soxamaca's weird (apparently growing) list of 7970m "fixes"

I've finally solved my only two issues with the NP9170, but the results are repeatable (I think), so these fixes apparently workaround some issues I suspect are with AMD's current drivers (12.7 beta).

1) Random Startup BSOD (display driver timeout).

For whatever reason, I'd been getting a BSOD only when I turned my computer off then on, or when I restarted it. Then, if I chose "Start Windows Normally," everything was completely perfect until I restarted or turned off my computer again, then the same thing happened.

Turned out avira Antivirus was the culprit. I noticed when my computer booted up after selecting "Start Windows Normally," that avira was always turned off. Not sure how or why, but it was. So I uninstalled it and currently have another AV installed - no more BSOD on startup.

2) Fix for Diablo 3's (and possibly other games') microstuttering:
Some of you may not have this problem or this may not work for you, but it's worth a try:

Steps:
1) open CCC (Catalyst Control Center for those even less familiar with AMD than I am) to 3D application settings and make sure Triple Buffering is enabled. By default, at least on my machine, it was not.

2) here's the weird part. After you click apply, you can't close CCC; it can only be minimized, or the microstuttering comes back. The difference is night and day - you can toggle Triple Buffering on and off to see the difference.

I might just be an AMD noob, but it doesn't seem like closing CCC should disable any settings - so it's either a driver issue currently, or a stupid design on AMD's part.

Neither of these fixes actually make sense to me, but they work like voodoo, so it's good enough for me =p.

 

After reading every thread containing problems with drivers or the actual card itself, it will be nvidia gtx680m for me this year. Just waiting for P370Em to hit MySN.

I have NEVER had problems with my 6990m. I think the 7970 launch is a big failure this year, they shouldnt have introduced Enduro in such a beta stage. They should have stuck with a pure dedicated GPU build and everything would have been fine.

Well, I am really sorry for all you guys having problems with your new machines. I hope a driver comes out that fixes all of them, I know how frustrating it is when something is not working right out of the box.