Back in May I upgraded my 4870's in crossfire to a 6970 lightning, and I have been having some issues since then, but I'm not sure if its down to a dodgy card, or driver issues, and wanted to sound them out before I do anything.

I didn't do a clean install, mainly due to laziness on my part, of not wanting to work out how to do a backup and reinstall, especially when I have a few games part way through, so I am assuming that these issues could be down to driver problems. I could do a reinstall now, but I had already decided if I went down that route, I would upgrade to win7 rather than stay with Vista. Obviously, if the problems are down to the card, I dont want to have to buy a new copy of win7 for no reason...

Anyway, the issues (I will get some pictures of this later).

Actual navigation around Vista is fine. No issues with video playback. Only graphical quirk is in Zune Marketplace, which occasionally has the odd line which seems to streak away from album pictures.

In games, the line streaking is much worse, and makes them somewhat unplayable. Dragon Age 2, Witcher 2 and Global Agenda, all have the problem. Not sure if streaking or tearing is the correct term really. I'm about half way through Dragon Age 2, and in the mansion house, the streaks radiate away from the characters and most animated objects, the fireplace for example. Haven't started Witcher 2, but this is the same in the tent at the very start. In game video's are fine however.

Also, in Rift, an odd speckling of pink/purple dots on certain terrain. No big deal, certainly not a game ruiner, was barely noticeable.

No crashes at all however...

As mentioned earlier, I will post some pictures later on, but is this likely to be a duff card, or just driver conflicts due to my laziness?

Sounds like a duff card really, probably the memory.

If the problem is specific to just one or two games than it could be just the drivers. un install the drivers again but this time use driversweeper to remove any registry left overs. Do this is safe mode since the drivers won't be in use, then install the latest drivers again. If that fails, then repeat the process only tis time use an older version but one that supports the card you have.

However, it does sound like a video RAM problems... There some examples in my sticky here if it helps:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=19335176&postcount=4

Used Driversweeper originally when installed, I'll give it another go in safe mode though.

Comparing the problems to the pictures in your thread Admiral Huddy, it's nowhere near as bad as that. When I get home tonight I'll post some pics up, the other bizarre thing is the MSI afterburner software that came with the card also pops up on startup, saying graphics card isn't recognised. This has happened with the drivers that came on the CD with the card, aswell as any ATI drivers I've used since.

Could try backing off a little with the memory clock and or core clock and see if that helps. Sometimes some of these 'factory overclocked' cards are not capable of what they are set to but it doesn't show in quality control but manifests later on. 480 SOC springs to mind, is this the same manufacturer, Msi?

Yea its an MSI card. I don't think however there is anyway to underclock the card, I seem to remember that they were on "stock" levels, and I have never gotten round to really testing it, with the summer/work taking up my time.

Pics:









might be better though

Didn't get a chance to clean up the drivers last night, but any ideas whats going on in those pictures?

I could only see problems in the DA2 screenshot, probably because the pictures are teensy though. In my experience its faulty vram or possibly too high of an overclock.

Will try and put up some bigger pictures later. I can see the speckles on the tent on the Witcher pic, and also lines streaking away from the characters on the DA2 and GA pics though? It's actually a lot worse than the pics show, but print screen didn't seem to pick up as much as was actually showing on screen.

Well, have cleaned in safe mode, installed the drivers listed on the MSI webpage for the graphics card, and its probably worse than before. RMA time?

Have also got a copy of windows 7 coming, and will almost certainly be getting an SSD to accompany it, would it be worth waiting and doing a fresh install and seeing if there is an improvement before going through the RMA process?

New clearer, hopefully, pics -