***M18x - AMD Crossfire (Driver Questions, Performance, Problems) Discussion Thread***

I always cc clean and driver sweep in safe mode before a new driver install I'll try the beta 8.

 

Hi,

Not posted here for a long time and don't know if this is the appropriate thread to ask but I am having a few problems, allow me to explain:

My M18x R2 used to have a pair of AMD 7970M's installed, prior to my upgrade to a 780M GTX. Although slower than the 780 I had no real problems with the 7970's - or at least that was until I sold them to a friend of mine who owns a M18x R1!

Having found little difficulty in upgrading my M18x R2 I couldn't see why there should be any problem fitting a 7970M crossfire setup to a R1, or so I thought!

Upon fitting the 7970M's to the R1 I have so far being unable to get the computer to properly acknowledge the second GPU. I have tried the latest drivers from amd and all I get from the device manager is one card (primary) working properly and a Code 12 error on the second card. Thinking that I had caused damage to the graphics card in the move I decided to re-install them in my R2 and they both worked perfectly!

I have since tried a pair of 6990M's removed from my girlfriends R1 in my friends R1 and they also worked perfectly. I have tried both crossfire cables to no avail, reseated the cards, the VBIOS' match on both cards.

Strangely enough I also tried my old 7970M's in my girlfriends R1 and encountered exactly the same problem - 1 card ok, 1 card code 12

The only thing I haven't tried yet is downgrading the BIOS from A05 to A04 on the R1

Are the 7970M's in crossfire not compatible with a M18x R1?

I really hope someone can help me out with this issue.

Thanks

Andy

 

Hi Andy. I had zero compatibility issues with 7970M CF on the M18xR1. It worked fine for me using A05. I think something else must be going wrong. Is it the same GPU that has code 12 following from machine to machine? What I mean is, did you try swapping them out as master/slave to see if the malfunction problem follows the GPU to the primary slot. For some reason the 7970M seems very fragile and I am wondering if something did not get buggered up with one GPU after it was removed from your system. I know it worked OK when you put them back into your R2, but there almost has to be a problem with the GPU throwing code 12... unless switching them around the code 12 stays with the secondary PCIe slot instead of following the GPU to the primary slot. If that happens, then it could be a driver problem. If you have the same Windows OS your old AMD registry entries for 7970M CF are probably still there even though you have 780M SLI installed now.

Did you do a complete driver scrub before installing or try a clean Windows installation or your friend's computer or your girlfriend's computer? What about confirming the driver INF has the correct hardware ID for the M18xR1 motherboard? If you simply installed them in place of a different GPU setup and planned to rely upon an existing AMD driver installation with a different GPU this will not work properly. You have to start over from scratch with the drivers if you change to a different GPU. The registry will not be set up properly for the new GPUs.

 

Thanks for the reply. I didn't see the need to switch the cards because as soon as I had established that the R1 would run the 6990's I immediately re-installed the 7970's back in my R2, enabled crossfire and ran furmark.

Once I had established there was nothing wrong with the cards I then went and installed them in my girlfriends R1 and exactly the same problem occurred.

So, if the cards STILL function properly in the R2 and have failed to function properly in both my girlfriends R1 and my friends R1 I drew upon the conclusion that the 7970M is incompatible with the M18x R1.

And yes I did use DDU to fully uninstall the video drivers prior to installation of new drivers.

I suppose one big question is - how/where did you acquire your 7970's? Because I have read that those people with R1's that didn't have problems usually purchased them from Dell as an 'upgrade' for the R1.

I am starting to think that it's more a VBIOS issue than anything else. Would you mind letting me know what VBIOS version is on your cards? Is it a Alienware VBIOS or a Clevo one?

Regards

 

I had Dell/Alienware 7970M cards, not Clevos. But, that was a long time ago now ( May 2012 was when I installed 7970M) and I don't remember what vBIOS version worked out the best. However, I did save some of the vBIOS files I was using.

