ATI 5870 issues

Try reseating your card.

Check your power cables to the card (see forum Sticky for Dell Tech. Doc)

Reinstall the Dell drivers... Uninstall, Reboot, Driver Sweeper, Reboot, Install fresh.

What make/model monitors do you have, how many, and how do you have them connected?

See this post. As I said in that thread ... I'm not sure, but i think there might be a firmware upgrade in there (or a work around built into the drivers). For one, I noticed some slightly different behavior at BIOS post (boot /load)

Since the 5870 cards we use are no different than the cards that might be installed in ... lets say a XPS-9000 or 9100 ... Dell says it's ok to install reference drivers from amd.com or nvidia.com .

Re: ATI HD-5xxx cards in desktop AW machines

Good luck.

I mentioned those things because they should be checked and not just skipped over. I have no way of knowing what you have or haven't tried already.

The problem you are having is not inherent in all 5870 cards because mine and others are working fine.

You never said how you are connecting the monitors.

I stopped reading when you started complaining

I dont know why my other post got deleted... Buy anyways I just did everything you said to do in the thread you listed. After reboot, i was trying to go back to this site to look at post, BAM, grey screen of death... had to reboot to post on here. So nothing changed, I dont know what else to do. BTW, I have my main monitor currently hooked up HDMI, and the other one DVI. My CRT and other monitors have all been just regular VGA when i hook them up.,......

Well, according to the article it's between AMD/ATI and Microsoft ... it's unlikely Dell can help (just caught in the middle).

But as I've said ... not all systems exhibit this behavior. So what is different with mine? ...

Try 2 DVI monitors or 1-DVI & 1-VGA ... maybe even try the Display Port . Basically, stop using HDMI and see what happens.

Your post got deleted because you said a bad word ... you have to be very careful what you say around here. I could go on about moderation and censoring, but then this post will be deleted ... or possibly the whole thread ... lets see if this even makes the cut.

You can ask Chris (I think that's who contacted me), about the bad words. Not the typical cuss words (ticked off i thin is ok, but not the one that starts with P. Also, you cant make references to bodily fluids, lol. The poo word that rhymes with wrap is considered colored too. Theyre really nice about it, unless they see that its blatently inapropropriate. I think the main thing is keeping people from getting emotional. They want us to stick to the facts.

At least thats what I get from it.

You can redo your post and put 'that you got mad' instead of alternatives to ticked off.

demarlie,

I have my main monitor currently hooked up HDMI, and the other one DVI.
* Remove the dual monitor setup while troubleshooting
- Run only one monitor on DVI. Does the issue occur?
- Run only one monitor on HDMI. Does the issue occur?

I found the post that was moved, you cannot use that word. You can say "I'm mad" or I'm angry".

Thank you for all the responses. My first time posting here so really didnt know what was "bad".

Anyways. When i first got my computer i had 1 monitor plugged in DVI. Then I had ordered a Monster Cable HDMI to use HDMI when i started to get the Grey Screen of Death. Issue persisted through both. As of now I only have one monitor hooked up and that is my Orginal Alienware 21.5 through HDMI, Last night it happend while playing World of Warcraft. I wasnt even doing anything intensive. Was just Idleing in a city......

Try the 8.753 P04 Beta driver. If still no go, get it replaced.

It is interesting that there are BIOS updates for virtually every ATI 5xxx card posted in the download section ... except one for the 5870.

Okay, I will try that driver when i get home tonight. Can you tell me what it does and what it is a driver for?

It's for all the Desktop Ati Radeons we sell on the Alienware line. I was never told what it addressed.

So I have installed this beta driver that you told me too. So far it might be good. My question is, Is this beta driver an actual video card driver, meaning does this replace the ATI driver i currently have installed when i installed the 10.8CCC. Or is this another driver in the system that just manages the videocard on top of the ATI driver?

The Dell beta driver is an actual ATI driver ( 10.7)...only it was tweaked by Dell for Dell machines.

It worked wonders on my 5970...

Do not just install it on top of the 10.8s...your asking  for trouble.

Completely remove the old drivers, run Driver Sweeper, and then D/L and install the beta drivers.

They are actual drivers ( CCC, Install manager,drivers..everything is there)

I could not install any ATI drivers after 10.5 without getting a BSOD on reboot. Even 10.8.  And was still having graphical problems ( flickering skyboxes, and artifacting in games..including the vertical lines ..only mine were colored not gray...and usually appeared when watching Hulu )

All gone now...and games run even faster...some by 20% or more. ( The beta drivers are awesome !..Can't say it enough...!!!)

Like Chris said make sure Net framework is fully updated ( you may have to look under optional updates) make sure you have everything updated...including Quicktime, Adobe, Java etc.

But do not install the beta drivers on top of the 10.8s ! Always delete old drivers...run driver Sweeper and then D/L and install New drivers when changing them. Save yourself a lot headaches,

Drivers can be become corrupted just like anything else...especially when you just install new ones on top of old ones.

Also make sure your DX is up to date .

I know deleting drivers, running Driver sweeper and then D/Ling and installing  the beta drivers sounds like a pain..but it's not. It only takes a few minutes and the results are worth it ! ( Driver Sweeper is free..just Google )

See this post:

Re: ATI HD-5xxx cards in desktop AW machines

Now, if you find that 10.7 runs on your 5970 better than 10.8, that's an ATI-AMD problem (but not that uncommon) ... the 5970 is a different animal (being a dual GPU card). It should be fixed soon (10.9 package or higher). Nothing wrong with staying on 10.7 either ... My wife's XPS-410 with 5770 is running 10.6 and they are super stable and fast.

Sounds like the 5xxx drivers have matured (dependability and performance) to an acceptable level now ... just in time for the 6xxx cards to be released.