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

Even if somebody say that cpu won't impact on performance, i can tell you that Crossfire will benefit a lot from higher CPU frequency.

If anyone with an XM is willing to make a test, run Vantage with stock GPU's clock, run it twice, one with the cpu@stock and one with the cpu@ let say 25x133 (85tdp is enaugh) and see how your Graphic Score will rise, and quite a bit also.

 

of course cpu overclocking can raise performance more or less but thats till a deadpoint when power issues occur. At least that the case with M17X default charger. My CPU is at 2% overclock with 6970s at 0.96V. . Didnt find any reason to gain it more.

 

I'm not even referring to overclocking the CPU. I was under the impression that the XM at stock clocks was substantially better than the model right below it (non extreme).

 

thinking that they can reach 3.2Ghz by themselves without bios or software overclock then i would say it does. overclocking xm cpus doesnt mean we need to. Its that we can do.

 

It's probably not the best idea overclock your CPU when you're running dual 6990s though.

 

Agree, but on our AW the cpu is setted by default @ 62W tdp 24/24/24/24 Multiplier instead of being 17/17/23/24 @55W tdp

Did you set it as it should with Throttlestop or are you run it as it is? If you didn't bring down the multipliers then you have an OC CPU plus the 2% FSB Overclock

 

Question: It seems like the m18x guys have issues with their 6990's heating and shutting down their systems. Do we have that problem? I haven't played enough on mine yet to experience it, so I'm wondering if we have that issue too.

Also, are any of you guys interested in the new dell driver for the m18x that supports the 6990's (and 70's)? I'm downloading it now to try it out.

I have actually had my computer freeze on my twice and need to shut down but that could be from a number of things. Is there an issue with the cards heating and shutting down that I should be aware of? Or does that only affect the m18x?

 

Its an M18x specific issue. hey don't trip the fans on a star from a cold boot so they overhead and thermal shutdown. As long as your fans are spinning your good. If there nite you have other issues.

 

That's really not the case. XM really only indicates that the cpu has an unlocked multiplier. Other than base clock speed, there is no difference in architecture or cache size when compared to the i7 820qm and i7 840qm.

It refers to a slightly higher base clock and unlocked multipliers (which is huge).

 

i dont even know how to use throttlestop. i tried two or three times but didnt come to a clue. read the guide the same. So i never used it actually because the last thing i want to do is to burn the cpu due to misuse of throttlestop.

 

Throttle stop is easy. TDP = more turbo power. Just up that. And leave all the multipliers at 24.

That's all you need. No need to mess with the other settings.

 

So even without using throttlestop, its still a huge upgrade from the model before it?

 

It was a pretty huge jump from my 720QM to the 920XM. I have mine with no OC and locked at x24 multipliers and it is plenty fast enough for me.

 

What drivers are you guys using? I'm using the new 11.12 beta drivers and I'm having some issues. Skyrim gives me a yellow flashing screen when paused / looking @ quest log and tf2 is full artifacting. Other than that though, the skyrim performance is godly, and it perfectly utilizes both video cards. SC2 works great too. Someone on the other thread was saying that the 11.12 beta drivers are hard to remove or something? Anyone know what / why that is? I was happy with the 11.10 driver but I wanted better skyrim performance. the 11.12 gave me that. 11.12 is MUCH better for skyrim than 11.10, but its causing issues with TF2 and, as you can see in the screenshot - paused skyrim. Have any of you guys tried that new dell driver for the m18x's 6990s? I tried installing it, but it wouldn't work. It installed the other CCC crap but it didn't install the display driver.

Thoughts?

 

Thanks again for all the awesome feedback on the processor and card upgrade. I have finally squared it off with my wife, and I can choose EITHER the xfire 6990 set up, or the 920XM.

Again, considering i am upgrading from q740 and from xfire 5870s, what is my best choice? By that i mean, what is most likely my bottleneck... processor or cards?

Thanks again for the forum awesomeness

 

My personal opinion (as I did both the upgrade from a 720QM to a 920XM AND and upgrade from a 4870 to the 6970), I'd go for the crossfire upgrade. Many games these days are more GPU dependent then CPU dependent and I personally think you'll see a far greater improvement with the video cards.

