The most frustrating RDNA2 bug that still hasn't been (fully) fixed

[Tanaz]

I don't even know what the goal of this post is, perhaps just a rant on my part. So there's been this recurring issue that many people with RDNA2 GPUs have had since release and it's still not fixed that's getting on my nerves and I'm at the point of buying an Nvidia GPU out of frustration rather than the need to upgrade.

 

First let me explain the issue - whenever you have a setup with multiple high refreshrate monitors the system will randomly hang at a black/grey screen and reboot (or in some cases stay frozen). It's a driver timeout issue and it always happens when there's video playing either in the background or in the foreground. The thing is this bug is tightly connected with another bug which is the fact that 4K videoplayback in a browser when multiple monitors are connected is stuttery and also slows down the entire browser. This issue is actually not even OS specific, it happens even on Linux.

 

When I got my 6950 XT last year the crashing was so common that I almost RMAd the card - it used to happen once per day. Then after numerous driver updates it actually became less frequent. Now it's at the point  where it still happens but it's like once every week to two weeks.

 

So both the playback lagginess and driver hang issues have something to do with dx11 being used to playback video inside of a browser. It doesn't necessairily have to be a YouTube video, or a high-def video to cause the crash, I've had crashes occur when playing a twitter video in the background. Its basically encoding + 3D workload = crash, but not every time which is the frustrating part.

 

I don't know how to reproduce this issue reliably and that is infuriating. All I know is AMD acknowledged the frame dropping video playback  issue back in 22.9.1 (see last point of known issues):

 

And they later claimed to have fixed it but it's not fully fixed and it's OS agnostic. The only way to avoid the 1440p/4k stuttering is to disable DX11 playback and use DX9 or to disable hardware acceleration altogether in the web browser. Here's the original stuttering thread that has A LOT of comments

 

In terms of the random hangs and shutdown issues there are multiple threads on reddit and the amd forums like this and this with the best solutions being to turn off MPO which I've done but doesn't fix the issue.

The "last resort" fix is to disable SAM and I don't count that as a solution at all because it cripples the GPUs performance by 10-20%.

 

I've reported both the video playback and crashing bugs to AMD multiple times, both through Wattman bug report and via email. I have also reported the bug to mozilla even though it's not a browser specific bug. I'm just super annoyed that something as simple as video playback and decoding can be so messed up on a modern GPU architecture. And I know there's going to be people that won't have this issue, again it's an issue that rears its ugly head when multiple high refreshrate (different resolutions and refreshrates) monitors are connected.

 

I have a 4090 sitting in my basket ready for checkout and I despise Nvidia's pricing/practices so much that I've put up with this nonsense for over a year now but I'm getting close to just being done with it already.

[Agall]

25 minutes ago, Tanaz said:

I don't even know what the goal of this post is, perhaps just a rant on my part. So there's been this recurring issue that many people with RDNA2 GPUs have had since release and it's still not fixed that's getting on my nerves and I'm at the point of buying an Nvidia GPU out of frustration rather than the need to upgrade.

 

First let me explain the issue - whenever you have a setup with multiple high refreshrate monitors the system will randomly hang at a black/grey screen and reboot (or in some cases stay frozen). It's a driver timeout issue and it always happens when there's video playing either in the background or in the foreground. The thing is this bug is tightly connected with another bug which is the fact that 4K videoplayback in a browser when multiple monitors are connected is stuttery and also slows down the entire browser. This issue is actually not even OS specific, it happens even on Linux.

 

When I got my 6950 XT last year the crashing was so common that I almost RMAd the card - it used to happen once per day. Then after numerous driver updates it actually became less frequent. Now it's at the point  where it still happens but it's like once every week to two weeks.

 

So both the playback lagginess and driver hang issues have something to do with dx11 being used to playback video inside of a browser. It doesn't necessairily have to be a YouTube video, or a high-def video to cause the crash, I've had crashes occur when playing a twitter video in the background. Its basically encoding + 3D workload = crash, but not every time which is the frustrating part.

