AMD Stability

Discussion in 'Videocards - AMD Radeon' started by Ragingun, Feb 17, 2013.

  1. Ragingun

    Ragingun Guest

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    Been using Nvidia for the last three builds. With current prices where they are at I'm considering AMD. I am reluctant however because of the stability issues I read about on so many reviews with driver crashes and blue screens and random crashes etc. These aren't just old reviews but seemingly even some new ones as well.

    With dropping $400, I don't want to regret it. Any thoughts and HONEST feedback from AMD guys?
     
  2. thatguy91

    thatguy91 Guest

    I have no issues with my HD7870. The latest 13.2 Beta 5 driver works brilliantly :). A lot of the problems are related to the 'budget' Sapphire and Powercolor brands, and other issues are related to people being too over-enthusiastic with overclocking..
     
  3. Nichtswisser

    Nichtswisser Guest

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    Stability is only a real issue with 7870 cards, best stay away from them! Using more than 1 GPU can also cause issues, yet one card is fine. AMD currently has issues in other areas like Firefox compatibility and frame latency, stability on the other hand is fine (just don't get a 7870 card).
     
  4. kevsamiga1974

    kevsamiga1974 Master Guru

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    What you are all failing to mention, is that the drivers still blow the same as they did 5 years ago and still leave a bitter taste in the mouth.

    Don't waste your money man if your a fan of driver stability....I've never overclocked GPU's either.

    Nothing wrong with the hardware though...but drivers nah...endless problems.

    And that IS being honest as an AMD user. Stay reluctant, it's good for your mental health and your pockets.

    The websites probably weren't lying to you especially if you factor in lack of 7K driver maturity and the new Windows 8 into the mix.
     
    Last edited: Feb 17, 2013

  5. Ragingun

    Ragingun Guest

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    Thanks for the responses guys.
     
  6. thatguy91

    thatguy91 Guest

    Although I've never really had a problem with the drivers (apart from one driver that caused BSODS, which was quickly rectified), I do know that there have been some issues with them. The above comment about HD7870 I believe is related to Sapphire cards. My Gigabyte HD7870 OC model does not have those issues. If getting a HD7870 I'd try and get one of the newer Tahiti LE ones, just 'because' :D

    kevsamiga1974 comments is fair enough... but remember he is running HD4870's in crossfire. HD4870's are really quite old now, they're literally from the same time as the Nvidia 9xxx cards. How many Nvidia 9xxx cards still 'work' ;).

    Both Nvidia and AMD have had driver issues in the past, just when AMD has issues they're criticised much more severely. A lot of the criticism for AMD driver wise can be attributed to Laptop GPU's, but there are other factors involved with that.

    So, now coming to driver crashes...

    Well, um, cough...
    http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2008/03/vista-capable-lawsuit-paints-picture-of-buggy-nvidia-drivers/

    That was from a quick Google, there are many other examples.

    Anyways, in any case single GPU configuration is a much better idea, both for Nvidia and AMD.

    In terms of old model support, Nvidia are no better than AMD either. The latest AMD drivers only cover HD5000 series and up, the Nvidia drivers cover all the old architectures as well... but the old architecture driver code is only updated as much as the legacy AMD drivers.

    Three principles when buying anything:
    - research (including quality of different options, in this case different brands)
    - maintenance (in this case, keeping drivers up to date as well as the rest of the system)
    - proper use (in this case, not over-overclocking then blaming drivers for any associated issues)
     
  7. CPC_RedDawn

    CPC_RedDawn Ancient Guru

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    No problems here going from a GTX480 overclocked to a HD7970 and then I got a second HD7970 for crossfire. When it worked, it worked very very well indeed. Metro 2033 maxed out would get around 65fps even in heavy battles and BF3 would skyrocket to around 160fps @ Ultra on 64 player servers!

    But in the end it was overkill for me, and certain games that I loved to play were not getting fixed so I sold my second HD7970 and opted to stick with one as I only game at 1080p so one is more than enough.

    Also, the 4870x2 is a really old card now. 3 generations old even, we have had the 5000, 6000, and now the 7000 series cards. I used to have one and back then they rocked but driver support was dire for them. So bad I went over to Nvidia and got the GTX480 which was just as fast if not faster in most games. But now with the HD7970 we are getting some great drivers, a few bugs here and there but nothing major at all.
     
  8. Lowki

    Lowki Master Guru

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    The drivers dont suck for me... All my games play great.
     
