AMD 7970m available for buy

I think someone posted a bunch of details a few pages back... would give credit to poster but cant recall who said..

New one rumored to have USB 3.0 on all ports
Sata 3 speeds on all ports including optical bay
probably bluetooth 4.0 like the m17r4
as well as other small upgrades.

Buy now if you can't wait.... wait if you want better specs and potential for ivy bridge upgrades

 

I'm thinking I'll wait, as i still have around 1-2 weeks before i gather all the money together, finalise on my decision etc. Is there any kind of ETA for the m18x r2 in Australia? Also, for some reason they have now taken out the 6990m crossfire in the m18x options, so i may very well have to wait! Unless i am able to swap out 580m's for 7970m's? If anyone knows that

 

Actually I just went to build a m18 and it is showing as a m18r2 in the url bar up top
I would def wait for better graphics to show up if you are after dual 7970s, but if you are able to wait a week or two, things might change. Or you can always call Dell and see what they can do about swapping cards, if anything

 

and will there be any limiting factors in the m18x for the 7970m as opposed to the r2? i heard someone mention that the mxm adapters on the r2 will be 120 watt as opposed to 100, is this true?

 

aaaand my 7970m is dead I had one neat run of 3dmark11 good times...

 

:O how did that happen!?

 

God knows! artifacted like hell all of a sudden under zero load, then bam, darkness, 6 beep no post

 

O_O

Maybe because of the incorrect heatsink?

Also, did you have pad between the GPU and motherboard?

 

AMD new driver is out, for desktop tho AMD Releases the Catalyst 12.4 WHQL Driver | techPowerUp

wow, thats fast..very unfortunate

 

I think I'd have more frowns than smiley faces.

 

probably your card was defective...

 

Most likely, maybe something shorted out? I mean the heatsink was lining up with the card except for one transistor was a little too close to the heatsink.. Also I had the pad in between GPU and mobo.. no understanding what happened! I so wanna try something again, but I already tried the whole day to make it work...

Believe me man, I frowned as much as any this day, now I must smile a bit because work tomorrow, meetings/teaching/students swarming all over office hour, must pick my spirit up, sooooo...

BYE BYE CARD!!! BYE BYE HAPPINESS

 

thats...unsettling I'm so sorry to hear that. Could you try examining the card to see if there is any burn mark or something?

 

got me, look below, it is perfectly intact, I mean there is no scratch whatsoever forget about burns

 

so can you boot without the card? using intel IGP? or just swap back in your 580M? I did burn out a 6870M but on a MSI since I wasnt careful but yeah...

 

oh damn! I didn't try the iGPU, I mean does it worth the try?? 6 beeps no post is clear cut problem I guess, because of the driver support issue, I disabled iGPU from the start as per Slick's guide.. hmmm, if I keep on unscrewing screwing the heatsink, I will render some screws useless soon

oh btw I swapped back my 580m, I was thinking maybe I can enable iGPU and try to flash the thing?

 

R32 is obviously on backwards. I can see it clear as day.

Sorry about your luck man. At least you're in good spirits though.

 

Oh, no. So sorry for your bad fortune, Graz'zt. Strange that it would give up while idling. Again, sorry. That's a body blow after all of the initial excitement.

 

I am not expert btw what is R32, one of the transistors? Are you seeing something wrong in there? I mean it was exact same when I got the card (yesterday )

yeah man, especially it is my first aftermarket GPU, I had very high hopes this morning

 

SlickDude's 7970M still alive?

 

^^ in perfect condition

 

Did you receive an engineering sample? it should say "ENG" somewhere on the die

 

yes it does, but we already knew it was a QS

 

That's a body blow BIGTIME. grazt, cook it in the oven for a bit?

 

do you have access to a similar system? I would want to try to put it on other system to see what happens. But thats just me.

 

How did your 7970m die???

 

I had the same issue gratz did with my 6990m. Ended up getting a mobo replacement and that fixed the issue. Not sure if it was the fact that I moved pads around or what that exactly fixed the issue though.

