Radeon HD 7970 DC2 TOP - Issues

[stitch]

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to post my experiences with my first iteration of this card just so that others were aware of some signs that they may have a defective card.

Windows 8:
Yes, I know this card doesn't even have preview drivers yet, but oddly it worked best under Windows 8. The issues I encountered were limited to random BSOD after the system sat idle for long periods of time (even with power saving features turned off like turning of the monitors and sleep). It seemed to run games just fine. The only odd-ball thing I noticed off the hop was the factory set clock when I opened up Overdrive was the 3D clock was set to 600 MHz. Even after that things were okay except for the random BSOD.

Windows 7:
This is where things went south fast. Running a game like Battlefield 3 or Mass Effect 3 at 1 GHz (factory overclock) resulted in a crash (3 screens, 1 different colour per screen) as soon as the GPU's 3D clock kicked in and the game was going to go full screen. I checked voltages, I checked card temperatures, everything seemed okay (except for the well documented VRM issue) with the card. My system voltages are stable, temperatures are nice and cool (my CPU generally only hits 40c if it is really hot in the room.) I disconnected devices, tried with only one monitor, no banana. So I downclocked the GPU to 925 MHz. Battlefield 3 now loads as does Mass Effect 3. Battlefield 3 does crash after 15-20 minutes with a black screen crash, but I was expecting that to no doubt be another issue un-related to the card itself.

So what am I doing? I'm taking it back to the place of purchase and praying that they have a newer revision of the card with the VRM cutout on the backplate and will see if the store will test it before I take it home.

[Spoony]

right for starters the monitor apple ones have issues thats for sure, a friend of mine has sort of the same set up and his pc crashes or graphics clitchs the lot during game play of video.

also yes your correct on the downclocking thats an issues witht he card we all have. driver 12.6 ive not had to downclokc it as of yet in 2 weeks since install so if your are not using it try it.

also tweek down your CPU just a touch, i had to put mine down from 4.5 to 4.4 and all things have been better.

also and this is to anybody else aswell reading this, ffs DONT use afterburn or Asus GPU tweek. is screws things up and never works right.

[Tennobanzai]

Spoony wrote:
right for starters the monitor apple ones have issues thats for sure, a friend of mine has sort of the same set up and his pc crashes or graphics clitchs the lot during game play of video.

also yes your correct on the downclocking thats an issues witht he card we all have. driver 12.6 ive not had to downclokc it as of yet in 2 weeks since install so if your are not using it try it.

also tweek down your CPU just a touch, i had to put mine down from 4.5 to 4.4 and all things have been better.

also and this is to anybody else aswell reading this, ffs DONT use afterburn or Asus GPU tweek. is screws things up and never works right.

I will give my other monitor a try and see if it's a problem with the DP adapter i'm using or the actual DP output. I read that the DVI-D is very picky with cables and that might be the case with the DP.

I've ran my CPU at stock settings with no luck, but that was when I was on my i5 2500k, I guess it won't hurt trying lower clocks on my 3570k

[stitch]

I thought I was mostly clear of issues with this card with the 12.6 beta drivers... It randomly colourful line crashes *sometimes* now, not every time I load a 3D game. Photoshop Lightroom 4, Photoshop CS6 and a browser triggered it last time (they were open for hours then BAM. Diablo 3 has caused it once in the last few weeks. I'm pretty sure the card wants to crash regularly though, if I have music or a video playing the system will suddenly stutter as if it is going to crash, then continue on as if nothing happened. I didn't have any issues with my 6850 installed.

I'll try updating to the latest BIOS for my board and see if that helps this evening.

[Spoony]

Asus have gone on as if nothing has everhappened withthe problems with this card.

im considering taking further action once ive finished moving as its just getting out of hand now and im sick of it not working right.

[Sarg_Scorpio]

I would be happy to also take further action against ASUS

[Spoony]

6 Points to this

the card DOES NOT do what it says on the box
the support from Asus its well i cant say it as i would get banned but its less than poor
ive paid money for something ive not got and doesnt work correctly
ive bought extra monitors for 6 screen eyefinity and cant use them so money wasted again.
MarshallR@Asus is the only one helping and its not his job or anything to do with him but thatnks anyway.
im pissed off and want to rage propperly at a person but cant and dont know who.

[MrCanadianRyan]

So ASUS responded to my original support requests and didn't even bother to troubleshoot based on all of the details i provided. They just gave me an RMA number. I guess they know what could have caused that issue. Just waiting now for the replacement.

[Tennobanzai]

Update on my issues. I tried a different monitor since my Apple monitor only has mDP. Didn't work with DVI at 1080. Still crashes randomly in 3D apps/games at stock 1000mhz

MrCanadianRyan wrote:
So ASUS responded to my original support requests and didn't even bother to troubleshoot based on all of the details i provided. They just gave me an RMA number. I guess they know what could have caused that issue. Just waiting now for the replacement.

Make sure they don't send you back the same exact card. They did this to me and it didn't fix that problem

[Sarg_Scorpio]

Spoony wrote:
6 Points to this

the card DOES NOT do what it says on the box
the support from Asus its well i cant say it as i would get banned but its less than poor
ive paid money for something ive not got and doesnt work correctly
ive bought extra monitors for 6 screen eyefinity and cant use them so money wasted again.
MarshallR@Asus is the only one helping and its not his job or anything to do with him but thatnks anyway.
im pissed off and want to rage propperly at a person but cant and dont know who.

This is the a joke. Sent messages here. on ROG Facebook page, ROG Youtube page... and the ROG Forums and no answer what so ever.. ASUS just keeps ignoreing everyone and this forum is becoming a joke.. So this is the RoG forum for ASUS which NOONE at ASUS even looks at or cares about if theres a huge amount of customers getting upset. To be honest i thought that by now someone at ASUS HQ would have been notified and something would be done. Legal action is looking better and better at this rate

[psyside]

Sarg_Scorpio wrote:
This is the a joke. Sent messages here. on ROG Facebook page, ROG Youtube page... and the ROG Forums and no answer what so ever.. ASUS just keeps ignoreing everyone and this forum is becoming a joke.. So this is the RoG forum for ASUS which NOONE at ASUS even looks at or cares about if theres a huge amount of customers getting upset. To be honest i thought that by now someone at ASUS HQ would have been notified and something would be done. Legal action is looking better and better at this rate

I comment about DC cards being voltage locked on the most recent Asus video on their channel about DC cards.

But no one answered till now, i just put it as a warning, its such a shame because i think this cards would the best on the market if there was no issues 😞

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8inXR-LqPNc

Here is the link, thumb up my comment so everyone will know about the issues of 7970 DC cards, and hopefully Asus will react as it should!