[Guide] Installing AMD Radeon Mobility 6970 / 6990 in your M17x R2 (Single GPU and CrossfireX)

Hi Stealth,

Pkheten was away on vacation last week, but I think he's back today. If you've already e-mailed him he should be replying to you soon.

Sorry to hear about your 6990s

 

Not sure if you've tried..but have you tried undervolting the card? Also, with the 6990's it might not be possible to overclock anything (CPU or GPU) due to power constraints. I'm sure you have already tried all of this, just can't think of anything else that might be causing problems. Also have you tried swapping the second card to the primary slot and running it in a single card (crossfire disabled) config and see if it gives you problems? One way to verify that the secondary card is indeed causing a problem.

 

Stealth, I'm not sure if I remember correctly, but you had the 330watt psu and the issues started since an overclock?

I would definitely try what Greywolf suggested.

Have your CPU at stock, undervolt the 6990's and switch back to the 240watt adapter and see how you go. I know there are people running the 6990's on a 240 watt adapter without it tripping.

 

Quick question, and may help Stealth as well. If you undervolt the cards, does it also reduce the wattage pull? Or is that independant of voltage? I know it will reduce temps, but not sure if it will reduce wattage pull. I was playing black ops and had the PSU trip.

Also got on to play Need For Speed Hot Pursuit and was bummed to see no one was playing it online anymore. Online was the best part of the game.

 

Yup, it will reduce the overall wattage draw.

I doubt by much but might just be enough

EDIT:: LOL now i am second guessing myself!! Aarpcard??

 

Awesome, thanks. Thats what I was hoping to hear. I think I also had the CPU OCed so that might have been part of the issue. I'll have to drop the CPU OC, and undervolt the GPUs. The system will still have plenty of power so with an undervolt it really might just be enough. Probably take the GPUs from 1.1v down to .96v

 

I would say dropping the CPU overclock will make the biggest difference.

As for your previous question I am fairly certain I am correct as Watt=VxA...

So if you reduce the voltage W should also reduce.

Please correct me if I am wrong Aarpcard, you're the resident electrical expert

 

That is correct Douse.

 

Gotcha, thanks guys. If theres time I'll UV the GPU's tonight and give Black Ops another shot.

 

when you guys say not overclocked cpu you also mean turbo mode off? should I try crysis 2 dx11 with turbo mode off? wont the cpu weak? thus i get fps drops on battlefield 3 too but this could be due to connection lagging too

 

unfortunately i dont know how to undervolt x.x. I was thinking of swapping card but how do i get it to fit to the main slot? upside down?...and yes when it crashes it takes the power adapter with it (as in it also shuts off)

 

Eh could be, but then again, Dell cards have the fan problem regardless of which vbios is on them. So there are some differences between the brands.

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To address undervolting, when I have both cards undervolted to 1.0v I saw my wattage pull drop tremendously. I was maxing out at ~235watts while previously it had been 270-280watts.

@Stealth, undervolt by using RBE to make a custom vbios. Then flash it. I urge you to be careful though. You don't want something else to go wrong from a careless mistake.

 

No. . . . uhh . . . swap the heatsinks . . . .

 

oooo that makes sense. ok so just turn CF off pull cards out and swap? and i dont have much exp. with RBE im a noob.

 

Question about CF cables. The one I got from Mythlogic doesn't have the plastic wrapper around it, they are just bare blue wires. Can this cable lay on metal parts of the laptop (edge of retention bracket for example) or will that short out the cable/card?

 

From your posts I can tell a number of things. One is that your crossfire is working properly so both cards are good. I know this because with only a single card you would not be able to trip the PSU. Not enough power pulled with a single card, even with an overclocked CPU. Undervolting should help.

Since your PSU is tripping, your cards are pulling too much power. I've had that plenty of times benching. I don't think it's crashing, just cutting out the PSU.

That blue part of the wire is the insulation to the tiny copper wire. It's fine to sit on the metal.

 

Thanks. That's what I thought. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't running the cable wrong which could have killed the card.

 

I agree with DR650SE, the fact that its not actually crashing, but the PSU is tripping indicates that too much power is being drawn.

This is backed up by the fact that you don't have issues when disabling crossfire and only using one card.

However it is strange that you are tripping a 330watt psu....I would be shocked (and a little scared) if dual 6990s with an overclocked CPU would pull more than that....do you have a watt meter?

@Aristotelhs2060, nah leave turbo on, however leave the CPU voltage, FSB, TDP and TDC etc stock, and allow the CPU to manage it's own throttling....in other words close Throttlestop

 

no i dont have a watt meter....i noticed something in GPU z it shows voltage on both cards as 0.0

 

From experience, unless you are almost certain that the problem is with the card, don't go down the RMA process (I wish I hadn't, but thats another story)

 

i never used throttlestop... i think i only have the cpu at 55w and 3% in bios. i ll set those to default and see if it helps on crysis 2. This occurs only on highest demanding games. for the time being crysis 2 and battlefield 3 dx11 ultra

 

Well everything turned up today, Got my 6970's from "eurocom" (ebay) and arrived in less than a week to the UK, I did however get a £22.10 tax charge on the cards which I had to pay the UPS driver? I promply set about the installation. fitted cards with 0.5mm thermal pads and tuniq tx-4 paste, Took paul5015's advice on not modifying the screws, but cutting the retention bracket for the heatsink. all went well, booted up and flashed vbios from op installed latest drivers, temps are good @ 65 degrees C (load), and crossfire working perfectly.

Ran vantage before and after

X-fire 5870's = 9417
X-fire 6970's = 19124

Really pleased so far

 

Hey jus71n,

Great news...question, I'm abit confused by the "cutting the retention bracket for the heatsink piece", do you have a picture or can you explain that in a bit more detail?