Here is an assortment I was using, including the stock vBIOS: [ 7970M Dell vBIOS Files ] [ Stock 7970M Dell vBIOS ]

I would still recommend trying them in opposite PCIe slots to find out if the code 12 problem follows the GPU or stays with the same PCIe slot regardless of which GPU is installed in the PCIe slot.

 

So, I assume that, as you have tried the VBIOS' in your reply that they caused no issues for you, apart from maybe stability and speed, in other words you didn't get a Code 12 (device doesn't have enough free resources)

Were you using stock drivers from amd.com as I have tried?

 

Hi all!
Sorry if this here OFF and sorry my english very bad
Yesterday arrived for my new M18xR2,7970M cfx (only for me new )
I testing sometimes 3DMark 11,the result was are not the same.Graphis score: 11800-13400.
The gpu temps was max.70°C GPUz screen missed openCL,and Direct compute5 signal.
I switch graphics,put out HDD and install SSD.Windows install and after drivers.
First time chipset-network-HD graphics,the last time i switch 7970M's,was on again standart graphics adapter on screen after install latest beta CCC.Now again missed the openCL signal when i run GPUz and bad points 3DMark 11 11800 Graphics score.Windows experience 7.9 What am i doing wrong?
Anyone maybe can help me? What is the correct install metod?

 

FIXED!

Solution:

I downgraded VBIOS to 015.017.000.001.042717 - all the ones after it end in 000000 and I incrementally downgraded the VBIOS' one by one with no success (Same Code 12 on second card).

No doubt a little skullduggery at Dell has been at work here!

 

I have been getting a lot of blue screens and artifacts on my screen as i browse. It happens no matter the driver i install. Ive tried 13.8 through 13.11 beta 6 and this thing just doesnt want to stabilize. Am i in need of video card swaps?

Notice in the pic below those white blocks. Sometimes they are black.

 

Yay! Glad that worked for you.

That's definitely not good to be seeing those blocks, and there is a good chance that whatever is causing those artifacts is also causing the BSOD. If you are under warranty, I would open a tech support ticket to get that fixed. Possible one of the GPUs is about to conk out on you.

What is the STOP error or bug check code you are seeing? Same one every time?

 

The error number is usually different, however its always the ATIKMPAG.SYS.

Under warranty until 2017.

 

Try 13.11 b2 and see how you go. Also turn off Hardware acceleration in your browser options.
Also try clean driver installations if you haven't already. Good luck.

 

Hi all!

My 7970M's not same original voltage.First card max.voltage 0,95V,secondary vga 1,00V. If i try flash OEM vbios,the crossfire command
-p 0 xyz.rom after -p 1 xyz,rom?

Thanks for the answer!

 

Just flash them to the same vbios and your done.

atiflash -p 0 romname.rom
atiflash -p 1 romname.rom

Also verify your checksums to be extra safe.

 

Thanks a lot!

 

So little problem I try flash ov 1,075V 900/1300MHz mod vbios,but only secondary vga accepted.First card still 850/1200MHz.
I use this commands: dir,atiflash -i,atiflash -cf,atiflash -p 0 ...rom,atiflash -p 1 ...rom. I saved original vbios before run flash.
Any idea whats wrong?

Thanks!

 

Update: All 2 vbios same,but first card only run 850/1200



Totally don't understand if i turn off crossfire same situation.

 

This is not uncommon. Many 7970M cards refuse to overclock. I don't know why, but you are not the first person to encounter this.

 

Solved. I had reinstall vga driver,AB,need again use -xcl trick and OC working fine,but not working perfect good.I think 7970M's +software metod OC cause many bug.When i run 3DMark 11 was on really nice score but falter and not smooth.I think only good OC,if i use modded vbios.The drivers bug yet there are still... AMD=very strong hardware+ bad drivers forever
So i soon put out this cards, and exchange 780M's

 

I just bought another 7970m for my M18xR2. Can I use the 240 Watt power supply till my 330 Watt gets here?

