Lifelong Green Team turn Red Team - Regret?

[Automatiic]

Afternoon folks!

Aside from my early gaming days and using VooDoo graphics cards (nostalgia, anyone?), I've ran nVidia under the hood. That is until the beginning of 2014 when I picked up two Radeon R9 290x's in Crossfire. The cards are just as fast, if not faster in some cases, than a 780ti and I was extremely pleased with my purchase initially. I was able to run literally any game maxed out with no issue at 1080p.

Since I built my new PC at that time, I've had an issue with my PC freezing during gameplay or BSOD'ing. My RAM and CPU are overclocked but I have undone all overclocking to test and the issue persists. I have swapped the RAM, CPU, PSU, updated every driver for ever item and even updated the BIOS and still, no joy. Finally, I decided to revert back to the original drivers released with the R9 series of Radeon graphics cards. The freezing still happens but it is less often and there are no more BSOD's. If I install any AMD driver that was released after the one I'm using now, I get BSOD's while gaming on some and BSOD's during install on others.

I am going to be buying 3 new ASUS ROG Swift monitors when they come available and while I'm doing that, I'm thinking of buying new cards. Like I said, I'm extremely impressed with AMD's price/performance ratio but lack of stability is killing me. I'm sure nVidia will come out with a 980ti-esque card or a 990 and AMD as already made a soft announcement of the 390 series which looks amazing. From what I've heard about AMD's 390 series, it seems like it would be cat's ass but I am reluctant to buy another AMD product if the lack of stability is a real issue overall for AMD. So, my question is this:

Do you guys/gals think I just got a screwed up pair of cards or are AMD's drivers really this awful overall? I never had a problem with any nVidia card or driver. I'd like to have a choice of card manufacturer when the new models are released rather than just going green because I have to. But if AMD's drivers really are this poor, I will have no choice. What are your experiences with AMD drivers? Am I just unlucky?

Thanks for your time.

Oh, and my PC specs are below in case you would like to view them to give me insight on what else may be causing the problem if you think AMD isn't the issue!

CPU: i7-4930k OC'ed to 4.5Ghz
MOBO: ASUS Rampaige IV Black Edition
RAM: G.Skill Ripjawz 2400Mhz DDR4 (4x8GB)
GPU: Radeon R9 290x x 2 in Crossfire
HDD: Samsung Evo 840 PRO 1TB SSD
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i
Case: Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra
PSU: Rosewill Lightning 1300W
Standard Blu-Ray CD-DVD Combo Drive
Windows 8.1 Updated
22 Cougar Fans (Can't remember the exact model)

 

[Automatiic]

I just looked and ... DDR4 RAM? Is it out already?

...

I just looked holy * look at the price!

The fact that it happens in the first few minutes might indicate a thermal triggered thing. How do your CPU and GPU temperatures look?

22 fans (!) I would hope they are okay but it is worth checking.

Temps are fine. CPU never goes over 45C under load and I have a fan profile setup on the GPUs to never allow them to rise above 80C. In addition, the 22 fans I have setup allow massive amounts of air to circulate.

Also, bear in mind that it only happens after the first 15-30 minutes of gaming and then after that, I can play for hours without issue so it can't be temps.

 

[Automatiic]

I don't know anything about that Rosewill PSU in particular but have you considered that this is the culprit? This might be off base but that's the first thing that came to mind.

EDIT: Nevermind I didn't see OPs most recent post. So was this purely an AMD driver thing?

I don't know if it's an AMD driver issue. The BSOD's certainly were. But the freezing is still consistent.

Get yourself a cheap Nvidia card and swap them over, if the problems magically disappear then you will know for sure that it is all down to AMD's drivers. I have a 7790 and whilst the hardware is fine (despite the suggestions of several AMD fanboi idiots) the drivers are pants and the only semi stable one is 14.2, which came out ten months after I bought the card.

Borrowed a card from a buddy last night (nVidia GTX 580) and was able to play for hours w/o issue (albeit at much lower settings ). So I suppose it really is AMD's drivers or hardware. Regardless, I think this solidifies my switch back to team green. It's really unfortunate because AMD has some killer hardware for the price but stability is king. I shouldn't spend 5k on a build and know that I have to wait for my PC to crash each night before I can really get into a game.

So I suppose the next question is what should I get from nVidia? Keep in mind I'm going to be purchasing 3 ASUS ROG Swift monitors when they are available but will game on only the middle monitor. My next GPU purchase will be running Tri SLI. Should I get 3 GTX 980s, wait for the 8GB versions, wait for the 980ti (or whatever it will be called) or wait for two 990s to run quad SLI?

 

[Mousemonkey]

I don't know anything about that Rosewill PSU in particular but have you considered that this is the culprit? This might be off base but that's the first thing that came to mind.

