• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Crossfire - is it working?

Associate
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
Finished building my new rig (as in signature) but I'm not sure Crossfire is working :confused:

I've checked the check box in CCC 6.2 to enable Crossfire, but 3DMark 05 gives me a score of a little under 12,000. Frankly I was expecting better! I've not overclocked anything manually yet as I want to know stock speeds first. The CCC image quality settings are all set to application control where available and high quality everywhere else, and Vsync always on (I was getting nasty horizontal tears without it when playing X3 Reunion) but I'm assuming 3DMark ignores those settings anyway?

Another thing I've noticed is there is a green led on the visible edge of the X1900 Crossfire master card, just under the fan, which is lit when the computer is running, but there are no leds lit on the XTX card. Except that on power up, a red led right next to the power connector on the XTX card lights briefly and then stays off.

The Crossfire master card is the only card listed anywhere in the CCC panel.

Anyone know if this any of this is normal?
 
Caporegime
Joined
26 Aug 2003
Posts
37,491
Location
Leafy Cheshire
I'd say that its either not working, or you have a major driver issue somewhere. I get 13K~ with two 7800GT 512MB cards in SLI.

Your X1900's should be battering my 7800GT's into next week.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
That's what I thought :(

Further info: Device manager lists the following under display adapters:

Radeon X1900 Crossfire Edition
Radeon X1900 Crossfire Edition Secondary
Radeon X1900 Series
Radeon X1900 Series Secondary
 
Last edited:
Caporegime
Joined
8 Jul 2003
Posts
30,062
Location
In a house
I htink both cards should be listed, one as a master, and one as a slave, is there no options in the BIOS of that board to enable Crossfire, and have you tried re-installing the 6.2's, got the cards in the correct slots etc...

Seem to be there in Device Manager, doesn't the Asus have a little card between the slots that needs to turned over or something.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
I cant find anything in the bios about enabling crossfire, other than putting the master in the blue slot and the slave in the black - which I've done. The fan is spinning on both cards and spinning at the reduced speed you get after the drivers load so there must be at least some power to the card.

Also, I'm not aware of any card that needs turning over. There's no mention in the m/board manual.

It may be a driver issue but I'm more worried by the fact there's no led lit on the slave card. That to me says it aint working :(
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
Should I be able to just remove the dongle and plug the monitor dvi cable directly into the slave card in its current slot, or should I remove the master card and put the other card in the pcie where the master was?
 
Caporegime
Joined
8 Jul 2003
Posts
30,062
Location
In a house
Id try the slave card in the other slot to see if it works, before i was on about like on the previous board, the A8R, theres a switch card that gets plugged into the other slot when in single card mode, but you won't have that in as you have both cards in, thought it was something plugged between the slots that needed removing or something, sorry for that. :)
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
S'ok. I looked in the manual and according to that, yeah, a single card graphics solution should be in the blue slot.

Anyway, I've now taken out the master and replaced it with the XTX card. It booted into windows and prompted me for drivers... Odd that. Shouldn't the drivers have already been on the system?

So now I know the XTX card works, and there is no green LED near the fan like there is on the master card. This means it's either a driver problem or the 2nd PCIE slot isn't working. Or maybe there's not enough amperes to power them both. Should be though. The fsp700 is ati certified for the x1900, even though according to fsp each of the four 12v rails are 15A max
http://www.fsp-group.com.tw/english/1_product/2_detail.asp?mainid=1&fid=98&proid=462

Stupidly I used the cd that came with the card when it prompted me for drivers so it over wrote the CCC 6.2 with the older version on the cd. Anyway, 3dmark 05 gave me 11025 points with that. That's even lower than the 11700 i got with the master card installed!

Going to uninstall CCC and put on the latest version and bench again. If I get a higher mark than 11025 but a lower mark than 11700 I figure that means crossfire was working in the first place.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
With just the XTX card and 6.2 CCC I get 11304 marks. Guess that means that crossfire was working in the first place LOL. Seems awful low though. Maybe something else isn't set up right or there's a bios setting that needs changing?
 
Caporegime
Joined
26 Aug 2003
Posts
37,491
Location
Leafy Cheshire
I would still suggest crossfire wasn't working, as if it was before you gained a whole 800 marks :eek:

Perhaps 3dmark isn't as good at crossfire as it is at SLI, but I find it hard to believe that its THAT bad.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
8,492
Location
West Coast of Scotland
Interesting to see that you are using a XT master and XTX slave - I'm having similar problems myself, except that I cant overclock both cards at all. I'm just about to try one card at a time and see what happens.