(or you can tell her that since you have to open up your computer anyway, it'd be easier to replace BOTH now instead of doing it later)

 

If you have to choose between a GPU upgrade vs a CPU upgrade then go with the GPU 6990m or 6970m. I was using a crossfire 4870m setup and a single 6970m outperforms them both. And crossfire 6990m would easily out perform your crossfire 5870m setup. From what I hear your q720 won't bottleneck the cards performance either.

 

11.12 works way better than 11.10 for Skyrim, but I thought the reason I was getting that yellow crap / artifacting in TF2 was because of 11.12. Well, it wasn't the driver, it was the app profiles. I'm back @ 11.10 with 11.9 CAP4 profiles. I may try and go back to 11.12 and try another app profiles, maybe 11.2 instead of 11.3 and see if that works well. Skyrim really doesn't play well for whatever reason on these drivers, but everything else plays perfectly.

 

No, my point was, if you were to take away throttle stop, there is really no difference between the two or three cpu's (i7 820qm, i7 840qm, i7 920xm) - aside from minor increases in the base clock.

The reason why the 920xm and 940xm are so "special" is because they have the unlocked multiplier which can be abused through throttle stop. Aside from that, there's no difference. Cache amount, archetecture, etc are all the same among the bunch. The only odd man out is the i7 720qm with less L2 cache.

 

11.12 driver? i think i lost something here? is it released somewhere? they fixed 11.11 blue screen issues?

 

Hello again!
For those, who are interested, it's done - I installed the card on friday, had to exchange the heatsink (clevo ones didn't fit) and everything works perfectly!
At first I was a bit disappointed, because all the benchmark results (3dMark 05 // 06) were exactly the same (~21600 // ~15100) with the new single 6990M as they were before, with the 4870 X2... But when it came to gaming (BF3, Skyrim) everything worked absolutely wonderful!
(Catalyst 11.11)
So for the benchmarks, I assume that maybe the CPU is "slowing" everything down!? (i7 M620).

So far, so good.

two questions, folks:


1.
I wanted to install one of my HD 4870s into my older MSI "GT735" as the AMD Website told me, they're both "PCIe 2.0 x16".
So I thought it might be possible, but when I made my way to the adapter, I found a completely different connector.

Could anyone tell me, how the two different connectors of the two cards are called? (I would like to upgrade the MSI "GT735" a bit, for my brother...)
I can't really find a satisfying answer through google...
The two pictures are attached.


2.
As I asked before:
"If I'm not mistaken, that's the card, which works properly in the m17x R2, except the "audio over HDMI" - issue, correct?
("ATI HD 6990M 2GB Video Card for P170HM" Clevo...)

Is there a mod/fix/update available by now, to make it work?
As I mentioned, unfortunately I can't search the thread :-/"


---

Thanks a lot!

 

It's a beta driver. Google it. Paired with 11.2 app profiles it works fantastically well. I had issues with 11.3 app profiles, but 11.2 with 11.12 beta work fantastic.

 

Intense, don't take it personally, but you are making a little bit confusion

CAP profile are 11.11 CAP3 and 11.11 CAP2 i guess, since there is no 11.3 & 11.2 cap profiles (unless you are using caps from very old driver sets)

 

Ack! I'm so sorry. I get it confused! I think I was calling my 11.12 beta drivers 12.1 on some threads! Lol!

EDIT: Also, hopefully the modding my cooling pad to use the new fans and 12V will help some with this, but do any of you guys have a solution for the added keyboard warmth? When gaming it gets pretty warm on my left hand side with these 6990's, even though they seldom get above 70-75C, it still gets really warm. Not burning hot or anything, but definitely warm. Any ideas besides the cooling pad mod? I sent Katalin a message asking how to increase the voltage to make the fans spin faster, but I haven't heard anything back yet. Hopefully I hear soon so I can buy a new power adapter on new egg if I need to.

 

Hi guys.May I ask a question on playing BF3?
When I choose the high level for graphic setting in BF3, the FRS will alwaws drop from 60 to 10 around sometimes (the SYNC was on), do you have the same experience as I have?

 

Hey guys, does anyone have any idea why my fan speed RPM on my master card never goes above like, 9 in hwinfo64 AND GPUZ, but my shader temps never go above 80C with everything on Ultra in skyrim. Obviously the fan is running, I can feel it. Maybe a busted sensor? My slave card has a max of 514 RPM in my current hwinfo sensor log.

