6990M Crossfire Guide

No. That's not the thread I was referring to lol. I don't check the m18x threads so that explains why I missed it. I'll take a look. Thanks.

Not sure about you guys, but for whatever reason I can't get skyrim to utilize my slave card, at all. I'm running everything @ ultra and the one 6990 seems to be handling it fine, but I'm sure my temps could decrease a bit (shader temps got to 80C and in other games almost never goes past 72C) with the slave sharing the work load. I'm using 11.12 beta with 11.11 CAP 2 app profiles.

I've asked in the skyrim thread, but I haven't gotten any response.

 

I don't own Skyrim at this time because I am waiting until it is old enough for the price to drop to about $20 or for Steam to put it on one of their awesome sales. Hopefully, by then it should be bug-free as well, LOL. From what I read on our forum and the internet, CrossFire seems to be broken on Skyrim. It seems to be a known issue with the game rather than a problem with your computer. It's good that you're not having issues playing it with one video card because I am seeing posts that some people cannot.

Google: skyrim crossfire support and skyrim crossfire issues and site:forum.notebookreview.com skyrim crossfire issues

My assumption is you have not received a response on the other thread because there is no known solution by the people that read your post. Maybe some of the M18x owners that have Skyrim can chime in to comment if their CrossFire systems have the same issue and if SLI is working properly even if CrossFire is not.

 

The rename one looks easy enough. I'm scared to install radeon pro and have it mess up everything. I installed Rivatuner on my old m15x and I had to reformat the machine in order to get stock performance back. Just installing it destroyed my framerate in everything.

Unfortunately that rename tweak doesn't work for me. Not sure if there's a trick to it

 

I used RadeonPro for a long time and it does not mess anything up. It's not the same kind of software as RivaTuner, and yet RivaTurner can really bork your system if you do the wrong things with it.

All RadeonPro does is provide a way to adjust settings that are application specific. If you don't let RadeonPro start automatically with Windows, it has no affect on anything until you manually start it. So, there's not really any harm that I have seen that it might cause.

You can use a RadeonPro profile for a different game to see if you can get it working. If you find a profile for a different game with the same engine, select it, then RadeonPro will handle Skyrim as though it were the other game.

 

I can also make it so radeon pro will ONLY affect skyrim, correct?

 

Sure... don't allow RadeonPro to automatically start with Windows. Turn that off so you have to manually launch it. That's the first thing. Do not mess with RadeonPro's global profile... leave it alone completely as the default. Make a profile for Skyrim and only launch RadeonPro when you want to play Skyrim.

We are starting to get off topic now for the driver thread. All this talk about CrossFire not working and questions about RadeonPro, perhaps this discussion should be in the CrossFire guide thread. I am going to the conversation there because it's a better fit.

OK, the posts were moved here, but the focus should be on how to get CrossFire working and how to use RadeonPro effectively. Don't make it all about Skyrim.

 

Cleaned and updated the OP with newer links - sorry for the lack of update guys. Please PM me if you wish to have more info on the OP for the new comers or if i've missed/misreprensted any infos. Thanks!!

Also here's an interesting news/article from Anandtech regarding future AMD Driver directions/implementions WOOT
AMD Releases Catalyst 12.1 Preview – Custom Application Profiles, HD3D CrossFire, & More

 

such a shame that gtx580m sli is a better than 6990m cfx for skyrim but anywayyyy

fox i got a brand new replacement machine, and looks like everything is fine so far. no more beeps at start, but still freezes when changing brightness.. sigh.

the new crossfire looks pretty stable except theres a bit of change. iirc the duo fan on the left side of my keyboard for cfx, most left should be the main graphics card, however its been changed to the middle one as the temperature on most left no longer heats up. weird =/

 

Good job... looking good, bro. +1

Awesome... glad to hear things are improved.

I have not seen posts with anyone else having freezing while changing brightness. I'm just wondering if there is some sort of corruption in the driver package. If so, that might be having some effect on your fan controls... not sure. It's odd that almost everyone else lacks display brightness control while you and p5795 have it. That makes me further suspicious of driver package corruption.

Did you do a clean AMD driver installation after running DriverSweeper and CCleaner? If so, try again but first uninstall all AMD software (including CAP profiles) and reboot into Windows normally. Manually switch to Standard VGA drivers in Device Manager and then reboot and do the clean driver removal in Safe Mode. You may have some persistent locking of old driver files for some reason, and manually switching to Standard VGA drivers might unlock them for deletion.

