Second GPU (HD 7970) in Crossfire setup, suddenly stopped working/no longer detected?!

Ok, so firstly, my complete setup is in my sig "My Rig"

2x MSI reference HD 7970's with flashed GE Bios.

So the issue began just a few minutes ago. I booted the rig for some modded Crysis time. I finished installing a new custom config and a few other things. That aside, I then proceeded to fire up the game, but before I did that, I gave the cards a very slight bump to 1100 on the core (up from 1050 default clocks), and then I started the game.

Upon loading the level, I immediately noticed some of the textures were not loading properly and poor performance overall. Also, the textures around the weapon/hands were flickering. I figured I loaded the mod incorrectly, and right as I'm about to exit the game, my PC locks up/crashes to a black screen with the game audio still playing in the background. It was completely unresponsive at this point so I was forced to do a hard reset.

Now here is where it gets interesting. Upon booting up to desktop and checking after burner, I noticed that my second GPU is not being listed, no temp info, no fan speed, etc.

So I head over to CCC panel looking for the crossfire option to see what was going on, and the second GPU is no being detected there either, in fact, there is no longer an option for crossfireX. I go to device manager and display adapters and it's the same thing; second GPU not there. It's as if no card is even installed in the PCI slot.

I uninstalled the driver (12.11b) and re-installed it hoping that would resolve the issue, but the problem persists.

What might be going on here? Right now, I plan to remove the cards and test the second GPU alone to see if it gets recognized by the system, but if it does not, could this actually mean that the GPU died?

I would be amazed if that were the case as I never applied any super aggressive voltage increases during overclocking, and my temps were always below 70c on that card.

I've had the card since launch back in January, and I paid a premium price for it at the time, so I would be upset if it's actually dead. I'm really hoping that's not the case.


Any suggestions/help would be greatly appreciated.
Edited by ELCID777 - 11/7/12 at 5:39pm

Thanks for the quick response. I tested out the second GPU alone and it's working just fine. And you were right, it was a bad crossfire bridge causing the problems. Luckily I found a spare bridge and all is well now.

Thanks again.