FoxHunter39

Ok, a week ago I desided to jump with both feet into crossfire, and like many others, problems came with that To start I should probably tell you my specs...

PSU: 700w Xclio Greatpower 12v x4 rails(each at 18 amps)
Motherboard: A8R-MVP /w 2 gb kingston hyper X
CPU: FX-53 (939 and not over clocked)
HDD: WD 250gb sata 2

and the 2 cards which I am trying to Xfire the master card X1800XT by 3DConnect, and the slave card X1800XT by ASUS(EAX1800XT)

Rather than explain the specs abut the cards here are the links

Asus card: http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1...15&modelmenu=1

3D Connect:
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=C3D-1800CF

On to the situation. I have done the usual with my board in preperation for installing xfire. First, I uninstalled the Catalyst drivers for the card that I had in there by itself(Asus EAX1800XT) and did driver cleaner pro. After all drivers where removed I took out the asus card and installed the 3dconnect master card into the blue slot, then I moved the asus slave card to the black slot. I connected the 6 pin power connecters that where made for pcie(from my PSU which is SLI comp.) Then I connected the dongle as instructed I connected it to the master through the interconnecter plug and then connected the longer piece with the male DVI connceter to the slave card. Once I booted up all was fine and I installed the 6.6 drivers(both video cards were detected) After a restart I adjusted the CCC panel to advanced and went to crossfire. However, once I was in the xfire screen the "Enable Crossfire " was greyed out! I read the box underneath and noted that the dongle might connect to the other DVi port, so I changed it to the other. Again! There it was still greyed out. I tryed several other methods to get it to work. Including going to bios and changing the xfire setting to dual video card thinking it didnt reconize it on auto. After awhile I just called ati and they didn't have a solution othere then asking if my slave was REALLY compatible! I told them it was since it said in the manual for the card that it was crossfire comp. and on the Asus website!( You can go to the website that I linked above and go to the bottom of the page and see it says "Enhanced Crossfire Support" ) Anyway Ati believed me and pretty much crossed that problem out(since it would be false advertisment!) Anyway thats all the comes to mind now... So if you have had this problem or know of anythink please HELP!
Regards

EDIT: this might be the wrong section, if so please tell me as I am new to DH

Dyre Straits

Greetings! And welcome to Driverheaven!

You have posted in the correct forum here. The one in Gaming is out of place.

However, I don't have a Crossfire system and can't be of help. But, keep watching this thread. It's where you'll get the best replies.

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cadaveca

what slots are the cards in?

FoxHunter39

I think I said,but if it was unclear the master is in the blue, and the slave is in the black slot. Note that I have the A8R-MVPX200, which has the master on the bottom near the pci slots and the slave near the cpu. This is before the A8R-MVPX3200 which reversed it.

Edit: For my info does omega support crossfire? I would like to try those to see if it is a software problem with the Cat drivers, which makes it so I doesn't see my other card? By the way...Does the X1800XT not require the dongle if both are the same chip set? (both are X1800XTs)

Tipstaff

Judas would be better able to help you out with this. Until he's able to:

From what I've experienced it's best to install 1 card, then the other. If memory serves you had to remove the switch card from the black PCIE slot to install the slave card, so that is pretty much taken care of. However, if you follow the advice to install one card first then the other you will want to put that switch card back. Install the master card first, remove the switch card, then install the slave. As well, don't forget to set the "Dual-slot Configuration" setting in the bios to "Auto".

One thing: I do remember Judas once saying that you can switch the cards around, although I've never had the need to try it myself.

As for the dongle, if you mean the external cable, yes, you do need it. Only the X1300 and X1600XT cards don't require it. As a note, future products won't need it as well.

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Judas

i've got the Asus A8R32-MVP which is a ATI Xpress 3200 chipset.

The A8R-MVP however is the older Xpress 200 Crossfire chipset.


Now i never touched the older A8R-MVP but from my understandings.

The master Card MUST be in the bottom slot and the bios set to Auto. Slave in top.

Install the drivers and reboot, now it shouldn't matter Which DVI port you have the dongle connected to on the Slave card as far as i can see. However a brief message of what it says about the crossfire being greyed out would also help.


On my A8R32-MVP, by default, they recommend that i put the master card in the top slot closest to the cpu, and slave in the bottom. But this gave me nothing but supreme problems with graphical glitches and obvious crossfire issues (that still have yet to be resolved).