Also, any idea why skyrim won't utilize the second card? I've asked in a few other threads, but to no avail. I'm using 11.12 drivers and 11.11 CAP2 app profiles.

 

Question 1: The first image I think is a MXM 2.1 and the second is MXM 3.0 type B

Question 2: Flashing to a vbios from a Dell version 6990m may help.

 

No. No fix for audio over hdmi.

 

Do you all use radeon pro? I would like to figure out a way to get skyrim to run crossfire, but I don't want it to just force 100% out of the other GPU. I want it to offload it properly so it shares the burden.

When I bought my m15x before returning for my m17x, I installed rivatuner and just having it installed destroyed my performance. I had to reformat. I don't want a repeat of that so I'm hesitant to download radeon pro since everything is workign so well .

EDIT: Also, Dan only uses Throttlestop when NOT gaming to do other stuff I guess. Do any of you use throttlestop while gaming?

 

Congrats on the great outcome IntenseIGFX!

I have never used Radeon pro, sorry!

I do, however, use throttlestop in games, but it is not necessary. I just like tinkering with stuff and getting the max out of the system. I personally think I can see a slight improvement in games when running the CPU overclocked.

Unfortunately with the 6990's it is a balance of CPU clocks and GPU utilisation otherwise throttling will occur.

 

Install Catalyst 11.10 WHQL, use 11.9 CAP4, copy the file atiumdag.dll on the skyrim folder. This way crossfire works.

atiumdag.dll can be found on this thread http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...nce-problems-general-discussion-thread-4.html , post #40

Also i sugest you to hang over the m18x forum from time to times, lot of info also there.

Edit: i do use TS while gaming, i keep all the multiplier @ 24x133 and my tdp is 75W. it never throttle back while gaming. Also keep in mind that with 6970's i have a little more room for OC compared to 6990's

 

Thank you

And thank you too
Nice forum, nice guide, nice guys ;-)

Hi,
I'm using the R2 with 4GB RAM, i7 M620 CPU and, since Friday, my brand new single (!) HD 6990M and I can tell you:
The GPU upgrade was the most effective one, I've ever experienced!

I upgraded from 4780 Crossfire and despite I think my CPU is not the fastest or best, my gaming experience reached a completely new level

Bf3 or Skyrim, both with high settings, running absolutely wonderful.
I'm planning to get my CPU upgraded as well, but for now it's absolutely satisfying!
I would definitely choose the GPU!

Regards

Edit: just as an example:
@Skyrim e.g. I have now normally between 50 and 60 FPS with settings high and 'normal ingame viewing conditions' - under worst ingame viewing conditions, (rainy weather, fire and smoke in foreground, combined with high distance view to background landscape) it seldom drops below 30 FPS.
In Bf3, high settings I think I have round about 40 FPS.
Before the GPU upgrade Bf3 was 'unplayable'...

 

Hi PKhetan, im looking for 2x 6970M in CrossFire kit . are this still available?

 

Hi Daddyz,

Pkhetan at the moment can no longer supply Clevo parts, so unfortunately he will not be able to order them for you.

The majority of people have been purchasing their cards from the eBay seller, upgradeyourlaptop. You will find them if you search for either 6970m or 6990m in eBay.

There are some other sellers around, but I dont know their details off the top of my head.

I hope you dont mind me answering for you Pkhetan!

 

Hi Douse,

Thanks for the reply.

anyway, im now in the middle of decision either to upgrade my 1 year old m17x R2 with 5870m or selling that and need to top up some money to get R3 with 6990m. As experience user , what do you recommend.

I am playing bf3 , but current system cannot get to ulta..i love to play in ultra settings. do you think upgrade to 6970m cfx and serve that purpose?

thanks in advance for your advise.

 

You'll probably get high settings in BF3 with a single 6990 in the R2, not sure about ultra. If you upgraded to 6990 crossfire you could play at ultra settings in BF3.

 

I agree with DR650, plus I wouldnt bother with the hassle for an m17xR3.

The R2 are considered better mainly because of their screens and the ability to crossfire.