 

I read the process to enable xFire 24/7. Does this degrade the reliability or stability at all? What kind of performance increases will people see from this?

 

Am a little stuck here. I've never had AMD cards before and really not sure of what CAPs are / do.

I am running the latest driver from Dells site
I followed instructions on the first page of this thread, which means I've done steps 1-4
1. I've got A05
2. Got 8.902 driver
3. Downloaded CAP
4. Downloaded and installed RadeonPro

Not sure what to do now. I'm not sure what to do with the downloaded CAP from here. Do I enable/load it through CCC? I did notice a difference after installing RadeonPro and that is that all pause screens in Skyrim have gone psychedelic. Certain screens are also now a little 'wonky' and flicker.

 

Go to where you downloaded the CAP on your computer Install the CAP (catalyst application profiles) it's automatic no need to enable it done.

 

Aah and how on earth did I miss that - thank you

+1

Regarding Radeonpro - do the profiles get shared (for instance for Skyrim) or are they uniquely user dependent?

 

I've just installed Catalyst 12.2 preview drivers and the 12.1 CAP2 profiles from AMD website and have to say that SWOTR runs a whole lot better even with shadows on High quality! I used to get around 30 to 40 frames with shadows on low, now it doesnt drop under 60 and I get about 50-60 FPS with shadows on High =)

Battlefield also runs a lot better! All settings maxed with 4x MSAA, 64 player Wake Island 50-60 FPS.

Crysis Warhead, all settings set to maximum "Enthusiast" with AA off, 40 to 50 FPS, with 8X AA about 25 - 35 FPS.

Skyrim crashes to desktop.

Witcher 2, no improvement, but still runs decent with all settings on maximum including AA, minus ubersampling 25 - 35 FPS.

Kingdoms of Amalur does not drop under 60 FPS all maxed.

X3 Albion Prelude also runs a lot better.

I think many game titles are now utilising crossfire properly.

This is on M18x 6990M Crossfire. I will do some more monitoring with HWInfo later to see how much each GPU is utilised in crossfire.

 

Does anyone experience Crossfire disabling itself? I have the suspicion that logging in to my machine via Remote Desktop causes Crossfire to spontaneously disable itself...

 

Hello, I have some questions

1. What CAD exackly is? Does it really make games performance better?

2. How do I Turn on / Turn Off Crossfire? Only by regedit?

3. My M18X spec is 2630QM + 6990 Crossfire and i reach around 6300 3dmark11 Performance points.

How do some people reach about 8000 Points on same spec in 3dmark11?

Its my score after OC : AMD Radeon HD 6970M / 6990M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-2630QM Processor,Alienware M18xR1 score: P6711 3DMarks

And Other ppl :

Search

Almost all of them have same spec and about 7-8 k Points, how is it possible?

And last question : Does drivers from first page here are still actual? I want to make my Crossfire performance as best as it is possible, so If could someone tell me which drivers are best now, I will be really glad!

 

The performance of my M18x so far has been good. But the games that I play mostly TF2, and CS:S don't really use that much gpu power. I was wondering if something is wrong with my card/cards, when running 3D Mark 11 trial under performance with one card I get P3121 3DMarks Graphics Score 2928 P5378 with crossfire and graphics score 5730, I am using 12.3 drivers

 

Which Xfire setup, 6970 or 6990? Also Fox is probably going to merge your thread with this existing one (just a heads up): http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...erformance-problems-discussion-thread-31.html

To answer your question I've been having the exact same issues with the last 2 6970M Xfire setups Dell has given me. Right now it looks to me like only one card is running for your setup. Try toggling the Crossfire on/off in CCC. You might have to do this a couple of times.

For me the first set was bad GPUs and I had to force flash the VBIOS (which ended up frying the card). This next set is better in that all I have to do is toggle Xfire in CCC a couple times to get them both up and running at a respectable level.

Note: All this is with the 12.2 Preview driver.