EDIT: Nevermind I didn't see OPs most recent post. So was this purely an AMD driver thing?

I don't know if it's an AMD driver issue. The BSOD's certainly were. But the freezing is still consistent.

Get yourself a cheap Nvidia card and swap them over, if the problems magically disappear then you will know for sure that it is all down to AMD's drivers. I have a 7790 and whilst the hardware is fine (despite the suggestions of several AMD fanboi idiots) the drivers are pants and the only semi stable one is 14.2, which came out ten months after I bought the card.

Borrowed a card from a buddy last night (nVidia GTX 580) and was able to play for hours w/o issue (albeit at much lower settings ). So I suppose it really is AMD's drivers or hardware. Regardless, I think this solidifies my switch back to team green. It's really unfortunate because AMD has some killer hardware for the price but stability is king. I shouldn't spend 5k on a build and know that I have to wait for my PC to crash each night before I can really get into a game.

So I suppose the next question is what should I get from nVidia? Keep in mind I'm going to be purchasing 3 ASUS ROG Swift monitors when they are available but will game on only the middle monitor. My next GPU purchase will be running Tri SLI. Should I get 3 GTX 980s, wait for the 8GB versions, wait for the 980ti (or whatever it will be called) or wait for two 990s to run quad SLI?

The diminishing returns of 3 and 4 way SLi make it a pointless venture IMHO, 2 way is a good middle ground in terms of power usage and performance benefits for me.

 

[Automatiic]

I don't know anything about that Rosewill PSU in particular but have you considered that this is the culprit? This might be off base but that's the first thing that came to mind.

EDIT: Nevermind I didn't see OPs most recent post. So was this purely an AMD driver thing?

I don't know if it's an AMD driver issue. The BSOD's certainly were. But the freezing is still consistent.

Get yourself a cheap Nvidia card and swap them over, if the problems magically disappear then you will know for sure that it is all down to AMD's drivers. I have a 7790 and whilst the hardware is fine (despite the suggestions of several AMD fanboi idiots) the drivers are pants and the only semi stable one is 14.2, which came out ten months after I bought the card.

Borrowed a card from a buddy last night (nVidia GTX 580) and was able to play for hours w/o issue (albeit at much lower settings ). So I suppose it really is AMD's drivers or hardware. Regardless, I think this solidifies my switch back to team green. It's really unfortunate because AMD has some killer hardware for the price but stability is king. I shouldn't spend 5k on a build and know that I have to wait for my PC to crash each night before I can really get into a game.

So I suppose the next question is what should I get from nVidia? Keep in mind I'm going to be purchasing 3 ASUS ROG Swift monitors when they are available but will game on only the middle monitor. My next GPU purchase will be running Tri SLI. Should I get 3 GTX 980s, wait for the 8GB versions, wait for the 980ti (or whatever it will be called) or wait for two 990s to run quad SLI?

The diminishing returns of 3 and 4 way SLi make it a pointless venture IMHO, 2 way is a good middle ground in terms of power usage and performance benefits for me.

I agree on 4-way but the reviews I've seen of 980s in 3 way show 40%+ gains by going from 2 to 3 in SLI.

 

[Mousemonkey]

Interesting results, though tbh I haven't really been following the 970/980 cards that closely as I am quite happy with my SLi'd 660Ti's.

 

[smeezekitty]

You could always add a third later.
2xGTX980 would be a good choice.

I wonder if if their is a compatibility problem with the X99 platform and the 290X?

 

[Automatiic]

You could always add a third later.
2xGTX980 would be a good choice.

I wonder if if their is a compatibility problem with the X99 platform and the 290X?

The Rampage IV is an X79 platform, not X99. But if there were compatibility issues with it when I first got it, those should be alleviated because I have updated the MOBO BIOS to the latest revision.

Because of how well the Maxwell GPUs scale, I'm definitely getting three. I just can't decide if I should buy now or wait for the beefed up Maxwell cards. This freezing nonsense is getting old haha

 

[smeezekitty]

The Rampage IV is an X79 platform, not X99.

Then was DDR4 a typo? I thought DDR4 is only supported on X99?

If you are having problems I would consider buying sooner rather than later.
I used to have random computer freezes (not GPU related) and it was extraordinarily annoying.

If you keep waiting for better hardware you could be waiting forever unless it is confirmed that it is right around the corner.

 

[Automatiic]

The Rampage IV is an X79 platform, not X99.

Then was DDR4 a typo? I thought DDR4 is only supported on X99?

If you are having problems I would consider buying sooner rather than later.
I used to have random computer freezes (not GPU related) and it was extraordinarily annoying.

If you keep waiting for better hardware you could be waiting forever unless it is confirmed that it is right around the corner.

Whoops you're right. It was a typo. DDR3 is what i've got.

I heard that the 8GB 980s should be out this month and 980ti's /990s out by Feb of next year.