Calling out to Alienware Support Where are our Official AMD 7970m Crossfire drivers ??

[huso7]

Yeah, I looked into the AMD website, and they are recommending the update to the 12.6. I'll have to run the sweeper through and do it properly if I decide to go through with it!

Thanks again

[Mr. Fox]

I have to agree, DumbDumb. If I were in a position that involved customer service, people demanding things and having an attitude would be the last ones I would want to go out of my way to help. I'd only want do the bare minimum for them. But, Dell/Alienware reps are pretty tough, and especially the Level 2 and Level 3 reps. They really know what they are doing and they care about the product and the customer. They do a better job with angry people than I think the average person would do.

Back on the subject at hand, here is another really strange thing that happens. It's not very frequent. This started from the first day I installed these video cards. I thought doing a clean Windows install would cure it, but it did not. I see this about once every 3 or 4 days at the most... perhaps longer, maybe 1 out of 50 times I have restarted my system. Among all the serious problems I had with 6970M and 6990M video cards, this was never one of them. It's not serious, it's just strange.

I have Device Manager open to show that the drivers are installed and the GPUs don't have any trouble codes. The one with the red X simply appears without anything that I can identify that triggers it. After that error appears, if I try to manually launch CCC I see the other one with the exclamation point in the yellow triangle. Restarting always corrects it, and I have seen it with 12.5 beta, 12.6 beta, 12.6 WHQL and 12.7 beta. This is one of the reasons I think the issues are still related to buggy drivers and not a hardware problem.

[Insane_Beast]

hey bro, look this kind of attitude is fine if you dont want to get any where..
I mean demanding on a forum that you get some thing free/cheap or discounted is not the best way to get any thing resolved..
To me its just not appropriate.. and you will never get a reply form one of them this way..
why dont you try pming one of the reps and politely explaining your situation..
it might help a tad bit better than going off on here..and losing your cool..

We obviously have different standards for how a company treats us as a customer. Alienware's customer support told me
it would be AT LEAST a full month before I saw a replacement laptop, to me THAT is ridiculous!

So yes I do expect a certain level of satisfaction when purchasing such an expensive piece of hardware.

[ichime]

I hope this new driver release schedule results in more responsive driver support. The reason they went that direction anyways is so that they won't have to deal with Microsoft's WHQL certification process, which, according to AMD takes time and resources.

That being said, 12.7 installed with no issues. Haven't tried OCing both cards simultaneously due to power adapter constraints, but it overclocks nicely.

Also, I'm sure most will be switching over to 680M SLi once it comes out since the new Kepler cards seem to be doing better than AMD's equivalents in both Vantage and 3d11.

[Arestavo]

I hope this new driver release schedule results in more responsive driver support. The reason they went that direction anyways is so that they won't have to deal with Microsoft's WHQL certification process, which, according to AMD takes time and resources.

Also, I'm sure most will be switching over to 680M SLi once it comes out since the new Kepler cards seem to be doing better than AMD's equivalents in both Vantage and 3d11.

Comparing Hackness's 6074 in 3Dmark11 with his OCed 680M, with just one 7970 OCed I get over 6600. Other folks luckier than I with better OCers have gone past 7K.

Not that I don't love Nvidia, because I am more green than red by far as evidenced by my Tri-SLI GTX 580 Classified desktop (used to be quad-SLI).

This debate will go back and forth, but they are both VERY close to each other in the grand scheme of things. Which is actually good, or Nvidia/AMD would charge whatever they felt like charging and never lower prices. (looking at Nvidia's mobile offering)

[juliant]

I can say that I have wonderful experience with Dell support team. Probably they are 'over-doing' it!

I had 3 systems changed already and this last one I have noticed that it does not have the extreme sticker (which is not a big deal) + there is a small area where the paint has come off (on the bottom case / left side).

As I said, already 3 systems replaced; so I called them and told them about the paint issues (there are no scratches / dents, nothing, it just looks like it was not painted properly there) and about the sticker. I said, please send me the part and I will replace it myself. They refused! They said that the system is to new and they do not want to meddle with it and they will send me a replacement?! This was discussed with them yesterday afternoon and today my system is in production already.