 

I don't know how to reproduce this issue reliably and that is infuriating. All I know is AMD acknowledged the frame dropping video playback  issue back in 22.9.1 (see last point of known issues):

 

And they later claimed to have fixed it but it's not fully fixed and it's OS agnostic. The only way to avoid the 1440p/4k stuttering is to disable DX11 playback and use DX9 or to disable hardware acceleration altogether in the web browser. Here's the original stuttering thread that has A LOT of comments

 

In terms of the random hangs and shutdown issues there are multiple threads on reddit and the amd forums like this and this with the best solutions being to turn off MPO which I've done but doesn't fix the issue.

The "last resort" fix is to disable SAM and I don't count that as a solution at all because it cripples the GPUs performance by 10-20%.

 

I've reported both the video playback and crashing bugs to AMD multiple times, both through Wattman bug report and via email. I have also reported the bug to mozilla even though it's not a browser specific bug. I'm just super annoyed that something as simple as video playback and decoding can be so messed up on a modern GPU architecture. And I know there's going to be people that won't have this issue, again it's an issue that rears its ugly head when multiple high refreshrate (different resolutions and refreshrates) monitors are connected.

 

I have a 4090 sitting in my basket ready for checkout and I despise Nvidia's pricing/practices so much that I've put up with this nonsense for over a year now but I'm getting close to just being done with it already.

If the issue only occurs when running multiple high refresh rate displays, then why not just lower the refresh rate on your secondary display? I imagine its better to have a 60Hz secondary display than crashing.

 

Yes, the RTX 4090 would solve the problem, but that's a $1600 solution (and more performance obviously). Yes this shouldn't be a problem, but obviously AMD is struggling to fix it if its a known bug since launch.

[WereCat]

I've had issues on both AMD (RX 6800XT) and NVIDIA (RTX 3060ti) with this same issue, I'm using OpenGL since and no such issues. 

 

[DarkKratoz]

FWIW, I've had a 6800XT for a couple years now, and I haven't had issues with stuttery video playback or grey screen forced reboots. The other guy I know with a 6750XT has had no issues either. And these issues you speak of seem to have not been reported on by any outlets, nor does a quick google return masses of posts on social medias, etc.

 

Your GPU is likely just defective, and you should have RMA'd it a year ago.

[Tanaz]

13 minutes ago, DarkKratoz said:

FWIW, I've had a 6800XT for a couple years now, and I haven't had issues with stuttery video playback or grey screen forced reboots. The other guy I know with a 6750XT has had no issues either. And these issues you speak of seem to have not been reported on by any outlets, nor does a quick google return masses of posts on social medias, etc.

 

Your GPU is likely just defective, and you should have RMA'd it a year ago.

So your and your friend's anecdotal experience is somehow more important than the multiple threads in multiple forums commented on by hundreds of users which I've linked just a small portion of by the way. That's why I've been hesitant to post this because of the anecdote Andys that were bound to say "hurr durr no issues here so no issues at all hurr durr".

 

edit: Also to be clear, there's no way to RMA a GPU that has a non reproducable bug. I've ran the damn thing through Furmark for hours and hours and it hasn't crashed. You can't just hand PowerColor a working GPU and force them to give you a new one.

[Tanaz]

18 minutes ago, WereCat said:

I've had issues on both AMD (RX 6800XT) and NVIDIA (RTX 3060ti) with this same issue, I'm using OpenGL since and no such issues. 

 

I'm using Firefox so I'm not sure there's an equivalent flag in the about:config settings.

[wONKEyeYEs]

1 hour ago, Tanaz said:

whenever you have a setup with multiple high refreshrate monitors the system will randomly hang at a black/grey screen and reboot (or in some cases stay frozen). It's a driver timeout issue and it always happens when there's video playing either in the background or in the foreground.

This happened the other day to me.

6900XT with a 1440p 144Hz and a 1440p 60Hz.

Had wOw open on the 144Hz and watching a youtube video on 60Hz monitor

with a driver crash requiring reinstall of video drivers.

Was working fine previously.

Edit- it's repeatable.

[Tanaz]

3 minutes ago, wONKEyeYEs said:

This happened the other day to me.

6900XT with a 1440p 144Hz and a 1440p 60Hz.

Had wOw open on the 144Hz and watching a youtube video on 60Hz monitor

with a driver crash requiring reinstall of video drivers.

Was working fine previously.