  9. Kaleid

    Kaleid Ancient Guru

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    I don't have stability issues, unless I heavily overclock.

    hd7xxx series however has had some flickering problems (they appear to be gone now) and the framerate wasn't always as stable as it should have been but recent articles have made AMD working on this.

    Nvidia has been a BSOD experience for me. First with a laptop, and their overclocking utility Ntune probably still crashes the entire system.
     
  10. SubtleOne

    SubtleOne Master Guru

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    I'll be honest, I have switched almost consistently from one brand to the next with each generation. this is not due to any particular issue, simply the best buy at the moment of purchase. I almost always buy in the $200 range.

    For example, some years ago, I had an nVidia 9800GTX (a really nice overclocked version by Zotac). Great card, no regrets. I then moved to the ATI 4870 1GB. Also great card. I found it a more interesting buy then the nVidia equivalent, and am not brand manic. It ran pretty hot (I knew this before buying though), though I was not crashing as a result, and I modded the BIOS with a new fan profile of my own. The ATI/AMD drivers were rock solid.

    I then went to the nVidia GTX 460 1GB. Needless to say it was *the* card to get in the $200 price segment. That said, this was the first time in a long time I had had driver issues. nVidia drivers were crashing far more than I had ever seen. And yes, it was a driver issue, since an older driver build (275.xx or so) gave me no issues. After seeing this happen with some 5 drivers, I stopped trying to update them, and decided I was fine as I was.

    I sold the card last December for $100, and bought the Sapphire 7870 OC in my profile. Again, an amazingly good card. The only driver issue I have had is a curiosity not linked to performance or crashes, but HDMI audio when recovering from ULP. I have a workaround while AMD fixes it. Actual crashes or instability due to performance? None. the only time was when i was trying to see how far I could overclock, but that is normal. The truth is I do not overclock since the vanilla still outperforms my needs by quite a margin. Sapphire does have one issue: the fan profile is a bit of a joke. It works fine, but I think it alternates between only two speeds: low (50%) and very low (25%). I changed it in MSI, but not due to stability to be clear. More for my own peace of mind. Other than that I could not be happier. The ASIC of the Sapphire (the only 7870 I could find for less than $200) is 88.5% if that means anything.

    Frankly, most people I see with issues are either SLI/Crossfire related (each claiming the other company must have an edge, but in fact it is a tie), and crazy overclockers who push their cards to the limit or beyond, just to brag in forums, not because they can actually see a benefit in the one frame per second in a game they are getting 120 as it is.

    I tend to be very cautious, knowing that in the long term, that just compromises my material for no reason. So my GTX 460, which could hit 850MHz before artifacting, I ran at 800, when gaming. This 7870, which can do 1240 MHz (vanilla is 1000), I will run at 1150-1170 when the time comes. Let's face it, two frames per second might only be visible if I can only get to 30-35 or so, and if I reach that point and am not happy, I will probably be looking to upgrade.

    I have not seen either brand have an edge in drivers over the years. The truth is you'll see AMD users complaining nVidia owners are lucky, and vice-versa.
     

  11. Ragingun

    Ragingun Guest

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    Thanks again guys. I got the idea that AMD had more issues than Nvidia due to all the reviews as a whole were much lower on multiple websites.
     
  12. DummyPLUG

    DummyPLUG Guest

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    If you play game a lot, stay away from AMD
    if not, then it is quite good for work as nVidia drop the nView support. Also AMD got problem with hardware decode a long long time, if you need that, then stay away from AMD.

    I am a long term AMD/ATI user, switched to a 560Ti before, but at that time the driver is much worse then AMD (endless TRD). after that I get a 7970 and happy with that.

    p.s. I don't play games and don't need the hardware video decode, I get the 7970 mainly because I need to drive 2xU3011 using display port.
     
  13. kevsamiga1974

    kevsamiga1974 Master Guru

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    It's got nothing to do with what card you own as to what problems you have with the drivers it's all the same rotten egg...

    When was the last time you saw non AMD hardware drivers doing this garbage :

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcsjAaHhTO0&feature=youtu.be

    that's 7K series btw, not my crusty 4K series (which still doesn't work right after 4 years of updates as it happens). Oh and notice the upload date

    And if you don't believe it's the latest available drivers doing this, follow this thread :

    http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=374612&page=8

    and this :

    http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=4517864&postcount=34

    The writing, or shall we say corruption is on the wall as they say. Pretty sad.
     
    Last edited: Feb 17, 2013
  14. rflair

    rflair Don Coleus Staff Member

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    Truth is drivers work well for 99% of the people, the ones who have problems are naturally more vocal and others never let whatever grudge they have go.

