MSI 7970 LIGHTNING's - Microstutter & Tearing - Anyone else have this?

[Malachor]

Hi All,

I've been experiencing microstutter/flickering since building my new machine some 5 months ago. I have 2 x MSI
7970 Lightning’s in Crossfire on a Rampage IV Extreme mobo (BIOS 4004) with 2 x Iiyama Prolite 24" 1920 x 1080 (60hz) Monitors. It is most prevalent when browsing. There will be a flicker/tearing towards the top of the screen, then the bottom and it will occur completely randomly. This also occurs in games (Skyrim, Diablo 3 etc). It does NOT occur during benchmarks however (Heaven, Kombustor etc), which is the strangest thing. Here's what I have & haven't tried so far to resolve this:

What I have tried:

1) Doing a full system rebuild 3 times: SSD Secure Erase. Clean OS install, all Microsoft Patches, latest
motherboard chipset drivers from ASUS Website and latest AMD 13.6 BETA Drivers (no CAP) installed - makes no
difference.
2) Setting CCC "Wait for vertical refresh" to "always on" and "always of" - makes no difference.
3) Setting refresh rate in CCC to 59hz/60hz (only options available at 1920 x 1080, but it will allow 75hz at
lower res; and changing to this seems to make the issue occur much less, but looks terrible) - makes no
difference.
4) Using MSI Afterburner s/w to limit frame rate to 60fps on a global system scale - makes no difference.
5) Disabling/Enabling ULPS using a 3rd-party tool to make the registry changes for me (reboots in between) -
makes no difference.
6) Disabling and re-enabling crossfire - makes no difference.
7) Disabling crossfire and running one card by itself - it still occurs but less than usual (it does this with
BOTH master and slave card) - makes no difference.
😎 RMA the cards to be tested by supplier. Both returned as "no fault found" and passed benchmarks.
9) Changed the connections from 2 x DVI-I (this is all the card supports) to 1 x DVI-I & 1 x DP (with adapter),
2 x DP (with adapters), 1 x DVI-I & 1 x HDMI (with adapter) - makes no difference
10) Swapped DVI cables for new ones - makes no difference

What I have not tried:

1) Flashing the cards BIOS using MSI Live Update 5 - this was going to be my next step but I'm very wary of
doing this because MSI support has been diabolical (their technicians can't even construct a legible sentence and have the computer knowledge of a house brick)
2) Setting manual clock speeds in the catalyst 'profile' file held in c:\Users\[profile
name]\appdata\local\ATI\ACE\Profiles (as apparently the flickering may be caused by the memory clocks adjusting
constantly)

I was wondering if anyone has any ideas or has experienced similar issues? Ideally I'd like to try and resolve
this before flashing the card, but if I can't then I have no choice. I appreciate your time and feedback all 🙂

Many thanks

Malachor.

[HiVizMan]

I have the same cards as you do. So lets see if we can problem solve.

Power down your system and use the PCIe toggles on your motherboard disable all but the primary PCIe slot. I want to see if your system has the same symptoms if you use one card only. If yes we can remove Crossfire as a cause.

[Malachor]

Thanks very much for the prompt response 🙂

I'm currently in work, but once I get home, I will do as you suggest and report back right away.

[HiVizMan]

Cheers mate have subscribed so when you reply I will get an email and can check in. We are both in the UK so time lines will not be an issue.

[Malachor]

Ok, I'm home, but I've been cursing the electrics in my house. Had 3 power cuts in a row, and EACH has occurred whilst I've been attempting to write a response in this forum ><

Anyway, thought I'd provide an update (fingers crossed I don't get another power cut) in that I thought I'd try something before troubleshooting; and I'm so very glad I did.

I disabled hardware acceleration in Firefox and the flickering has subsided by about 75% and is hardly noticeable (apart from some minor text blur when scrolling up/down a page). That being said, I tested the same URL's where the issue was most prevalent in IE10 and there's no issues at all. Everything runs butter smooth.

Maybe this is a good indicator as to the root issue?

[HiVizMan]

Ok the good news is that the signs are that it is more driver/software than hardware alone.

If you go to sites with high flash content what is the visual like versus sites with no flash content?

[Malachor]

Well that's uncanny. I just returned to this page having run the 1080p trailer for Pacific Rim in both IE10 and Firefox (one on each screen) at the same time and both run flawlessly. It's looking better :rolleyes:

[HiVizMan]

LOL Lets just hope that the good news continues.

[Malachor]

Thank you for offering to assist me with the troubleshooting. I really appreciate it. If I have any related issues ill post here 🙂

[HiVizMan]

All good my friend like I said I am subscribed.