's clock is currently -9437MHz!!:

screen

----------

## feld

thats odd

I just got an 6600GT (actually two of them - newegg screwed up and completed my order twice and charged me once - anyone need a card?) and my glxgears is lower than yours. Only about 7100....

Could that be because my processor is only an AMD XP 3000+ 333FSB NON 64BIT? I also have 1 gig PC 3200 DDR.

I thought GLXGears was only a GPU test anyway cuz if I overclock my memory it doesnt help the score at all...

-Feld

----------

## bigredgiant1

 *fctk wrote:*   

> should i try this howto with my geforce 4 ti4200?

 

Yeah go for it, if you lose performance just switch back to your current configuration.

----------

## bigredgiant1

 *Need4Speed wrote:*   

>  *bigredgiant1 wrote:*   I played with the RenderAccel option, running tests when it was on, and when it was off, and found no difference.  
> 
> RenderAccel is used to enable hardware acceleration for 2d (desktop) things like transparency.  If you use something like transset you will notice a massive improvement.
> 
> That sucks that you can't unlock the extra pipes under linux.  I'm not really sure how rivatuner enables them, but maybe you could try enabling them through the video card's bios?

 

I can't figure out how to manage the video card's BIOS either, much less flash it. I think the utility to do it is also specific to windows.

----------

## bigredgiant1

 *feld wrote:*   

> thats odd
> 
> I just got an 6600GT (actually two of them - newegg screwed up and completed my order twice and charged me once - anyone need a card?) and my glxgears is lower than yours. Only about 7100....
> 
> Could that be because my processor is only an AMD XP 3000+ 333FSB NON 64BIT? I also have 1 gig PC 3200 DDR.
> ...

 

glxgears isn't the greatest thing to use as a benchmark, try out some of the games listed and see what you get for framerates. Also I doubt your low framerate is because of your system, it's a good system.

----------

## bigredgiant1

My friend just installed the same exact video card into his system:

AthlonXP 2500+

1x512, 1x256 PC2700 RAM

Windows XP Professional

And is beating all of my framerates by a solid ~35fps in games. And not only that, but the visual quality of his graphics in games is UNBELIEVABLE compared to mine. The CS:S stress test looks absolutely amazing with transparencies that I can't even see. He's also got the four extra pipelines unlocked, but the card is not overclocked. Hmm.

----------

## feld

i'll look into unlocking those pipes. is that a software hack or is it something where i can boot into windows and unlock them then go to linux its still unlocked?

-Feld

----------

## bigredgiant1

When I ran RivaTuner in cedega, it appeared that it just modified some DLL files. Unfortunately I couldn't actually make the changes using the emulated RivaTuner because the driver showed up as unknown. It's definitely a softmod to unlock the pipes, I've read up on it at multiple places.

----------

## Coogee

First I thought: S**t! Same card, faster processor (3500+), but only 9550 fps in glxgears  :Shocked: . But then I saw that you only use 16 bit color depth.

I changed to this depth and I got the same fps like you.

For a moment I thought that there is something terribly wrong...   :Very Happy: 

----------

## bigredgiant1

 *Quote:*   

> I did that but Fastwrites doesn't work for me: 
> 
> ```
> cat /proc/driver/nvidia/agp/status | grep Fast
> 
> ...

 

Did you reboot after doing so? The module has to at least be reloaded with the new /etc/modules.d/nvidia.

----------

## Stajerc

Guys regarding the unlocking and rivatuner. Install windows and give a try which pipes / vertex units are good/broke. Then if all pipes/vertex units ok flash the bios with a modified bios you can get from different sites and it works. A nice forum about this is at the site www.guru3d.com There they have a section where the maker of ravatuner is the mod and you can ask him perosnally there and read some faq's . Rivatuner modifies the pipe configoration before drivers load in windows though.

----------

## bigredgiant1

I posted a poll to get Transgaming to fix the Cedega performance issues with DirectX 9 and HL2/CS:S. Vote it in!

http://www.transgaming.com/postlist.php?forum=1263

----------

## PZoned

 *feld wrote:*   

> thats odd
> 
> I just got an 6600GT (actually two of them - newegg screwed up and completed my order twice and charged me once - anyone need a card?) and my glxgears is lower than yours. Only about 7100....
> 
> Could that be because my processor is only an AMD XP 3000+ 333FSB NON 64BIT? I also have 1 gig PC 3200 DDR.
> ...

 

i could use a new card  :Very Happy: 

----------

## UB|K

Good news: nvclock-cvs now works with geforce6800...