 

Sorry no picture, basicly on the rear of the card there in the X shaped retention bracket, on the end of each leg is the thread into which the heatsink screws into. Paul suggested cutting each of the 4 legs about 2mm from the threaded section and use these to anchor the screws. then you still get the even pressure across the gpu because the screws only go in the correct amount.

 

ahh, got it. So you can use the same screws that came with the 5870s vs the screws that came with the card (or something that would fit).

Thanks!

 

Hey Jus71n,

Sorry for the multiple posts, but one other question. Are you using the crossfire cable from Eurocom? or are you using the one with your 5870s? Is the Eurocom cable long enough?

 

I used the Eurocom one, its really easy to bend and shape, just the right lenth too

 

Awesome thanks! +1 Rep when I've spread it around enough

 

I measured 313watts with prime95 and furmark running at full kilt for a few minutes on heavily OC'ed gpu's and cpu.

If he has a i7 920xm or 940xm that is heavily OC'ed and OC'ed the 6990's by a lot, I can see him pulling 350+watts. Shouldn't trip the PSU, but it's getting there.

But I think something on the Mobo would fry first.

The PSU is tripping. The question is why. I can't think of a reason atm. But I'll think about it.

 

Just wondering if you you provide ebay link to cards you purchased? did you get Xfire cable too? how much did you pay for 2x. been looking at getting an m18x but i can't passup this RGB screen

 

Eurocom 6970M eBay. I'm running a single 6970 from them right now. 11.9 won't install, and I'm stuck at 1600x1200 resolution. Still on the Eurocom VBIOS though. I used the X-bracket and heatsink from my 5870. Using the retention mod. I have to read back a few pages to figure out this driver and resolution issue. Fan is working just fine.

 

ATI Mobility Radeon? HD 6970m GPU MXM 3.0 Type B | eBay

$758 + $69 shipping, X-fire cable was free

 

awesome thanks and all you did was flash clevo vbios linked on page one? xfire all working correctly?

 

For me everything is working fine, xfire, fans and 1920x1200 res. Yup just flashed clevo vbios.

To start with it didn't have 1920x1200, but in catalyst it thought it was on multiple monitors? changed to monitor 1 and all was well.

 

It won't let me flash the Clevo VBIOS either. I'm getting a 0FL01 'adapter not found' error. GPU-Z and HWInfo all show that it is a 6970.

 

Download the newest version of atiflash. I had a similar issue.

 

Thanks DR. I'll give that a shot and report back.

 

I was able to flash the Clevo VBIOS by updating ATIFlash (mine was WAY old). I have the same problems though. HWInfo sees the card just fine. GPU-Z sees it as a Standard VGA Graphics Adapter, and displays wrong information (480 shaders). I reseated the card to no avail. Probably something very stupid I'm overlooking here. The card is idling at around 50°C, and there seem to be no weird fan issues, so that's good.

 

Turbo, is windows showing the correct device adapter (ATI 6900)

 

Try installing all drivers Turbo, Then install the dell stock drivers, than the ATI drivers over the dell drivers. Might be worth a shot.

 

Nah. 'Standard VGA Graphics Adapter'. HWInfo is the only program that reads the GPU correctly. GPU and CPU-z show that it is an ATI adapter, but nothing else. It is using the damn card though, or I wouldn't be typing this right now. I would rather not reinstall Windows, but signs are pointing to it.

How can you tell what the system BIOS sees for my GPU? I thought there was a screen that showed it somewhere while booting?

 

Hey Turbo,

If you haven't tried this already, you might try installing the modded desktop drivers (depending on what driver you are using), I remember my first set of cards wouldn't install off the standard mobility driver (for whatever reason), even after reinstalling windows. The card I'm using now is running off the standard mobility driver (although I don't know what is different, other then just the order I installed everything I suppose).

If the modded desktop driver installs correctly, you may then want to try uploading the mobility driver.

Just something to try before doing a complete windows re-install (take it from someone who did 4 complete installs with no luck the first time around)

Good luck

 

That's a good idea. Where do you get the modded desktop drivers?

 

Hey Turbo,

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=350638

Follow the mobility link and it should take you to the correct driver.

Let us know how it goes.

Good luck

 

Now, are we talking about just installing the driver via running the file, or force installing through the 'have disk' method? Does anyone have any idea why HWInfo is reading the card right, but Windows fails to?

 

You should just be able to run the executable (as you would with the standard mobility ATI driver), it'll install catalyst and everything.

 

No matter what package I install, the actual display driver never gets installed. Thanks for the help boys. Gonna have to call it a night. Need to find out why Windows won't see the card for what it is, and hopefully that does not include a fresh install.

 

Try DR's suggestion. I had similar issue with my ATI drivers. Install Dell's first, then Newest ATI. Reloading the OS should also fix the problem.

On another note, I have temporarily reinstalled my 5870s. Wanted to test the secondary card slot to make sure that another card will work in it. I played COD BO for about 2.5 hours and had good performance. But occasionally when I open HWInfo 64 I get no sensors on the GPU#1. See pic.

The card still seemed to work fine though. Is this a bug with HWInfo 64? Should I be using HWInfo 32? Or is there something wrong with my 2nd card or mobo?

 

i have the same issue with my 6970s since i got them but both gpus work flawlessly. however i found a trick. if you run gpuz before or during hwinfo runs, sensors of second gpu appear magically. dont know why. maybe should be reported to hwinfo thread. I use hwinfo32 by the way because only this reports temps on hwinfo gadget. the story is the same on hwinfo32.

 

Same here have to run gpuz before I run Hwinfo even with my 5870s I had this problem, I also had problems with drivers not installing, I didnt try dells or the desktop drivers, but a re-installing windows fixed it