 

But the card itself is still functional in your case?

 

yup still going strong, haven't pushed it to hard cause I don't wanna fry it.

 

So grat, there is still hope

 

I would just reset the bios, and reseat the card, as well as making sure all the thermal pads are in the right places so you don't get a short circuit.

 

Graz'zt, this might help you to get your R3 running again without doing a blind flash. Alienware Mobiles - 5 Beeps after turning ON the system | Dell. You'll probably need to put the 580M back in so there is a video card present even though Win 7 won't be able to recognize it because of the AMD drivers currently loaded. (Or you could try with the 7970M, but I'd be wary.) Then restart and enter the BIOS to switch the video config back to SG and enable the IGP. Hopefully whatever caused the artifacts and killed the 7970M didn't do any further damage. Good luck.

 

i say gratz puts it in the oven

Holy crap, it worked! Dead video card resurrected! - [H]ard|Forum

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...r-your-dead-graphics-card-your-alienware.html

from what i understand, he did put the 580 back in and the computer boots.

I'm thinking that he had the pads in wrong and it caused a short? he got his new pads from frozencpu today. Are those pads electrically conductive?

 

No, not conductive. I thought he couldn't pass POST. Was just getting beeps.

Graz'zt . . . .

"oh damn! I didn't try the iGPU, I mean does it worth the try?? 6 beeps no post is clear cut problem I guess, because of the driver support issue, I disabled iGPU from the start as per Slick's guide.. hmmm, if I keep on unscrewing screwing the heatsink, I will render some screws useless soon

oh btw I swapped back my 580m, I was thinking maybe I can enable iGPU and try to flash the thing?"

 

with the ati card in...but he put the 580 in after and my understanding is that it was fine. So there's something wrong with the ati card.

It could have been him installing the card with a 580m arrangement of pads and missing some pads too

if he has nothing to lose, i say 200c for 10 minutes in the oven. let it resolder any microcracks...but only if he has nothing to lose

 

Sorry for the loss of your card, hopefully slick's solution might work out. I have a question your 7970m is not from upgradeyourlaptop? Also is the r3 capable on running on just the igp? Because i would still want to use my laptop if i ever sell my gpu to get the 7970m.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

could be that he forgot the pad under the GPU. that would cause problems as the GPU wouldn't be grounded properly and its an easy thing to forget.

Yup its easily doable, just don't expect to do any gaming.

 

@ SlickDude80 -- Well, I hope you're right.

 

could be


GRAZT, did you put that large pad on the back of the card?

 

He said earlier that he did use the large back pad.

 

in a PM. he said he had his 580 back in to keep him busy...i assumed from that that it was working. Oh well...we'll know for sure tomorrow.

 

Maybe it wasn't placed properly? Thats the only theory I can come up with on why it would "fry" suddenly.

 

Yep, it's an obvious inquiry, but here's what he said:

"Most likely, maybe something shorted out? I mean the heatsink was lining up with the card except for one transistor was a little too close to the heatsink.. Also I had the pad in between GPU and mobo.. no understanding what happened! I so wanna try something again, but I already tried the whole day to make it work..."

 

I think his best bet would be to try the card in another machine and see if it works. That way the issue could be narrowed down between a bad card or another issue.

 

Certainly worth a try if that's an option.

 

SlickDude, add a picture of backside of videocard with a big thermal pad, so people won't forget to place it. I wonder what thermal pad thickness we should use on a backside 1mm? Can we just reuse big thermal pad from our 6990M?

 

It "should" work just make sure you place it properly.

 

I'm glad I'm getting mine installed and not doing it myself I'd be furious if I killed a 500$ 7970 lol. After tax, brackets, thermal pads , shipping. Ha

 

Don't put your card in the oven, it's useless in your situation. The oven method was supposed to reflow the faulty solder used on the older GPUs as an alternative to reballing.

Technology advanced since then and solder quality improved.

 

Sounds like it was faulty :/

If it was shorting you would have got artefacts whilst benching... Or beeps on post after installation..

Or the missing pad could have led a component to overheat?