Crossfire 5870m workaround fix for ETW (possibly NTW too)

Hey guys! After weeks trying I'm glad to bring you the news that I finally found a way to play ETW (Empire Total War) with crossfire enabled without having to deal with massive flickering on maps, missing textures on the UI and other graphical glitches that makes the game unplayable (that is, unless you disable crossfire with a huge performance impact).

Step by step what I did was:

1) Download Radeonpro (AMAZIN PROGRAM!):
http://www.radeonpro.info/Download.aspx

2) Open Radeonpro->settings->advanced-> check "Enable Driver Compatibility"

3) Create a profile for ETW.

4) Under the profile settings go to advanced->click on "Manage my drivers"->Download Catalyst 10.5 driver files->click on "Add/Update Driver Set

5) Back to the advanced tab for the profile settings choose Catalyst 10.5 under Driver Compatibility and check all boxes.

6) And finally, very important! Check Mipmap Quality and set it to Quality mode.

Catalyst A.I. can be set on Standard or Advanced (didn't make much of a difference for me on this game, so I play on advanced).

I can play ETW now, on very high settings, crossfire enabled, no serious graphical glitches, and with smooth 50-60 FPS.

This "fix" will probably will work with NTW too, though I haven't tested it since I don't own the game.

 

The problem has never been that it doesn't work for me. it's that it increases all the load times into the 4-6minuite range, it will predictably not respond (even according to task manager) at ~ the 30-40% mark for 80% of the time before it continues to load. Does this fix that?

 

Biggest problem for me was campaign map flickering like mad with missing textures and other graphical glitches. With 10.5 compatibility mode I noticed reduced loading times, but don't think I ever got 4-6 min load times. Those are just crazy long loading times. My load times with this "fix" are more like within the 1m-1,5m max range.

 

I'm willing to try anything right now. I'll do this later today and report back if someone else hasen't by then.

 

You and me both. I gotta get this pig running right.

 

Just confirmed. Loading times are still 5x larger with crossfire on. This sucks. Doesn't seem like AMD will fix this issue too in any time near the future. Damn!

 

Sure its not an issue with the game itself? Some titles just aren't coded or are poorly coded for SLI or Crossfire. Just a quick thought...

 

Don't think so. 4870 X2 crossfire cards used to run this game fine with older drivers. I have to use an older driver just to avoid graphic glitches with crossfire enabled.

Anyways, CA is not releasing a new patch either, so I'm stuck playing this game with one GPU. Oh well...

 

Might want to google it - when I did, came across multiple hits on 'Empire Total War Crossfire problem' / 'Empire Total War Crossfire issue'. Might have some tips, I didn't go in and look. Lots of reports though.

 

I believe it was their own patch(s) that make it not function. Both games worked with it flawlessly before their patches.

 

Didn't know that. Got the game recently. Would you mind posting this info here?
Loading times unbearabling long with crossfire enabled

 

CA and sega are aware of the problem by now. You're not the first person to post it on the total war forums. They're not willing to correct the problem, period.

 

Well, not telling them about it wouldn't help much either.

I'm not keeping my hopes up there will be a fix any time soon, or any time later in the future, but I'm sure gonna harass them and AMD about this issue.

 

as I said previously, there have been threads before, mine included, dozens infact, as well as on their own bug report page. however as they have officially announced that there will be no further patches for either game as they devote resources to shogun II I would consider the matter closed indefinitely. the m17x is the only platform with this problem as far as I am aware, that makes it difficult to put man power into something in such a niche market to being with.

if incan dig up my old login info I'll post, but I don't expect well get any responses than the typical "it's your hdd or, defrag your game files" comment, afterwards people will give up lol.