Before toggling Xfire in CCC even though it said Xfire Enabled:

http://3dmark.com/3dm11/2947489;jsessionid=1vbpiboh6zh1l5owx928l7636


After toggling in CCC and applying an Overclock via TriXX:

http://3dmark.com/3dm11/2975480;jsessionid=17ybdduisqce0ye560l8s6bxm

 

I am using the 6970m crossfire, and there is a boost in performance in benchmarks, and i usually have crossfire of anyway, I think maybe I should try 12.2

 

I get P6328 6990 CF. 12.3 drivers everything stock.

 

Oh ok, the only thing that made me want to ask is that 3D mark told me that my score was low.

 

Yea, because it knows you have an Xfire setup. If you're using a single card that score is normal, P3121 may be a liiiittle bit low but that can be accounted for by a number of factors. Not low enough to worry if you ask me.

 

Maybe you can find some help in this thread.

 

Does anyone have a fix for Crysis 1 and the issue of certain graphics flickering (mainly in distance) while in crossfire? I there any way to reallt make the game utilize crossfire, because I only really play with the single because of the issue.

 

I had pretty serious flickering in Crysis with CF enabled and found that enabling 2x or 4x AA nearly eliminated the problem. You might want to give that a try. Also, have you installed the AMD CAP? I have found this is necessary for Crysis to work well. I also had good results with RadeonPro, using their Crysis profile.

This tweak guide has a lot of useful information specifically for Crysis.

 

Cool, let me try that.

Also I play on an external HDTV with a max of 60z and have my M18x closed. I have to alt-enter a couple times to get Crysis to on to the 60z but at first its gets pulled down to 24z. This seems to be without Vsync but when its on 60 its I get Vsync and its pretty smooth. But the down side is I get less FPS while on 60. And in 24 without Vsync I get the flicker.

Any tips for that?

 

I deleted your duplicate post in the http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...erformance-problems-discussion-thread-32.html as cross-posting is against forum rules. I am mentioning this only because we are seeing cross-posting (and the starting of duplicate threads) occurring more frequently with many new forum members.

It's kind of difficult to know what tips to offer without having more information to work with. You can find a lot of tips for Crysis flickering issues using Google.

Have you installed AMD CAP already? If not, that would be tip #1. Have you tried using RadeonPro yet? RadeonPro has a profile for Crysis. That would be tip #2.

Sometimes renaming the game EXE file will trick the video cards into thinking a different game has launched and this will, in turn, cause AMD CAP and/or RadeonPro to react with different changes to settings. I have read where some folks have renamed Crysis.exe to FarCry.exe and found it worked better. (I saw this mentioned in a Google search.) I have not tried renaming the EXE because turning AA up to 2X and 4X resolved flickering for me with AMD CrossFire. There is no flickering on my system with SLI. Turning up AA settings will lower your FPS as well, but it also produces better graphics quality.

Turning on v-synch and increasing refresh rate will generally lower FPS while producing smoother video, less flicker, etc. The drop in your results are to be expected to some extent.

Also, are your results better using the native M18x LED display? Are you connected to the HDTV using HDMI or another type of cable? I'm just wondering if the HDTV you are using is causing some performance issues and whether they may not exist using the laptop display.

 

Yeah sorry about that, should just be patient.

No caps seem to work because of the naming of the file for the mod, and my HDTV gives that same performance as the native screen when Im on 60z.

But because I have the "maximum immersion" mod you have to rename the file to make it work, so I guess thats out of the picture. But I seem pretty happy with the performance of just one GPU. Even though I dont get above 40 even looking up, its feels smoother than when Im on CFX getting 50+, not sure why. But I like it.
Thanks.

 

So is this just for the 6990m? or am i going to have to do something similar for my 7970m?

 

Nobody knows what (if anything) you and others are going to have to do to make the 7970M work properly at this point in time. Hopefully, you'll need to do nothing except wait for a short time for AMD to get their act together on the drivers. I think this may be a simple case of getting the cart in front of the horse and rushing a product to market that wasn't ready to be released.

I would like to think (and hope) that all the end user tweaks and work-arounds that were sometimes necessary on the 6900M series will no longer be required with the 7970M. With 6970M/6990M the cliché "your mileage may vary" was a bit of an understatement. The end user experience was the most inconsistent I have ever seen after many years of being a satisfied ATI user. Some of the tips and tweaks in this tread may not work on the 7970M the same as they did for 6970M/6990M, at least not until fully functioning drivers are released.