    And this goes for both AMD and nVidia.
     
  15. kevsamiga1974

    kevsamiga1974 Master Guru

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    I've got no complaints with my stuff, but then again I also have 5 years of mature driver development behind me which is worth everything when on AMD.

    And I can still get 50fps out of the unigene valley benchmark on ultra @ 1080p. :banana:

    AMD drivers are like buses, they're big, red and usually have bad drivers.

    Anyway it's time I got out of this thread since 7K owners will offer a much better opinion quite obviously... :)
     
    Last edited: Feb 17, 2013

  16. Deathchild

    Deathchild Ancient Guru

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    No problems whatsoever. Either is fine, it the long run it won't really matter.

    But just to tell you, AMD is doing fine. I had to decide as well, I wanted to go for nvidia initially, had the same biased/prejudiced opinion the same way as you, but in the end took the 7950. And I can tell you that I've never been happier with a product like this. Very solid quality, OC's like a beast and have had no driver issues, none.

    You will be happy with either card, but as Titan/8000series is around the corner I suggest waiting as you still have one of those GTX285s that still does well.
     
  17. Darkest

    Darkest Guest

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    I've been using AMD off and on for a good while now, over multiple generations of hardware. I've honestly never had a problem. There were latency issues in some games, but newer drivers have corrected a lot of that. Future drivers aim to keep latencies low. The 7900 series are incredible cards, especially for the price point and game bundles available. The truth is most people run the cards just fine, there's a vocal minority that tend to shout about problems, as mentioned by rflair. You can pick as many examples of 'problems' from the Nvidia side of the fence.

    The most honest thing anyone can say regarding the subject would be to try for yourself. I realise putting down a few hundred is a fair chunk of money, but I'd say AMD are worth the chance right now. They've been working hard with the current series of cards, and they've exceeded expectations in my opinion. If you've a good head on your shoulders when it comes to using hardware you shouldn't have a problem (Unless you have pretty bad luck) with the current gen cards.
     
    Last edited: Feb 18, 2013
  18. yasamoka

    yasamoka Ancient Guru

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    Never had any serious issues here. Faced some Firefox / flash issues, but that's it.

    Drivers are continuously improving, and I always see worthwhile jumps from one driver to another. Performance issue in BF3 and some games? Here's a driver. Latency issues in DX9? Here's another driver. Most important issues were / are getting solved one by one. AMD has given the word that it will be focusing on smooth gameplay from now on to ensure that such frametime issues do not come back. Nvidia has been focusing on it since around 2 years, it seems. (The Tech Report)

    I tend to overclock a lot, but I always make sure to stress test with the toughest software out there, OCCT & Furmark. No errors there means that in 99% of other workloads I shouldn't have any trouble. My overclocks tend to be lower than the rest, but hey, that's stability. I don't crash, black screen, or whatever when running anything.

    Some people overclock their cards to hell and back, refuse to reduce overclock settings, and then complain about newer drivers not being stable with their overclocks. And that is BS, because this means that the new drivers have opened up performance on those cards. GPU usage has risen, and their overclocks are no longer stable at tougher workloads.

    Crossfire has microstutter, much more than Nvidia cards. I won't go into whether one would notice it or not; it's there. If you're planning on going for more than one card, make sure you enable VSync, cap framerate at monitor refresh rate, etc... in order to have smooth, stutter-free gameplay with minimized input lag (higher than no VSync but very manageable). This requires maintaining 60FPS+ on games at the resolution & settings you are running. I gotta test whether microstutter is present with VSync + TB on below 60FPS.

    Going for SLI with Nvidia guarantees that you won't need to find workarounds and can run below 60FPS as you won't face microstutter anyways, but you do get lower performance per card + lower scaling sometimes. Plus less VRAM, less memory bandwidth, etc...
     
  19. SubtleOne

    SubtleOne Master Guru

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    Of course, it might be worth mentioning that nVidia drivers are no smaller...
     
  20. Fox2232

    Fox2232 Guest

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    Last year when 1st batch of HD7970 came, I had to buy one, I simply would not wait for modified board/cooling.

    I have it @1050/1500MHz ever since. Not single BSOD ruined my gaming. On other hand, since Dx9 flicker seems to be mostly resolved AMD can put prices at same level as nV.

    Because right now You can get same performance and cooling with AMD with 15-25% lower price (including games).

    I wonder how pricy HD8970 will be. Since there will be hardly any negative issue reducing value to customer's eye.
     

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