Softmod NVidia Quadro 1500m to GeForce 7900GS

Right now I have a Quadro 1500m in a laptop I use mainly for gaming. I've searched all over for a tutorial on how to softmod the Quadro 1500m into it's gaming counterpart GeForce 7900GS, but I haven't found anything at all.

Has anyone done this before that could help guide me through safely softmodding the 1500m into a 7900GS? Would I see a performance increase in gaming if I did softmod it? Thanks!

Update: For anyone in a similar situation as I am, I found a pretty old thread in the Rivatuner forums (thanks to diGit_S for pointing me in the right direction) with an explanation on how to Softmod a 1500m to a 7900GS using a program called "NVStrap." Software modding the 1500m to a 7900GS is possible, but it may not be very practical. The thread is about 6 months old, but I assume the method is still identical (but don't take my word on it).

 

I don't believe you can softmod an OpenGL accelerated card into a card that was made for gaming. I don't know where you heard it, but Quadro and Geforce cards are completely different. Softmodding simply unlocks options that a card has disabled because it's a lower version, such as extra pipelines that were disabled because it is a gs and not a GT.


I have a question for you, Did you buy that notebook for gaming, or for 3D compiling and creation? It's just really annoying when I hear so many people complaining about their "Workstation" notebook with a FireGL, or Quadro gpu.

There should be a notice next to every notebook with an OpenGL Accelerated GPU that states "Quadro and FireGL cards are made for use with professional 3D programs such as 3DSMAX, and are not intended for gaming."
Hopefully that will get across to those people who think that if it costs more, it's better.

 

I bought the laptop at a discounted price, cheaper with the Quadro 1500m than with a GeForce Go 7900GS (believe me, I would have gotten the 7900GS if it was the same price). I have done research on the card itself, all sources saying that the Quadro 1500m is the identical hardware as the GeForce Go 7900GS (both using the G71 core). From what I have read, the only major difference is that the software bios on the Quadro 1500m is optimized for CAD/3D/OpenGL intensive multimedia. If the bios is the only difference, softmodding it should be able to change it from a 1500m to a 7900GS?

 

I don't think you need a softmod. the performance is pretty much equal and the softmod process can lead to instabilities.
Run the 3DMark05 test and then check it against the 3DMark table in my siggy.

 

Really I don't think it's worth it. The difference in gaming performance between the two cards will be there, but it won't be noticeable. It'll be maybe 5% difference tops. Considering the Quadros are "business-line" and Geforces are "consumer-line," the difference in performance in terms of gaming are almost nil.

The customer testimonials of the IBM Thinkpad owners really demonstrate this. Between the ATI FireGL v5250, and its consumer counterpart, the ATI Radeon X1700, there is very little 3DMark or other benchmark difference.

 

That's exactly the difference between "workstation" and "gaming" gfx; the BIOS has different options (un)locked, so as to perform better in either a 3D work-environment or 3D gaming environment. Maybe during production they check which core is better for one of those, but i'm not sure about that at all.

edit: check a few threads on the Rivatuner forums

 

Hey there,

Where did you find these Thinkpad owner testimonials? I would like to take a look at them. So far, all Im getting from these forum is "the v5250 sucks for gaming, just go for the X1700."

That one statement is bascially preventing me from purchasing that Thinkpad.

 

Updated my first post for users in similar situations:

For anyone in a similar situation as I am, I found a pretty old thread in the Rivatuner forums (thanks to diGit_S for pointing me in the right direction) with an explanation on how to Softmod a 1500m to a 7900GS using a program called "NVStrap." Software modding the 1500m to a 7900GS is possible, but it may not be very practical. The thread is about 6 months old, but I assume the method is still identical (but don't take my word on it).

Thanks everyone!

 

Hi!

I'm looking to do the exact opposite of the original poster, namely to softmod a 7900GS to a Quadro 1500m. I've tried to find information about how to do this on the net, but I couldn't find anything useful. Maybe my googling skills just aren't up for the job.. Anyway, does anybody have any hints on how to do this? I understand that the cards are pretty much physically identical, so I guess it should be possible.. The reason why I want to do it is that I want to use the laptop mostly for AutoCad and other "work applications", and the best deal I can get right now is on the 7900GS.

I don't mean to hijack the thread BTW, but I figured it would be better to dig up this thread rather than starting a new one since the topics are so closely related.

 

You can check this thread out as it discusses how to softmod GeForce cards into Quadro cards (check the more recent posts as the thread is still alive after 2 years). It seems that you will need to use a feature in Rivatuner called NVStrip, and softmod your GeForce to a Quadro. It is almost the exact same process as what I'm looking to do, but just backwards. Hope this helps!

 

Phoenix I would love to hear back details on wheter or not this works for you. I have been itnerested in doing the same thing and had been left to wonder (w/out something to test on):

- What results in running a Quadro card on the equivalent GeForce driver?
- As they are the essential hardware identical - could you not just replace one card with the other if you came across one at a good price?
- Performance wise several people have noted it being not worth it as it would result in a minimal advantage - however - Looking at this post comparing the 1500M to the 7900 on the first row looks to be more like a ~40% difference, which IMO is more than minimal

If anyone could shed some light on these curiosities I would appreciate it.

 

The two benchmarks you were looking at with the 40% difference can't be compared because the 7900GS was tweaked to a GSX and overclocked a fair amount. The 1500m, on the other hand, was using stock frequencies.

And you also have to take into consideration that these are synthetic benchmarks, which will not always translate to the same performance in a more modern game. Many factors, such as the supported software/bios on the card, will limit the card maximum performance. I don't know if this is exactly true, but I've read that the Quadro software is more memory optimized because programs such as CAD/Drafting are more memory intensive. The GeForce software is more processor optimized since its focus is primarily towards video games.

I've seen users posting that the difference in performance between a Quadro and its GeForce equivalent is 30% and I've seen users saying that the performance difference is less than 1%. None of which I have seen have been confirmed.

Like you, Saint, I am a bit hesitant to potentially ruin my graphics card, so I hope someone who is experienced and has successfully softmodded their own card will help.

 

Anyone else out there that can shed some light on this rather dim subject?

 

For the mobile GPUs, the likeness between the Quadro and GeForce (Radeon and FireGL) Cores is very high.In fact, looking at the 3DMark05 scores, you can consider them the same.The difference on desktop hardware however, is much greater.This is just the fact that 3D studio Max designers do not use their laptops to render complicated scenes (just as they do on desktops), so nVidia and ATI are not going to make major changes in the GPUs.

 

there is got to be more information on this. I'm interested in turning the fx1500 into a 7900gsx as well. I'll look into on notebookforums.com.

 

I have read it somewhere that the FX1500m > 7900gs and FX2500m >7900gtx.

 

The difference is little, almost negligible (for the gaming)
EDIT : sorry for the typo.