 

can anyone tell me why my catalyst control panel says that xfire is enabled, but Gpu-z says it is disabled? I currently have the latest AMD driver 12.6, it is the correct mobile driver, I am running 6990's on my m18x.

EDIT: nevermind i updated gpu-z now it works

 

Noob question, but bare with me: can I install dell latest driver and still install a newer version of CAP, like 12.7 cap2 ?!?

 

Yes, there's no problem doing that alcaloide. Unless something has recently changed with CAP compatibility it should work fine. I used to do that all the time with 6970M and 6990M and it never hurt anything.

 

Thanks again. I will try.

 

Quick question, and sorry for my ignorance. I just updated tot he most recent driver for my 6990m Crossfire (8.982.0.0), but the only Cap I can find is here Its the 12. CAP 3. Is this the most recent CAP profile, and is it compatible with Mobility Drivers. I can't find a specific download for laptop CAP profiles.

Thanks so much!

 

Anyone?

 

The answer to your question is already posted just a few spaces up (post # 283) before you asked. Did you read the thread before asking?

You can use any AMD CAP file... they are not driver dependent.

 

Recently when I am playing DiRT the screen goes white and the game crashes. The same does not happen when I am playing Skyrim. What can be the cause of this ?

I am running 6990m in Crossfire on 12.8 WHQL

 

so i thought about time i ask.. i am currently still using 8.851.20 driver version. first page is 8.9 and i tried that seems to have issues and works only if its with Bios version A05. i use potplayer and 1/5 from bottom of the screen when playing video would show somewhat a "cut" line so i end up sticking with the old driver. but my main question is the difference between 12.8 and 11.8, or none at all.

ive tested it after install windows i install 8.8 and graphics card get recognized and works, but then i proceed to install 11.8 but after i install it does not ask or prompt me to restart makes me think its a wrong install.. so i have no idea what they are. does someone know? please explain im confused

 

so.. does anyone knows about difference between 12.8 and 11.8

 

Isn't Catalyst 11.8 close to a year old now? Catalyst 12.8 was just recently released. Are you trying to install 12.8 over 11.8 without doing a clean driver installation?

 

@unitoyle
8.5 & 8.9xx etc are the driver branch families. The other number, 11.8, is the date they were released. 2011, August. But this has nothing to do with the actual driver branch. The most recent WHQL driver has the driver branch 8.982.0 and is called 12.8, because it was the WHQL for August 2012. --> Link AMD Catalyst 12.8 (8.982.0 July 27) AMD Official WHQL - Guru3D.com Forums

 

ah that make sense. thanks for help guys, i didnt install one over the other, i simply tried both of them with fresh windows and 8.9 didnt work so well for me. my pot player would show weird distinct lines where it kind of disconnect when playing 10 bit HD videos. so i ended up sticking with original one not the one i got from this thread.

AMD really has some driver issues..

 

Wondering if anyone here are able to play SWTOR with Crossfire enabled and not get map flickering?

After patch 1.4 of SWTOR I ended up getting serious flickering of the mini-map and main map. Disabling X-fire solved this. I tried disabling various options in the in-game settings, but none actually seemed to have any effect on the map. In fact, I compare this to the issues I had with Skyrims map back in Dec of last year (then AMD / Dell provided an update if memory serves correct).

I've tried every different version of the 12.x driverset, except for 12.1.

 

i did get some flickiering with crossfire on when my laptop used to work. That was 1 month ago. I was thinking of selling this one and gettting a refurbished one from the dell website. I wasn't sure if get nvidia or ati though.

 

does the latest amd driver work, 12.10? im still using 11.8 lol

 

Im using 12.10 with AMD 6990M Crossfire. And its working great so far. BF3, MW3, Killing Floor, Painkiller (2012 release) and a few others. However RAGE still runs at 20 frames unless I disable crossfire, then it shoots to 60. However I'm not experienced with setting up profiles works or not as that's why I'm here on this thread. I just downloaded Radeon Pro. Gonna see whats up.

 

anyone using AMD latest beta for 6990 crossfire? any issues or running smoothly?

 

I'm using 13.1 and have been for awhile. No problems at all, in fact I've never had a problem with this machine. I do remember having problems with AMD cards many years ago on my desktop however and never bought an AMD card again.

 

alright i will try it out, thanks man