Edit- it's repeatable.

I have tried multiple drivers, different windows versions. It just won't stop happening, granted for me it's at random. Also forgot to mention that the reason I am sure it's the GPU is because I started with a 3700x + 1080Ti system - zero issues, then I moved to the 6950XT and the issues began instantly and then I upgraded to a 5950x. So the GPU is the only part that I have those crashes with.

[Tanaz]

50 minutes ago, Agall said:

If the issue only occurs when running multiple high refresh rate displays, then why not just lower the refresh rate on your secondary display? I imagine its better to have a 60Hz secondary display than crashing.

 

Yes, the RTX 4090 would solve the problem, but that's a $1600 solution (and more performance obviously). Yes this shouldn't be a problem, but obviously AMD is struggling to fix it if its a known bug since launch.

Because I can not stand 60hz even for side monitors. I often have to read lots of text/watch videos on my side monitors and 60hz is killing me especially considering the fact that I spend 12hrs at my PC. Also I've paid for high refresh rate, using my monitors at 60hz would be equivalent to throwing money down the drain.

[Agall]

30 minutes ago, Tanaz said:

Because I can not stand 60hz even for side monitors. I often have to read lots of text/watch videos on my side monitors and 60hz is killing me especially considering the fact that I spend 12hrs at my PC. Also I've paid for high refresh rate, using my monitors at 60hz would be equivalent to throwing money down the drain.

So is buying an RTX 4090 to solve it, if you won't be making use of the performance gains associated with upgrading from a 6950XT. 

 

Why not use your iGPU (buy a 13900k instead) and/or a e-waste tier card to host that second monitor, or would that bug still apply if your secondary monitor was driven off another display adapter? Something like an Intel Arc A380, as an example, being only $120 sometimes and having an AV1 encoder.

[Tanaz]

4 minutes ago, Agall said:

So is buying an RTX 4090 to solve it, if you won't be making use of the performance gains associated with upgrading from a 6950XT. 

 

Why not use your iGPU and/or a e-waste tier card to host that second monitor, or would that bug still apply if your secondary monitor was driven off another display adapter? Something like an Intel Arc A380, as an example, being only $120 sometimes and having an AV1 encoder.

From personal experience adding more hardware complicates the issue rather than solving it. I don't know if the bug would persist (it probably will because the video would still be decoded by the main GPU). Opening the Intel can of worms along with the AMD would be like having explosive diarrhea and solving it by sticking dynamite up your a**. And the reason that I'd be going for a 4090 is because I don't know if rdna 3's okay. The 7900XTX is a great deal right now but buying a second flagship GPU that has potentially bad drivers would literally make me quit enthusiast PCs for good and buying a 4080's simply not a big enough upgrade. Perhaps the "cheapest" solution would be selling the 6950XT and buying a second hand 3090 but those have been mined on thoroughly and they have memory on both sides of the PCB and some are already failing due to improper memory cooling on the top side of the PCB.

[Agall]

2 minutes ago, Tanaz said:

From personal experience adding more hardware complicates the issue rather than solving it. I don't know if the bug would persist (it probably will because the video would still be decoded by the main GPU). Opening the Intel can of worms along with the AMD would be like having explosive diarrhea and solving it by sticking dynamite up your a**. And the reason that I'd be going for a 4090 is because I don't know if rdna 3's okay. The 7900XTX is a great deal right now but buying a second flagship GPU that has potentially bad drivers would literally make me quit enthusiast PCs for good and buying a 4080's simply not a big enough upgrade. Perhaps the "cheapest" solution would be selling the 6950XT and buying a second hand 3090 but those have been mined on thoroughly and they have memory on both sides of the PCB and some are already failing due to improper memory cooling on the top side of the PCB.

Do you have a spare non RDNA2 GPU laying around that you can test that with or another system with an iGPU that you can throw the 6950XT in to test that theory?

 

Multiple GPUs aren't a problem and in comparison its a far more cost effective solution. If you don't have a spare GPU, having one available with a 5950x would be a smart thing to do. Drivers with Intel Arc have been great for me, since I have an A380 that I play with occasionally.

 

Otherwise if you're not willing to do those suggestions, then really it comes down to either sucking it up, lowering the refresh rate, or buying a new big GPU.

