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

Congrats jus71n!!!! Glad to hear it is working well for you

I have the same issue with my 5870's. I find that they both appear after I do something that uses both cards..

 

If you've seen 1600x1200 it sounds like you just have a borked installation.
Whilst a re-install will sort it out, it's a real drag.

I installed the dell 6970M driver for the M18x then installed PREVIEW/BETA 11.8 mobility drivers & ccc from AMD. These don't check and just installed. You could try other preview/beta versions.

I've had a quick look (I'm at work) and I couldn't find the ones I used. I do however have the installation package on my machine at home. If you can't find them I'll put the package up somewhere later and you can use that.

You're nearly there
P.

 

Are people having problems playing games with the 6990 in crossfire upgrade? Thinking of upgrading to these cards once I got the money. Might as well go for the 6990 if the m17x can handle it.

 

I reinstalled Windows from a bare bones system image that I keep. No go. Is it possible that I may have to do a completely fresh install?

 

Thanks again gentlemen. I thought it was probably a hwinfo bug.

 

I installed the 11.8 preview driver. It was the only one that gave me the warning screen that the driver was not signed. It actually did install. My computer still thinks that another monitor is plugged into it though. Thank you all for your help.

 

Sounds good

It usually thinks it's extended onto a second screen. You just have to disable this second screen. Then you get access to the full res.

Then to make it fully behave: cos the settings seem to start corrupt

Change a gaming graphic setting (anything).
Save changes
Select defaults
Save changes.
Restart.

After this it should be fully working.

P.

 

ok so i undervolted to 1.05 everything was fine until i tried a game with CF, it tripped the PSU. Then i swapped the cards everything is working fine i just havent tried a game yet.


something did fry in my motherboard though could that be drawing power away from cards?

 

Possibly, it is hard to know what effect a fried component could have....and also what other damage may have occurred.

I would be interested to see how a game goes now that you have switched the cards!

 

Where do you disable the 2nd screen? Windows settings or CCC? OSD still shows both when I hit FN+F6.

 

Right Click, and Screen Resolution I believe

 

Whilst I think it was through CCC, there are display setting through windows too, could have been there. I'm not in front of my M17 atm, sorry.

After checking the CCC (display managment), try right clicking on the desktop and looking through the 'normal' display settings. It calls it 'extended'.

jus71n, did this in the last 24hrs, perhaps he can post for sure.

I'm home in 2hrs or so, if you've not got it sorted by then I'll have the answer.
P.

 

DR650SE is bang on.

RMB on desktop, select 'screen resolution'

Set:
Display : 1.Mobile PC Display
Multiple Display: Show desktop only on 1.

APPLY

After this you should be able to (if it dosen't change it by default) select 1920x1200.

P.

 

Oh, I had already done that. I was trying to figure out how to get my computer to not show that a VGA monitor was plugged in.

My temperatures are hitting around 85°C in Vantage and Fallout New Vegas. Is that normal?

 

lol, ok. Sorry, I misunderstood.
Mine is the same. I didn't know it was wrong.

P.

 

So is there any news concerning compatibility with the 330w psu, either through a modded bios or even the psu id chip swap DR was talking about before?

 

Not sure Malignant. However, I have three other Dell laptops in my household, all with the small blue LED at the tip of the power cord. My M17x PSU works on all of them, and all of them work on my M17x. I never get any sort of PSU warning or not charging condition. Maybe a cheaper adapter could be sacrificed to make a 330W work?

 

I havn't had any time at the moment to further pursue my dream of swapping the ID chips. But if I do get some time. I'll definately be reporting back. My worry at the moment is that it's the bios thats causing the throttling. Once TheWiz has more work done, we should know. I know they are definately busy on a ton of bios projects. I might send him a PM today or tommorrow.

 

Wow I just finished flashing my two cards with a .96v modded bios and just tried out crysis 2 and amazingly no throttling (max 250watt that I noticed) and the game was running buttery smooth at 60 fps on extreme settings, with shadows on very high. The only time the fps dipped to the mid 30's (im still in the beginning after prophet blows his brains) was when I stepped outside for the first time, even then the fps still shoots up to 60 when looking through the visor or looking at a slightly different areas.

