M17 Radeon Crossfire Driver Issue

[cloakofwinter]

Hello All:

New to the forums here, but I've owned my Alienware laptop for about 2 years. It's a 17x with dual Radeon 5870s in a crossfire formation. I have NEVER been able to successfully update the original driver. I am assuming the crossfire configuration is causing this, but I have no solution. I have been to both Dell and ATI sites and downloaded the whole Catalyst upgrade, but when I apply it, it makes the computer functionally unusable. BSOD constant or won't boot ot similar issues. I end up having to reset the entire computer to an earlier config save.

It's quite usable, though it has issues. Some games (the important stuff!) won't display properly and several of the themes just don't display windows and borders correctly. Also, it causes the machine to crash about every 24-36 hours. Its usually just a minor thing as its just a reboot and ready to go. I can pretty much handle any game, save for Crysis, so it's not been a major issue. But as more stuff comes out using later and later updates, I am concerned that I'm going to have to either replace the cards or I won't be able to use high-end graphics, photos and programs.

Suggestions? Is anyone else having a similar issue? Is the best option to see if Dell can upgrade to a newer card that might have fewer problems?

Here's the stats:

M17x10
i7 Q820 1.73 MHZ
8GB RAM
64-bit OS - Win 7
ATI Radeon 5870s in Xfire Formation

 

[triplenerd]

I had the same problem... Untill 2 days ago, I went to the AMD website and they have a nifty piece of software that you download, and it scans your computer hardware, and tells you exactly what driver to get.

Up until then, My drivers were such crap, and my crossfired gaming rig was falling behind my 5 year old IMB thinkbad...Simply because of the atrocious stock drivers and lack of support from alienware. Dell really ran them into the ground, but its nice to see AMD/ATI picking up the slack.