----------

## brenden

I'm getting relatively poor performance with my geforce 6800 ultra.  Can anyone provide some advice?

```
brenden@phuket ~ % glxgears 

20371 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4074.200 FPS

23088 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4617.600 FPS

brenden@phuket ~ % cat /proc/driver/nvidia/agp/status           

Status:          Enabled

Driver:          AGPGART

AGP Rate:        8x

Fast Writes:     Enabled

SBA:             Enabled

brenden@phuket ~ % cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Section "ServerLayout"

        Identifier     "X.org Configured"

        Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0

        InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"

        InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"

EndSection

Section "Files"

        RgbPath      "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"

        ModulePath   "/usr/X11R6/lib64/modules"

        ModulePath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/modules"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/misc/"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/TTF/"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/Type1/"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/CID/"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi/"

        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi/"

EndSection

Section "Module"

        Load  "extmod"

        Load  "dri"

        Load  "dbe"

        Load  "record"

        Load  "xtrap"

        Load  "glx"

        Load  "type1"

        Load  "freetype"

EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

        Identifier  "Keyboard0"

        Driver      "kbd"

EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

        Identifier  "Mouse0"

        Driver      "mouse"

        Option      "Protocol" "ImPS/2"

        Option      "Device" "/dev/input/mice"

        Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"

EndSection

Section "Monitor"

        Identifier   "Monitor0"

        VendorName   "Monitor Vendor"

        ModelName    "Monitor Model"

EndSection

Section "Device"

        Option     "NvAGP"        "2"           # <i>

        Option     "RenderAccel"    "True"      # [<bool>]

        Option     "TwinView"         "True"    # [<bool>]

        Option     "TwinViewOrientation" "RightOf"      # <str>

        Option     "SecondMonitorHorizSync" "30-86"# <str>

        Option     "SecondMonitorVertRefresh" "50-180"  # <str>

        Option     "MetaModes"     "1400x1050,1400x1050;1400x1050,null;1280x1024,null;1280x1024,1280x1024;"             # <str>

        Option     "HorizSync"     "30-86"      # <str>

        Option     "VertRefresh"      "50-180   # <str>

        Identifier  "Card0"

        Driver      "nvidia"

        VendorName  "nVidia Corporation"

        BoardName   "Unknown Board"

        BusID       "PCI:1:0:0"

EndSection

Section "Screen"

        Identifier "Screen0"

        Device     "Card0"

        Monitor    "Monitor0"

        DefaultDepth    24

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth    24

                Modes "1400x1050"

        EndSubSection

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth     4

        EndSubSection

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth     8

        EndSubSection

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth     15

        EndSubSection

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth     16

        EndSubSection

        SubSection "Display"

                Viewport   0 0

                Depth     24

        EndSubSection

EndSection

brenden@phuket ~ % cat /proc/cpuinfo 

processor       : 0

vendor_id       : AuthenticAMD

cpu family      : 15

model           : 31

model name      : AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3200+

stepping        : 0

cpu MHz         : 2299.902

cache size      : 512 KB

fpu             : yes

fpu_exception   : yes

cpuid level     : 1

wp              : yes

flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 pni syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt lm 3dnowext 3dnow lahf_lm

bogomips        : 4505.60

TLB size        : 1088 4K pages

clflush size    : 64

cache_alignment : 64

address sizes   : 40 bits physical, 48 bits virtual

power management: ts fid vid ttp

phuket ~ # hdparm -Tt /dev/sda /dev/sdb

/dev/sda:

 Timing cached reads:   3240 MB in  2.00 seconds = 1620.25 MB/sec

 Timing buffered disk reads:  174 MB in  3.01 seconds =  57.76 MB/sec

/dev/sdb:

 Timing cached reads:   3252 MB in  2.00 seconds = 1625.43 MB/sec

 Timing buffered disk reads:  156 MB in  3.00 seconds =  51.97 MB/sec
```

Thanks in advance.

----------

## thecrazyperson_ws

 *feld wrote:*   

> thats odd
> 
> I just got an 6600GT (actually two of them - newegg screwed up and completed my order twice and charged me once - anyone need a card?) 

 

i could use one!  might have to wait until i get a new box though...

----------

## UB|K

 *brenden wrote:*   

> I'm getting relatively poor performance with my geforce 6800 ultra.  Can anyone provide some advice?

 

Don't know if it's related to your performance problem but you can remove:

```
        Load  "dri" 
```

from modules section. There's no need of DRI with nvidia's driver.

----------

## Aynjell

Can I use this guy's method with the 2.6 kernel? Like the recent gentoo-dev-sources?

----------

## Aynjell

What drivers do you use, giant? I have the same board (MOBO) as you, and LSPCI gave me no love. What do set up to get networking and sound and such?

----------

## bigredgiant1

 *Aynjell wrote:*   

> What drivers do you use, giant? I have the same board (MOBO) as you, and LSPCI gave me no love. What do set up to get networking and sound and such?

 

For networking I use the forcedeth nvidia driver. It is so much easier to install than nforce-net, just select it in your kernel config. For sound I use the ALSA intel-8x0 drivers (which are also used for nforce audio, in fact I think they're now also labelled as nforce in the menuconfig).

----------

## Aynjell

Yeah I figured that out, like 2 secs before your responded to my PM. Haha...

----------

## Aynjell

Thanks for the help, my video card is running very nicely, although when I use GLX gears something starts buzzing.   :Shocked: 

Nothing else makes it buzz, just glxgears...

Speaking of GLXgears:

14500 standard window size;

5500 fullscreen;

Though for some reason, nothing works @ 1280 x 1024. I'll try and figure it out tonight...

----------

## peka

Hi,

I have nVidia 6600GT (on PCI-Express)....

... and 3 stupid questions  :Wink:  Please be patient (n00b inside)

1) Having a PCI-E card, do I need to compile AGPART in kernel? Weel.. I know I don't have to b/c it works without it, but do I need to? Will it improve anything?

2)  What does NvAGP option to do with it? How should it be set, if at all, for a PCI-E card?

3) Is emul-linux-x86-nvidia only for AMD platform?

----------

## Aynjell

Well, I can only answer the third:

if you are using the amd64 platform, you still wouldn't need it. I've never used it, and I beleive it's masked. Probably pending removal (As I hear all emul-linux-libs are)...

Anyway... Hope that helps.

----------

## peka

Thanks,

I don't use AMD. I'm on i686, but I've seen in emul-linux-x86-glibc (which is required for emul*nvidia) ebuilds amd64 keywords, so I thought... Thanks for straighting this out

Anyone with answers to 1) and 2)?

----------

## Aynjell

To be honest, these two options are extremely configurable. So configurable that they are changed with a simple option. I'd just try it for yourself. It seems easy enough to set up.  :Smile:  I'd try it without first...

----------