I've got a Sapphire master and MSI slave.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
Ok, so after all that I've now gone back to my original configuration and can only conclude that Crossfire IS working since it's what gives me the highest 3DMark05 score :(

Also, I loaded up X3 Reunion again and noticed that if I look at my dell LCD from the side I can see a faint checkerbox pattern in black areas, which I think is one of the Crossfire modes?

I still believe something isn't quite right though. Either 3DMark05 can't do Crossfire (unlikely, and I think i would have remembered reading about it in one of the reviews) or something in my bios isn't optimal.

@ philstanbridge - what are your default clock speeds reported by CCC on the Overdrive tab? I haven't used ATI cards for yonks so I don't know whether it's reporting 2d speeds when I look in the control centre from the desktop, but mine says:
Graphics processor status - requested 621Mhz/current 500Mhz
Graphics memory status - requested 720Mhz/current 594Mhz
Temp is at 50C
Also, do you have both master and slave cards listed in the drop down box on the overdrive tab? I only have the master listed.
 
Associate
Joined
14 Dec 2005
Posts
181
I have the Concect3d 1900XT-X and the Saphire X1900 CF Edtion and im also having problems.

It also only lists one card in my CCC and thats the CF edtion.

My main problems are the horizontal lines rolling down my screen(ive heard a lot of ppl getting this).

And my other annoying problem is, When i was running just the one card(xtx) i had an option in my CCC called "Moniter Properties 0" where i could change my hue/saturation which i like to do to make my games color more vivid. BUT when i have my 2 cards in and using same CCC version the "Moniter Properties 0" option is missing from my list :/

Do you have that option in your CCC with crossfire daftVader??
 
Caporegime
Joined
8 Jul 2003
Posts
30,062
Location
In a house
Just as i thought, according to this here 11k odd is with 1x x1900 XTX, Crossfire x1900's get over 13.5k.

Change the stars to h e x u s.

Those scores are with the the FX57 to, so you should be higher as you have an FX60 which ive just noticed.

Thinking about it, i get 8.5k with my x1800 XT 512mb at stock on a stock 3500+, but if i had a faster CPU, i could be getting 10k stock, so there is definately something up id say, also when you put the slave card in on its own, and it asked for the drivers, did you reinstall them again to make sure the card deffo works.

Yup, even x1800's in Crossfire get over 12k.
 
Last edited:
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
Vault5ChOnG said:
I have the Concect3d 1900XT-X and the Saphire X1900 CF Edtion and im also having problems.

It also only lists one card in my CCC and thats the CF edtion.

My main problems are the horizontal lines rolling down my screen(ive heard a lot of ppl getting this).

And my other annoying problem is, When i was running just the one card(xtx) i had an option in my CCC called "Moniter Properties 0" where i could change my hue/saturation which i like to do to make my games color more vivid. BUT when i have my 2 cards in and using same CCC version the "Moniter Properties 0" option is missing from my list :/

Do you have that option in your CCC with crossfire daftVader??

Yeah, with both cards in and running (alledgedly) crossfire, I do have a "digital panel properties 3" (no idea why it's 3.. maybe because of all the screwing around installing/uninstalling CCC) where i can adjust hue and saturation. Have you tried uninstalling CCC? I did it from the ATI folder, there's a program called AtiCimUn. Helpfully, it wasn't put on the start menu anywhere! :rolleyes:

I haven't had the problem with scrolling horizontal lines, but is that another of the crossfire calculation modes? The fact that you have those and I can see a checkerboard pattern in dark areas (albeit very faintly) makes me wonder whether there needs to be a way to match each cards individual colour output. Maybe then you wouldn't see the lines and i wouldn't see the checkerboard.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
25 Feb 2006
Posts
171
Location
Bournemouth
:(
LoadsaMoney said:
Theres definately something wrong if your only gettign just over 11k in 05 in Crossfire with 2x x1900's, try 03, and 06. :)

I might try to get hold of '06. Trouble is, what with setting this up and all the download updates for windows and various games I'm rapidly approaching my 2gb ISP limit
 
Associate
Joined
14 Dec 2005
Posts
181
Answer me this please :)

To get a accurate 3dmark score do you need to format then run the program?

When i first got my crossfire i scored 6323 on 3dmark06, i just ran it again there and scored 5789 :/

Hmm thats strange daftVader, wonder why my option is dissapearing, ive uninstalled and reinstalled countless time.
 
Back
Top Bottom