Powercolor ATI Radeon 7870/Official amd drivers locking up pc.

Deathfather · Apr 27, 2013

This is my first time using this website!

I am having a bit of an issue with my dual powercolor radeon 7870s. Whenever I try to install any driver off official amd website, even over a fresh install of win 8 64-bit, The entire screen goes black and I am forced to reset pc 3 times before it will load windows again with previous drivers. It will,however work with the drivers provided to me by powercolor,which are catalyst 12.1. I even uninstalled windows drivers and turned off automatic installation of new hardware via the change settings option under computer/properties.
With no drivers installed I have tried to install powercolors drivers, which were successful, then upgrade via catalyst to 13.4. I Have also tried to install 13.4 by itself with no drivers present, which provides me with a rage-stroke invoking black screen. I have re-installed windows 8 64-bit several times now, due to the amount of hard resets corrupting the OS. This problem does not occur on windows 7 Ultimate x64 , but I do not use windows 7 because it does not manage my processors properly even with all the updates installed and a manual adjustment to the registry. Normally I can troubleshoot a lot of things myself! But, asking the pros is worth it when your rig costs $2000.00! Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope we can get to the bottom of this.

PC Specifications(non detailed):

Processor: AMD fx-8350 Black edition- 8 core cpu

Ram: 16 GB 1800 MHZ

GPU(s): Powercolor Ati Radeon 7870 2 GBx2

HDD/SSD: 2 TB (64mb cache) WD HDD/120 GB Kingston SSD(read write 555+MB)

PSU:750 WATT Corsair

Cooling unit:Corsair Liquid Cooling push/pull airflow

Monitor:24 Inch LED Asus/Connected with HDMI cable.

Motherboard: Asus M5A97 R2.0 AMD 970/SB950 chipset support

Bios: UEFI Bios

photonboy · Apr 27, 2013

Points:

1. Your OS should not be corrupted. Your problem may be elsewhere if so such as RAM issues which may also account for your graphical problems (more at bottom).

2. You should make a BACKUP IMAGE of your C-Drive anyway. Make a backup IMAGE using Windows 8 or better yet Acronis True Image. If you have a WD or Seagate drive get the free version of that software (WD site for WD drives). If you run into issues you can RESTORE the backup. Use a different drive if possible, alternatively a second partition on the Windows drive though if the drive physically dies the backup is gone.

3. I would REMOVE your second card while reinstalling Windows and setting up drivers etc.

4. Try running a BENCHMARK on one card, then physically SWAP it for your second card just to verify both cards are stable on their own. REPEAT this for the second PCIe slot to verify both slots works as well as both cards.

5. Don't install the Powercolor drivers at all if you reinstall Windows. Just use the latest AMD drivers (though there shouldn't be an issue uninstalling them anyway).

DIAGNOSTICS:
*Run MEMTEST: www.memtest.org (major errors show up in a minute or so)

If you get errors this is likely the root of your issue. Errors don't necessarily mean your RAM is defective:
1. Confirm latest BIOS is applied. Update if needed.
2. Confirm DEFAULT CPU and RAM settings (don't overclock either. If you do oveclock the CPU be careful not to overclock the RAM. You may have to adjust the RAM multiplier if you overclock the CPU)
3. If you STILL get errors, test RAM with MEMTEST one stick at a time. Consult your motherboard manual for the correct slot for using a single stick of RAM.

Deathfather · Apr 28, 2013

I did run the tool, it was not a memory issue, thanks to your memtest I was able to conclude that. I simply updated my bios to the newest version, which allowed the MB to allocate power better between the PCIe slots!

Thank you for your reply photonboy, a lot of your information ld me to this simple yet effective solution. I hope I can return the favor someday!

photonboy :

Points:

1. Your OS should not be corrupted. Your problem may be elsewhere if so such as RAM issues which may also account for your graphical problems (more at bottom).

2. You should make a BACKUP IMAGE of your C-Drive anyway. Make a backup IMAGE using Windows 8 or better yet Acronis True Image. If you have a WD or Seagate drive get the free version of that software (WD site for WD drives). If you run into issues you can RESTORE the backup. Use a different drive if possible, alternatively a second partition on the Windows drive though if the drive physically dies the backup is gone.

3. I would REMOVE your second card while reinstalling Windows and setting up drivers etc.

4. Try running a BENCHMARK on one card, then physically SWAP it for your second card just to verify both cards are stable on their own. REPEAT this for the second PCIe slot to verify both slots works as well as both cards.

5. Don't install the Powercolor drivers at all if you reinstall Windows. Just use the latest AMD drivers (though there shouldn't be an issue uninstalling them anyway).

DIAGNOSTICS:
*Run MEMTEST: www.memtest.org (major errors show up in a minute or so)

If you get errors this is likely the root of your issue. Errors don't necessarily mean your RAM is defective:
1. Confirm latest BIOS is applied. Update if needed.
2. Confirm DEFAULT CPU and RAM settings (don't overclock either. If you do oveclock the CPU be careful not to overclock the RAM. You may have to adjust the RAM multiplier if you overclock the CPU)
3. If you STILL get errors, test RAM with MEMTEST one stick at a time. Consult your motherboard manual for the correct slot for using a single stick of RAM.

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