Before I could not order a new system unless I returned this one, got the refund and then placed a new order. This time the guy told me that as soon as I receive the replacement and I am ok with it, I can return the old one back to Dell. I said, you guys prefer to have so much of loss and expense when you could have just sent me that part and solved the issue... I do not mind, it looks like I am getting every few weeks new system until I will be perfectly happy

The only problem I am facing is with the corsair memory, but I am returning it and getting the kingston hyperx which is very stable.

Otherwise the GPU's I have, work perfect so, I have to focus very much on this when I will receive the new system and make sure it works perfect otherwise I may swap those in (ofcourse I will call dell and ask them first)...

[Mr. Fox]

Out of all the drivers, I do think 12.7 beta is working best. It installs for me without any issues as well. WHQL certification is a real pain from the things I have heard about it... I've heard rumors that is why NVIDIA drivers are mostly beta releases as well. I don't blame them a bit... if I were running either company, wasting financial and personnel resources only to get something labeled as "WHQL" would be most unattractive.

[Zero989]

Out of all the drivers, I do think 12.7 beta is working best. It installs for me without any issues as well. WHQL certification is a real pain from the things I have heard about it... I've heard rumors that is why NVIDIA drivers are mostly beta releases as well. I don't blame them a bit... if I were running either company, wasting financial and personnel resources only to get something labeled as "WHQL" would be most unattractive.

Well the WHQL isn't such a bad thing. The last 2 beta drivers from nVIDIA are actually bad. People are getting crashes in various games and there are some stuttering issues. It's not just AMD that's having bad drivers these past few months.

The WHQL driver doesn't have these issues. There's a thread dedicated to Alienware 680 SLI (desktop) users that are having all these issues.


I've had some crashes myself. Neither company is perfect this year...

[Mr. Fox]

I know that WHQL certification exists to ensure only good drivers get approved. It's just unfortunate that it is a pain and an overly burdensome expense if those things are true. I think it is good for consumers that WHQL certification is in place. Both companies should focus on releasing two or three, maybe four, good drivers a year with WHQL certification and just stop with the beta thing. I think we (consumers) drive that by being too OCD about things. At the first sign of an error some people just about have a brain hemorrhage. Most things improve over time and being impatient doesn't speed up the process. I think we are seeing a great example of what speeding up the process too much looks like with 7970M CrossFire.

[DumbDumb]

I have to agree, DumbDumb. If I were in a position that involved customer service, people demanding things and having an attitude would be the last ones I would want to go out of my way to help. I'd only want do the bare minimum for them. But, Dell/Alienware reps are pretty tough, and especially the Level 2 and Level 3 reps. They really know what they are doing and they care about the product and the customer. They do a better job with angry people than I think the average person would do.

Back on the subject at hand, here is another really strange thing that happens. It's not very frequent. This started from the first day I installed these video cards. I thought doing a clean Windows install would cure it, but it did not. I see this about once every 3 or 4 days at the most... perhaps longer, maybe 1 out of 50 times I have restarted my system. Among all the serious problems I had with 6970M and 6990M video cards, this was never one of them. It's not serious, it's just strange.

I have Device Manager open to show that the drivers are installed and the GPUs don't have any trouble codes. The one with the red X simply appears without anything that I can identify that triggers it. After that error appears, if I try to manually launch CCC I see the other one with the exclamation point in the yellow triangle. Restarting always corrects it, and I have seen it with 12.5 beta, 12.6 beta, 12.6 WHQL and 12.7 beta. This is one of the reasons I think the issues are still related to buggy drivers and not a hardware problem.

yea i have had that happen lol... no amd card detected and your stomach drops for a second lol

We obviously have different standards for how a company treats us as a customer. Alienware's customer support told me
it would be AT LEAST a full month before I saw a replacement laptop, to me THAT is ridiculous!

So yes I do expect a certain level of satisfaction when purchasing such an expensive piece of hardware.

Do not get me wrong.. I will be the first in line to knock on dells door if some thing really goes wrong.. Yes I do feel that the issues with the 7970s are bad..real bad but im not going to put my self on record and offend a rep i may later have to ask for help..

I hold both accountable at the moment.. but what i want to know and maybe a rep can chime in hear.. Does amd build these cards or do they ship you a bunch of little chips and dell puts them together.. or does amd build the cards and ship them to you?