When moving the cards around... master in bottom and slave in top, crossfire would grey out and state that the master card is set as the secondary device. The fix for this however was simple, all i had to do is go into the bios, and set the:

BOOT VIDEO PRIORITY from PCI-Ex1~>PCI-Ex2 to PCI-Ex2~>PCI-Ex1

This made it so instead of booting and loading the Top slot as the primary video, it change it to boot and loading the 2nd slot as the primary. Alas, loaded windows, video drivers installed, rebooted and crossfire was aloud to be enabled once again.

And My excisting (most of) problems were solved.


Now you may have an option in your bios to set which slot has boot priority. I'm not sure. But whatever the case, you MUST have the master card on that board in the bottom Slot. AND you MUST make sure in the bios that the 2nd slot is setup as the primary.

Read your Motherboard Manual.

And BTW, there are several issues with that board you have, i'd highly recommend you take it back asap and at least get the Asus A8R32-MVP instead.

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FoxHunter39

Yea the asus A8R-MVP is not very good and the only reason I got it was because it was 89 dollars. Last night i made the decision to get the 32x chipset(Abit AT8 32x), since I reviewed that is is better then the Asus one, which is quite buggy, and it doesn't have the Phenoix Bios.
The A8R-MVP which I have now doesn't have a bios setting that allows me to change the pcie primary and secondary slot boots. Anyway I am glad I'm getting a new motherboard and hope to solve the problem of not being able to detect my slave card. Btw, about what it says in ccc

"The interconnecter Cable must be connected form Crossfire Edition card to a DVI port on the regular ATI PCI-Express graphics card. If this is already connected, switch to the other DVI port on the regular card. The display device must be connected to the Crossfire Edition graphics card via the interconnect cable. Please secure all connections."

Also why I asked if the interconnect(Dongle)cable was not needed was basically that I heard the new ati drivers(cat 6.6) allow the 1800xts to run in crossfire without it and just use the pcie PEG link bandwith(only in on the Xpress 3200 chipsets). Ill look for the sources.... as I know this was said a lot over forums.

Edit: Here is the link for the forum related to no Dongle.... http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=104079

Antho

I got the same error msg when I was moving my Master card between slots on my A8R32-MVP, i uninstalled CAT 6.6 & re-installed 6.5 & the cards were correctly detected & "Enable Crossfire" was no longer greyed out.

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Athlon 64 Processor X2 4400+
ASUS A8R32-MVP
2x RADEON X1900XT
SB X-Fi Fatality
2 gig OCZ Gold
Enermax Liberty 620 (And a Jeantech Arctic 600 for when it's RMA'd)
2x Seagate Barracuda 160gb (RAID stripe)
1x Samsung Spinpoint 250gb
1x Seagate Barracuda 120gb
etc etc etc......... All wrapped up in a Thermaltake Shark case

Judas

In that case it very well could be a Catalyst 6.6 issue.

That message seems to know that the cards are correctly positioned, just the cable (dongle) is either buggered or not fully secure.

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FoxHunter39

I just tried using the 6.5 version, but to no success. I installed the master with the mvp card then restarted and installed the slave but it was still the same. I am thinking that it is the board, which might be defective since I got it when it was just released..thinking from the reviews that it would be stable as they where saying it was...but they might have been hiding something

FoxHunter39

Ok after a month of wrestling with this issue I finally just sold my A8R-MVP and the slave card. Then I got the Abit AT8 X3200 motherboard and a ati slave card. Installed and FINALLY everything worked, so I have crossfire now. However, I still have a problem. When I turn on crossfire waves appear and sometimes go diagnaoly(always going toward the top of the screen) If I turn on aa they become more visable Is there anyway to run my master in the top slot and slave in the second? Also, I tried to enable crossfire with out the dongle, and just connecting to the master card, but I doesn't work.(I saw an article that you could run X1800XTs without dongle???? See other posts above)

Edit: I found out why I get the waves, it is because of the converter to my monitor(I have to use the dvi to D sub converter) I used another monitor with a dvi cord and there is no interference! So I either a. have to get anotehr montior or b. get crossfire to work without a dongle so the signal isn't converted so many times. Any help would be extremely appreciated!

CrypticSpoon

..i read on one of the links on ati's website you cannot use any graphics card....you need two crossfire compatible cards ..

CrossFire™ - Certified - Build-Your-Own - CrossFire Certified Graphics Cards

Dyre Straits

Greetings, CrypticSpoon.

However, as this thread is over a year old, I'm closing it. Please start a new thread with more up-to-date information and questions, please.

Thanks!

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