If you dont mind the hassle of selling and all that go for the m18x. However, even the m18x has an inferior screen (I have never seen one though)

But that is just my opinion, other people may differ.

 

Hey, since I upgraded my R2 just 3 days ago from 4870 CF to single 6990M, I can check my FPS in Bf3 with ultra settings and give you a feedback within the next approx. 2 hours! Stand by

 

Cool, I know Iplay on ultra and love it. I have all the settings maxed Don't remember framerates, as I havn't played in couple weeks. Theres to many days in the week, and not enough time in the day.

 

thats true, R3 minus in screen and not able to x fire... how about 6970 xfire. anybody know the performance in bf3?

hi Bennylaws, appriciate your findings on single 6990..

I have read and followup this coloum, but seems i not confident enough to do the xfire 6990, but maybe xfire 6970 since according of many of you, the current PSU wattage is capable enough..

one quick questions: single 6990m is >, = or < than 6970 cfx ..? anybody knows
??

 

Single 6970M < Single 6990M < 6970M Crossfire < 6990M Crossfire

 

the new official dell ATI driver has been released on m18x driver site for 6970\6990 the beta of this driver was amazing with my cf 6990 r2.

 

hehe. It's more like:

Single 6970M < Single 6990M <<< 6970M Crossfire < 6990M Crossfire

 

Hi DR650SE

Did you experience that FRS sometimes drops down to only 10FRS or 20FRS?
I changed to 6970CF, and got high setting in BF3, the FRS so unstable. Currently using 11.10 with 11.3CAP

 

Well I ran a test, for just a few minutes:

(System: M17x R2, 4GB RAM, CPU: i7 M620, HD 6990M [single])

BF3
Map: Metro (Outside, "Park")

BF3 Settings Ultra:
FPS between 15 and 40, mostly in the lower 20s ~25 I think, sometimes below 20.
Not desirable for nice gaming.


BF3 Settings High:
FPS between 35 and 60, I think mostly around 40, sometimes below 30, but surely good enough for that game.


BF3 Settings Medium:
FPS between 40 and 60, mostly ~50-60, very seldom below 40.
My preferred setting, because it's very fluently to play and still looks awesome!


I think, in case you really need to play on ultra settings, you should be fine, to go crossfire.
For me personally settings at high, respectively medium (or individual) is/are satisfying.
(Especially because i had to pay round about 530 Euros (~700$), to get a single HD 6990 from the US to Germany )


Regards

 

I havn't had any frame rate drops. What processor do you have and are you overclocking? I use 11.10 drivers with 11.11 CAP 2 I believe. I even play on Metro 64 players with all the explosions and stuff at the choke points with very playable frame rates. Don't remember what the frame rates were but they were good. And that is with all settings maxed out.

 

My CPU is 940XM with 5% OC. When I set back to median, everything is fine. I dont understand what the problem is..The temperature is fine. GPUs are no more than 80c.

 

I don't have CF, but with single HD 6990 I don't have such problems at all.
Sounds like a driver, (((or maybe power consumption?))) problem, to me?!

 

If its the power consumption, I think it should be same as I set median in BF3.
I know single card wont have a problem like this...

 

I'm not quite sure about GPUs/CPUs and their need of power, but I could imagine, that the graphics processor takes/needs more power, when it has to compute more details or extras like FSAA, AF, etc... ?
Higher work load -> higher power consumption?

But I'm not an expert on this.

You could measure your overall consumption at the power plug with different settings

Or e.g. disconnect internal parts like second HDD, DVD-drive and see whether or not it's stable then


Edit:

I just read an article (older one, but the facts didn't change...)

(german)
"So wurde die laut AMD heute noch immer schnellste Gaming-Grafikkarte die "Radeon HD 5970", mit 291 Watt gemäß Furmark-1.6-Test, 216 Watt bei Spielelast und 43,3 Watt im Leerlauf (idle) gemessen."
-> english:

According to AMD, "Radeon HD 5970" which is still the fastest gaming video card (as I mentioned, older article ) measured 291 watts under Furmark-1.6-test, 216 watts at gaming and 43.3 watts at idle.

-----

That means, it's proven, that a graphics adapter consumes more power when it has to perform more work.
That means, theoretically, I would say, it is quite possible, that your problem is power related?!