 

I believe you can, but it might only power it and would limit performance.
I think you will get a BIOS adapter error at boot, implying lower performance. Not sure if the batter will charge during use, but battery should charge when off.

 

Then I might as wait till this coming weekend. Dang it... I was really wanting to see how well two cards would work on BF4. I have not seen any info on how well they do.

 

I can tell you 7970m in CF make light work of BF4

 

Hi all!
Last week I received my Alienware m18x r2 with 7970m crossfire.I have made a clean install of the 13.11 beta driver.The laptop runs ok except a little thing that I find strange.When the crossfire is enabled in idle the first gpu is at 300/150mhz but the second gpu is at full load at 850/1200mhz.That is according to MSI Afterburner.Also the first gpu is at 46-47 degrees and the second is at 65-67.That is at idle and no game is running or something.When I disable the crossfire the second gpu goes to normal like the first one.Is that normal?

 

Hi Guys

Have any of you found a decent driver for BF4? I am so sick of losing sound and crashing as I want to play the game

Cheers

 

13.11 beta mobility 9.5 is working without crashes for me on m18x r1 with crossfire 6990m.

What's the deal with 13.12? The utility download is crap. It keeps giving me an error that I have downloaded the wrong version for my windows, which is win7 64, This makes no sense. Why doesn't amd provide a link to install the full driver package. This is silly.

 

How well does 7970m cf run on max settings BF 4? Also, what drivers are you using?

 

What is the direct link to download AMD Mobility Catalyst 13.12 WHQL driver? Has anyone tested the stability of this newly-released driver?

Thanks for the information.

 

here's the link

Anyone tested this with 6990s?

 

I clean installed both the 13.11 beta and the 13.12.

In both cases the programmes seemed to run fine but neither offered the Reboot option after installation leaving me with the generic drivers. Even when I rebooted manually the drivers were not picked up.

Ended up back to my old ones???

 

I installed this 13.12 version. And restart required....after which the crossfire is off (as gpu-z stated) and the second gpu is "Disabled Adapter". After which I tried restoring the previous 13.11 v9.4 but they don't work as well ...same error....all the way until 13.10 v2 which is working but with very low performance.
I even tried the 9.03 from Dell which worked but same low performance...
NOW....Amd...thx for the mess...and your crappy drivers... look at Nvidia and learn.

 

Man, I hate seeing this. Things were really looking good for AMD drivers for a little while and that was extremely encouraging after such a long spell of really lousy drivers. Now it seems like the driver problems have returned with a vengeance for so many folks. I wonder what has caused AMD to veer so far off course again with their latest driver releases?

 

I have the 13.11 Beta 9.5 drivers installed on my M18xR1 with Dual 6990Ms, and my primary GPU will spin up the fan out of nowhere and just sit there spinning making all kinds of noise for no good reason. I'm pretty sure this started with these drivers. Anyone else experience this?

 

I asked this same question quite some time ago. My R1 has always done this. It did it with my 6990Ms, 7970Ms, and even now with my 680Ms. Do you by any chance use any program to monitor your system's temps, etc.? If so, do you have that program set to auto start with Windows?

 

I believe that was brought on by A05. The M18xR1 had problems with 6990M CrossFire overheating and thermal shutdown. The fans would never kick on when they needed to with the AMD cards. A05 was released to remedy that problem. I noticed the fans acted a lot more spastic with A05 when I still had an R1 motherboard. It affected all systems the same whether they had AMD or NVIDIA cards. It was more pronounced with some drivers than it was with others... not sure why the drivers made a difference, but it did to some extent.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...d-re-dell-aw-conference-call.html#post8030512

If it has been a while since you cleaned out the fans and heat sinks, it might help the fans settle down a little bit.

