[insid3rkill3r]

I've bought 6950 about 2 months ago and started noticing problems starting somewhere in the past month.

I havent been gaming until recently so i can't really judge how bad it really was but right now as it seems to be random i'm getting annoying BSODs that ONLY occur when crossfire is activated.

I've tried changing Crossfire link, putting my cpu overclock back to default speed, switching ram sticks in different board spots, removing ram stick.

Even tho it can be fine for a while, suddently it just starts out of no where and become pretty much chaotic again.

So the crossfire setup can work for a while as i played BF3 for a couple days and had maybe 3 BSOD which didnt alert me given the beta catalyst 11.10 waas what i was using and that BF3 is still in a beta state but then today **** started to hit the fan to the point i can't even play without having a freaking bluescreen.

Formatting 'seemed' to have temporary fixed this but it came back again...

I tried disabling crossfire and overclocked my first card pretty high and it was completly stable even tho the OC was 1000/1500mhz but trying to overclock with Crossfire activated was a NO-NO today,,, but worked fine days ago.

The problem is just that it seems to be so random that at this point i'm completly clueless on what the problem could be.

The BSODs are obviously ATIkmtag 016

What are the possibilities here? I just want to be guided a little...

Given that it works sometimes and then doesnt... im guessing that the card can't be considered dead.....

Could my Ram have a problem once crossfire is activated?
Could my motherboard be starting to have issue running it?
Could my SSD have some problems with the Atimktag corruption?

I'm just trying to convince myself that the card isnt faulty cause i hope for god's sake that it isnt the case.... as i likely wont be able to get it 'refunded'

My power supply is a brand new HX1050W so power can't be the issue here either.
I,ve also did some memtest and it didnt show any errors and my CPU was stable....

 

[PunkX 1]

Have you tried installing an older video driver?

 

[Ken1649]

If you put the cards back to default clocks and voltage run fine without BSOD, it's the unstable high OC. The Core/Memory has limits, we push it too far, it crashes.

 

[insid3rkill3r]

Even at default clocks they are BSOD appearing when Crossfire is active.

Logging getting into Battlefield 3 can get me a BSOD after a few seconds.
Opening GPU-Z can get me a BSOD
Running Furmark can get me one as while.

Right now it didnt freeze on me but how long will it last...?

What else could cause problems with a crossfire setup?
Ram problem?
SSD?

I Ran with the 6970 bios for like 2 weeks when i first got these and 950/1450 was running perfectly with no issue whatsoever at least nothing nothing comparable to the unstability that ive been facing for a month or so now. But even now i played BF3 for like 3 days with the same overclock and i maybe got 3 BSOD in 2-3 days but yesterday, without an overclock i couldnt do jack ****.

I thought maybe ram was the issue so i tried to play with that but it didnt change anything. ANd right now as i just opened computer after last's night chaostic phase i just ran Furmark without problem, opened gou-z without any issues as well... just need to try Battlefield 3 again and see..... this **** is really confusing....

 

[insid3rkill3r]

See just now... i tested Furmark when i opened my comp for the heck of it;

Furmark ran fine for a minute or so...

I surfed on the net for like 10 minutes, checked a few things and then decided to open MSI afterburner and there;

BSOD 0116

Clocks are at default , MSI does have unlocked OC limit but ULPS is disabled in the registry..... i can't stand that **** anymore.

 

[Ken1649]

Re-flash the cards with original/stock BIOS.

 

[insid3rkill3r]

This has been done already, in fact the current bios is the original one and i have even set the bios switch to the NEVER touched one which is the original bios which i have never touches.

Still crashes.... right now i have removed the crossfire bridge and everything is stable when it comes to running 3d application, i can OC first card to 1000/1500mhz without issue and nothing crashes whatsoever.

Although, i need to add that i've had a problem that has been showing up here and then out of no where.

My computer will do a HARD crash.

NO BSOD, no freeze just completly shutdowns and then booting it back up can be quite a *****.

- The Comp willl shut down
- Then when i attempt to power it up the lights will light up for a second then turn back off right away

- I then try to power it up again and same thing can happen or even it will flash the light up to 3 times until it decides to stop

- I need to press the cmos, turn power supply off and attempt to power it up until it simply wants to.

When i finally get a nice boot, i log into windows and the most obvious sign of a problem is that the Windows time (12h53 for example) is completly off as it's not showing the right time.

I've found on the net that this could very be a problem with the cmos battery but i've changed the cmos battery and this is the first time since i've changed it that it happened again.