Anyway this is much improved from my previous performance where the fps would just drop to the 20's and 30's sporatically. Temps were looking real good, primary card only reached 80c, 84c shader at 70% fan speed and 100% utilization. The secondary card shined even brighter reaching a max temp of 75c at 56% fan speed and 100% utilization. I am also using the BF3 beta 11.10 preview drivers, so perhaps that helped. I am thoroughly impressed so far though.

 

Definately what I like to hear, I flashed mine to .96 last night. Havn't had time to game on it though. Going to do a full rebuild of my system tonight hopefully.

 

I have my 6970m's flashed to .96v as well. I'm trying to troubleshoot some minor issues. Does gpu-z or furmark detect the voltage as 0.96v or 1.000v for you guys?

 

Hey aarpcard, how hot do your 6970s get at the clocks in your signature? I'm at 700/950 and I am hitting 95°C playing New Vegas. I also noticed that my GPU heatsink might be touching that metal looking square around the GPU core. I have OK idle temperatures, but my peak temps are pretty nasty. That leads me to believe that my heatsink doesn't have proper contact with the core/memory. I can't get it any tighter though...I already have the retention mod in place. This card is a heater though, that's for sure.

 

what thermal pads are you using turbo? maybe try some 0.5mm ones or some thermal paste instead.

 

AS5 on the VRAM and the core, just like I did with my 5870s, and they could take a considerable OC before reaching even 80°C. I will rip it apart again once I get done with my homework. I realize that my 6970 is going to produce more heat, but this is out of the ordinary.

 

Noob question, does undervolting the cards compromise the cards' performance?

 

Nope, performance is the same at stock clocks. It reduces temps and power draw but you can't overclock much if at all.

 

Hey Turbo,

I tried running my single 6970 at 810/1050 and the max temps I saw was 89 while playing Crysis 2. At stock my max never goes above 81 . At 775/1000 I saw my max temps go to about 82 - 84 while playing Shogun 2.

I'm also using a clevo card, with the stock screws that came with the card, and using OCZ Freeze on the Chip and Fujiopoly .5mm thermal pads on the memory and back of the card (the small chips).

 

Thanks Greywolf. Upon further inspection, I found the issue and have corrected it. You know the square around the GPU core? When I tightened my heatsink down, it was sitting on that, and not the core. What I had to do was file around the copper square on the heatsink until the copper square was slightly higher than the surrounding parts of the sink. Now I am sitting in the high 70s C with a 700/950 OC.

 

Hey this is a question for those of you who ordered your 6970's from Eurocom. Did you get the ones with posts (looks like you did Turbo) or without posts. If you get it without the soldered posts does it include the X-retention bracket?

 

No posts, or retention bracket for me. Hense having to modify the ones off my 5870's

 

Been enjoying the cards, well as much as I can working nights

Seen improvements in games, not just FPS but the quality as well (maybe just me) also knowing its going to cope with the next wave of games BF3 & MW3

Been playing alot of F1 2011, there is an improvement, but I don't think the game uses crossfire? which is a shame.

Couple of things I've noticed.

Currently running @ 1920x1200, but if I close the lid and reopen it it goes back to thinking its on muliple monitors and lowers the screen res, have to right click, select monitor and screen res again.......... also cant seem to find this native overclocking utility in the catalyst software?

 

No, I am also using the one from my 5870.

 

Hopefully these issues will be fixed with new releases of drivers.

EDIT:: Actually....i know what is causing this and it pains me as well. Kill the OSD process and you will find that this wont happen when you close and open the lid.

I was playing around with it as I wanted the res to stay at 1920x1200 when pluggin in the TV, however I ALWAYS have to manually set it every time.......

 

i think this has to do also with the recognition of brand and tv type from the ati driver

 

Yeah you are right, but I found that if I connected the TV and set the resolution's correctly, it would revert if I closed and opened lid. Dispite the fact that I hadn't disconnected the HDMI cable.

Frustrating as I can keep the HDMI cable connected but I want to be able to close the lid when watching something on the TV.

I imagine the same thing is happening here. Because it thinks there is another monitor connected it will always 'refresh' when you open the lid.