 

I just did that last night, it had been awhile. I forgot how sensitive my laptop was to dust. I had massive overheating issues due to dirt merely 6 months or so after getting my laptop. Don't game as hardcore now as I did then, so my fans have overall sucked in less dirt. After playing The Walking Dead for a while, both cards seemed to be running at a reasonable temperature (not too hot, because TWD is not very intensive). I'll have to keep an eye on it.

 

Okay. Got my other 7970 installed, so I am now running 2 7970's in crossfire. So far no issues. Running windows 8.

 

How did you fit one, much less two, 7970 inside of your laptop???

Oh, wait, you mean 7970 M. j/k

Two GPUs is almost always twice as nice as one. Congrats on the upgrade.

 

Can someone answer if it's normal my second 7970m to be at full load at idle when the crossfire is enabled?

 

No, it's not normal. But, it's not entirely uncommon. There could be a background process running that is triggering it, which is more likely to occur at idle. If it just started doing this the problem may go away on its own if it is a maintenance task of some sort. If it continues to do this indefinitely you have have a driver glitch or something. It used to be common for AMD cards to sometimes get hung in high-performance 3D mode as well as low-performance 2D mode, but I haven't seen it mentioned for a while. If you have a web browser open (even if you are not actively web browsing) when the system is idle, this can also cause it. If that is the case you may find a browser setting for using hardware acceleration that you can turn off.

 

Thanks for the reply Mr. Fox.I have my Alien since a month and it has been doing it since I have it. I was at 13.11 beta and just made a clean install to 13.12 LeeKM. Now it seems it's working normally at idle.

 

hi . i have 7970m on crossfire M18x r2 and when i play bf4 on ultra fps are from 120 and they go down to 20 is like slow emotion with is unplayable any1 can try help me with this or some1 have same problem in past. I reinstall windows few times.( sorry for english) . Thanks

 

Hello Xavier. Welcome to NBR.

What are your GPU temperatures and clock speeds when the BF4 framerate drops so low? Have you ruled out thermal throttling? It might be something as simple as cleaning out your heat sink radiators and fans.

This is with the AC adapter connected, correct? (I ask because you cannot game running on battery with SLI or CrossFire.)

 

hi, i clean up fans and i always play with charger connected . I also have m17x r4 with single 7970m and is much faster . I have also same cpu in both ,32 gb ram , both on 512 ssd and m18x is just horrible to play bf4 i didnt check temp so far . When i turn game on its fine for 20 sec but after fps droping down from 120 to 20 and then go back fast to 120 and every 10 sec same all the time ... any idea what i should do next please? i spend so much money on this machine's cuz i love them lol but with m18x r2 iam not happy at all atm.

 

It's probably something simple. What are your GPU temperatures when this begins happening?

How about other games, 3DMark11 or Vantage benchmarks? Does it have the same behavior in all games and GPU benchmarks, or only BF4 acts this way?

 

benchamark i think is fine have a look . i test bf4 and metro last night and is same issue with fps . temperatures will check now and i let u know. Thank you

 

Your Fire Strike score is way too low also. It should be over 8000. See these other examples.

You need to be aware of your GPU temperatures and GPU clock speeds when this problem is occurring to have a better understanding about what might be causing it.. It looks like your CPU is performing correctly.

See the link below. This will not work for BF4 or 3DMark11 since they are 64-bit, but you can use other games and benchmarks that are 32-bit (or the 32-bit version of 3DMark11) to see what is happening in realtime.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...mperatures-game-benchmark-screen-display.html

 

so that's mean i can have faulty gpu ?? i still have dell warranty on .

 

i remove all fans and clean them up . fit everything back . reboot . start 3dmark 11 again and result are :
FIRE STRIKE 1.1 - 7083
CLOUD GATE 1.1 - 19081
ICE STORM 1.2 - 131008
will check the game now

 

i done again 3dmark at is much lower again....
fire strike: 4911
cloudgate : 15456
ice storm : 113331
have no clue what to do next