So clearly it has to be more than just the cmos battery..... could the motherboard/bios have a problem now?

As i finish this post and then go on to press the POST button.... both screens just decide to go black, forcing to press the reset button

It's like all kinds of problems are currently piled up to the point where i clearly have no idea what to do know anymore.... i just feel like buying a whole new freaking computer.... **** is rediculous.

 

[Ken1649]

All these point to hardware, but If you could reformat and reinstall OS to make sure it is not driver, registry or other corrupted files related.

 

[insid3rkill3r]

I did reformat 2-3 times,,,, and i thought it had fixed the problem as i didnt seem to have issue for a significient amount of time.... but everytime the problem came back when it comes to the BSOD 0116 and the constant instability with the Crossfire mode being activated.

But on top of that there is still the fact that the problem with the hard shutdown is still here and i mean, i don,t know everything about comps but i highly doubt such issue can be related to drivers when it happens when the system doesnt even get to power up for more than 1ms.... it seems like this thing is related to the bios/battery even i did change the battery and it didnt fix it.

 

[Ken1649]

1. Boot each stick of RAM and test with apps that gave you BSOD. Test every stick.

2. Remove the first card and test the second card as primary.

 

[insid3rkill3r]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken1649;15239680
1. Boot each stick of RAM and test with apps that gave you BSOD. Test every stick.

2. Remove the first card and test the second card as primary.

Before i start doing this.... is there any way to test the second as primary without having to switch PCI-E slot? I have them under watercooling so i can't do this unless i completly unmount my watercooling.

 

[Ken1649]

The point of swapping the second card to first PCIe is to know something is wrong with the PCIE slot where the second card occupies or the card itsef has issues. Also, check all power connectors are firmly seated.

If they are watercooled, just remove the bridge, plug the monitor to the second card. Power down while doing this.

Test each stick of DIMM if one of them is faulty.

 

[rdr09]

i read AB may conflict with CCC and cause bsod. try uninstalling it.

 

[insid3rkill3r]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken1649;15239796
The point of swapping the second card to first PCIe is to know something is wrong with the PCIE slot where the second card occupies or the card itsef has issues. Also, check all power connectors are firmly seated.

If they are watercooled, just remove the bridge, plug the monitor to the second card. Power down while doing this.

Test each stick of DIMM if one of them is faulty.

Yeah i know it was the point, i myself wanted to do this but given they are under watercooling, i didnt know if i could find a way to avoid unmounting everything. Thanks for the help.

And i have unistalled AB already so it doesnt seem to be the problem as it wasnt a problem at all when i played BF3 for 3-4 days straight and now suddently everything is back to crashing...

Anyways, be back shortly, gonna run a few tests.... AGAIN. and if it doesnt work ill format again to see if it isnt for like the 4th time a registry issue caused by bad drivers installation even tho i do use driver sweeper everything in Safe mode....

Anyways thx for the help.. brb

 

[insid3rkill3r]

So i went on and removed ram dimm and tested it.

Tried with one, went on and tried Furmark and BF3 and all was working fine
Tried with two, same
Tried with three, same

Right now everything is working just fine with 3 ram sticks.

I am not overclocking or anything, GPU and CPU are at default.
ULPS is disabled and MSI after is not installed either.

Although my comp did get hard crashes out of no where prior to these test so what that did it set my cmos to it's default state.

My current windows time is also wrong and so is my current bios time (they are the same)

Like i said earlier, when i learned that this could be a problem linked to the cmos battery i went on and switched it with my cmos battery that i had with my last motherboard which had never caused me a single issue. they are both cr2032 batteries 1.3v but the problem didnt seem to go away as it's back now and as annoying as ever.

So right now i'm kinda stuck as yes my crossfire is CURRENTLY working but i know that sooner or later either it will go nutz on my ass again or that my comp will just hard crash as it did it 3 times tonight.

I will go buy a brand new battery tonight just to see how it goes.

What i want to test the most tho is to see if i can put my 2nd card as my main one as i did try what you said;

I ungluged my HDMI cable from my main card, plugged it in my second card.
Shutdown my computer
Removed Crossfire bridge
Powered it back up
It then booted into Windows but i had no screen so i didnt get to test it's stability.

 

[Ken1649]

I am not sure on UD3 but on my UD9, the card I plug the monitor to will be as primary rendering and don't have to change anything in BIOS.

It is possible to remove the primary card from its slot (unplug PCIe power too) without having to take the loop down?

After CMOS reset, do not forget to go into BIOS to load "Optimized Defaults".