Killing the OSD process stopped this.

 

AMD Overdrive? If you click on Preferences in CCC and switch to Advanced, it should be under Gaming or Performance on the left. I lost it when I switched back to my 5870s, but it will be there with the 6970s.

 

I started building my fresh install yesterday. Had to deal with the whole 1600x1200 issue. Found that the correction for this was the fact that the dell driver was never installing the display driver. Apparently it doesn't recognize the cards, and leaves the display driver out. Can't even select it. So than I installed the 11.9 Beta drivers, and those worked fine. I also found that after installing, Overdrive worked, but only had limits of 740/1000 for the cards. I'll have to search a way to increase those upper limits, but since it's my gaming and everyday install, I don't have any need at all to OC. In fact I have the GPU's undervolted to .96v

I also only use the AW software to change the keyboard colors, everything else isn't installed or disabled. So I theortically won't have the screen reverting issue.

Just a few observations. Are there other drivers I should be using? Any tips? My goal is to get everything installed on my OS/App drive, and my second SSD will be a dedicated gaming drive. Than of course I'll still have the 1TB for media storage.

Once everything is done, tweaked, and installed, I'll be creating a backup image of both SSDs so that if/when I bork my system messing around out of curiosity, I can revert back with nothing lost and not have to invest so much time.

Cant wait to do some real gaming on these cards. Thats really the whole motivation. And having a clean neat system.

 

Nice! I am soooo jealous >_<

Although as far as I can tell I dont think anyone sells 6990's atm....

 

I'm sure I looked in there? I'll take another look when I get home

 

Douse,

Have you looked at the Eurocom website? Under Upgrades, I think you can purchase a pair of 6990s with xfire cable. Now I don't know if there are any restrictions on the purchase, or if there are any other issues (I personally haven't attempted this), but I did see them out there when I was looking around.

Just something to consider I suppose.

 

Hey guys, sorry this is gonna be a n00b question, but since the Clevo cards came with the x-brackets installed I didn't have to go this route.

My question is how do you remove the x-bracket from your older cards (5870/4870), is it simply "taped" on the back and is there a secret to removing it?

Or is there something more to it?

 

Wow....why haven't I looked here before!!

Not too bad....600 GBP (714 inc VAT... ) plus shipping...

I think I will go down that path if they offer warranty...

Anyone know where they stand with this?

EDIT:: WOAH $150 FOR SHIPPING TO EUROPE!!!!!

 

hey Douse,

Let me know what you find out about warranty (as I'm interested as well). And yeah shipping is ridiculous (even on ebay their shipping is ridiculous...45 USD to ship two cards??? without any heatsinks or anything??).

But I'm curious about the warranty, so if you find out anything I'd appreciate it.

 

On mine, they are not exactly stuck to the rear of the card, for me it was simply a case of prizing each of the legs gently with my finger nail to get it to pop off, there was a little resistance but not much.

 

I know through their ebay store, they no longer offer any sort of warranty at all, Not even DOA as they claim to test the cards before they ship them.

I remember looking on their official website where the cards were slightly dearer, but the postage was expensive and I would of had to pay the full 20% import tax to the UK.

 

Hey Douse,

Did you get in touch with the UK clevo service center I pm'd you the details of? I know they give 6 month RTB warranty. The quote I got from the was for 6970's but I'm sure they could supply 6990's. they sure aint the cheapest option but if its worth the extra for the warranty?

 

Yeah becareful with purchasing directly from Clevo..from my experience they only offer warranty for Clevo based machines. Which isn't a problem, unless they ask for the serial number of the machine. Just my 2 cents, it may very well be the same for Eurocom or anything else, so may be a non-issue. Just something to be aware of.

 

Awesome thanks!! Just popped mine off of my 4870's. Just didn't want to do that if there was something more then the simple black pad holding it to the card.

 

Has anyone tested whether the 6990's on RJtech's site will work on my R2?
Laptop Video Cards :: ATI HD 6990M 2GB Video Card for X7201 - R&J Technology, Clevo Barebone Notebook kits, Laptop and desktop system builder

 

I thought someone recently ordered some cards from RJTech?