[Tanaz]

13 minutes ago, Agall said:

Do you have a spare non RDNA2 GPU laying around that you can test that with or another system with an iGPU that you can throw the 6950XT in to test that theory?

 

Multiple GPUs aren't a problem and in comparison its a far more cost effective solution. If you don't have a spare GPU, having one available with a 5950x would be a smart thing to do. Drivers with Intel Arc have been great for me, since I have an A380 that I play with occasionally.

 

Otherwise if you're not willing to do those suggestions, then really it comes down to either sucking it up, lowering the refresh rate, or buying a new big GPU.

A reasonable solution would also be.. you know.. for AMD to acknowledge the bug. Nvidia has live chat and actually respond to bug reports. AMD is this split company that has an insanely dedicated CPU division that's even fixing bugs years after release  (EDC limiting voltage to 1.4v bug on ryzen 5000 got fixed the other week with a brand new bios) and then there's the GPU division that feels like it's being run by the outcasts that aren't good enough to make the good sh*t. Anyhow I was hoping that this thread might finally get some attention but I highly doubt it.

[Tanaz]

Update: The 7900XTX Taichi costs around 1050EUR after tax right now in my country with Starfield included which is 200EUR cheaper than the cheapest 4080 and a whopping 800-1000EUR cheaper than a 4090 depending on model. I'll do some more research on whether or not RDNA3  has those playback issues and/or crashes and might pull the trigger. The price is just insane. Also there seem to be multi-monitor issues popping up on Nvidia's side too, so I guess it's not only AMD having driver issues. A high-end model 7900XTX + Starfield for 1050EUR with VAT is just an insane deal.. damn. Hopefully I don't screw myself over.

[hollyh88]

so your main display is a 1080p display? and you have 2 1440p monitors and one i would assume 4k tv attached to your pc? why would you have 3 different resolutions all hooked up. this could also very well cause issues. especially since they also arent even having the same refreshrates. 

have you tried limiting the other displays to 1080p?
to lower the 2 1440p screens refreshrates to 60?
and or to disconnect your 4k tv as well to just try it out?
even though you cannot stand it. if it fixes it than it is better to do that then to literally throw more money at the pc when it isnt needed.

so far i have my main display hooked up(1440p 144hz). a secondary 1080p display at 60hz for simple video and 24/7 on screen data of my hardware. and a  4k tv hooked up for miscellaneous things like movies and maybe gaming if i desire with wireless keyboard and mouse. and i have 0 issues. 
 

[hollyh88]

8 hours ago, Tanaz said:

Update: The 7900XTX Taichi costs around 1050EUR after tax right now in my country with Starfield included which is 200EUR cheaper than the cheapest 4080 and a whopping 800-1000EUR cheaper than a 4090 depending on model. I'll do some more research on whether or not RDNA3  has those playback issues and/or crashes and might pull the trigger. The price is just insane. Also there seem to be multi-monitor issues popping up on Nvidia's side too, so I guess it's not only AMD having driver issues. A high-end model 7900XTX + Starfield for 1050EUR with VAT is just an insane deal.. damn. Hopefully I don't screw myself over.

yes that deal is great if your into starfield and such games. sadly i bought my 6950xt in april and well yeah also starfield premium when it was available so not fun so if you can get a deal on it its pretty worth it. although again i dont see a reason why you would throw more money at it when its not needed. But its your money so ultimately your own decision.

[Tanaz]

50 minutes ago, hollyh88 said:

so your main display is a 1080p display? and you have 2 1440p monitors and one i would assume 4k tv attached to your pc? why would you have 3 different resolutions all hooked up. this could also very well cause issues. especially since they also arent even having the same refreshrates. 

have you tried limiting the other displays to 1080p?
to lower the 2 1440p screens refreshrates to 60?
and or to disconnect your 4k tv as well to just try it out?
even though you cannot stand it. if it fixes it than it is better to do that then to literally throw more money at the pc when it isnt needed.

so far i have my main display hooked up(1440p 144hz). a secondary 1080p display at 60hz for simple video and 24/7 on screen data of my hardware. and a  4k tv hooked up for miscellaneous things like movies and maybe gaming if i desire with wireless keyboard and mouse. and i have 0 issues. 
 

Because I play competitive games and the standard resolution/size is 1080p@25 inches. The 2 1440p monitors are to both sides of the 1080p monitor and I use them for work and the TV is above the 3 monitors and I use it for AAA games. Also the issues started before I bought a TV when I had just the 3 displays.

[Tanaz]

Update 2: I tried to post about this bug one last time on the AMD subreddit and it got insta auto-flagged and deleted. There are no words.

[DarkKratoz]

On 7/25/2023 at 7:23 AM, Tanaz said:

So your and your friend's anecdotal experience is somehow more important than the multiple threads in multiple forums commented on by hundreds of users which I've linked just a small portion of by the way. That's why I've been hesitant to post this because of the anecdote Andys that were bound to say "hurr durr no issues here so no issues at all hurr durr".

 

edit: Also to be clear, there's no way to RMA a GPU that has a non reproducable bug. I've ran the damn thing through Furmark for hours and hours and it hasn't crashed. You can't just hand PowerColor a working GPU and force them to give you a new one.

I'm just saying, I couldn't find anything with a quick Google. It sounds like a very limited problem, and hardware bugs would be ubiquitous, not rare. I've seen RMAs for less, and Powercolor has a pretty responsive support team. You're causing yourself more harm by not trying to RMA.

On 7/25/2023 at 8:03 AM, Tanaz said:

Because I can not stand 60hz even for side monitors. I often have to read lots of text/watch videos on my side monitors and 60hz is killing me especially considering the fact that I spend 12hrs at my PC. Also I've paid for high refresh rate, using my monitors at 60hz would be equivalent to throwing money down the drain.

You need 120+Hz to read static text and watch 24Hz-60Hz video?

[CancerMancer]

On 7/25/2023 at 10:15 AM, DarkKratoz said:

FWIW, I've had a 6800XT for a couple years now, and I haven't had issues with stuttery video playback or grey screen forced reboots. The other guy I know with a 6750XT has had no issues either. And these issues you speak of seem to have not been reported on by any outlets, nor does a quick google return masses of posts on social medias, etc.

 

Your GPU is likely just defective, and you should have RMA'd it a year ago.

"It works on my machine." is a meme for a reason: it's not very useful input.

 

Also I've had this issue with both AMD (RDNA and up) and Nvidia GPUs (RTX 20XX and up) so this isn't just an RDNA2 thing.

[Tanaz]

1 hour ago, DarkKratoz said:

I'm just saying, I couldn't find anything with a quick Google. It sounds like a very limited problem, and hardware bugs would be ubiquitous, not rare. I've seen RMAs for less, and Powercolor has a pretty responsive support team. You're causing yourself more harm by not trying to RMA.

You need 120+Hz to read static text and watch 24Hz-60Hz video?

Link 1:

https://community.amd.com/t5/graphics/6900-xt-stuttering-with-youtube-4k60-videos/td-p/534271

 

 

Link 2:

 

Link 3, Supposed "fix" that doesn't work at least on my machine:

 

I have shared just the threads with a lot of comments and upvotes. There are dozens of threads with like 5-10 upvotes and 2-3 comments that are not worth sharing.

[LOST TALE]

I had the same issue with my rx 6800 and It works with D3D11 on brave (chromium based browser)

[Tanaz]

9 hours ago, LOST TALE said:

I had the same issue with my rx 6800 and It works with D3D11 on brave (chromium based browser)

Ugh all my shit is synced with Firefox I'd be so annoyed to switch browsers. Will test anyways.

[LOST TALE]

On 7/29/2023 at 12:25 AM, Tanaz said:

Ugh all my shit is synced with Firefox I'd be so annoyed to switch browsers. Will test anyways.

just export bookmarks and history. I'm guessing ur talking about instances on other devices. GL

[Tanaz]

12 hours ago, LOST TALE said:

just export bookmarks and history. I'm guessing ur talking about instances on other devices. GL

I think I found out why Brave isn't lagging. It's because by default it's not utilizing the GPU for decoding video. So I can achieve the same by changing some settings in Firefox. No worries tho soon it won't be a problem, I'm getting rid of my 6950XT in a few days.