Radeon HD 6950 - Upgraded to Catalyst 13.1 from 12.11 - Now experiencing Stuttering

[FireDart]

Hey guys,

I'm hoping you guys can help me out. I just updated my Radeon HD 6950 from Catalyst version 12.11 to 13.1 and now seem to be experience micro-stuttering in every game, however my FPS is fine. I know that 13.1 is aimed more for the 7xxx series so when I found the problem I decided to downgrade back to 12.11 and still experiencing the issue, I'm now back at 13.1.

My defintion of "stuttering/micro-stuttering":

Screens seems to jump up and down, a lot no drop in FPS.

Card:

AMD Radeon HD 6950 2GB by SAPPHIRE TECH

Not OC'ed

Clocked at 800Mhz (Some people reported the clock got Under clocked, however not my case)

The full process (with drivers):

Upgraded from 12.11 to 13.1

Found problem

Uninstalled 13.1 drivers

Rebooted

Install 12.1 drivers

Rebooted

Still having problem

Downgrade again to 12.10 from 12.1 (since 12.11 was a beta drivers for 13.x)

Drivers crashed

Went into safe mode uninstall drivers via Device manager

Upgraded to 12.11 again

Still having problem

Rebooted

Decided to upgrade again to 13.1

Still having problem

Tried re-seating the card (Which would be strange that it happened at the same time yet still worth checking)

Still having problem

The stuttering is very bad in Far Cry 3 (30 ~ 45 FPS) and even in games like TF2 (Normally get 150+ FPS), funny enough hardly noticeable in BF3 (45 ~ 50 FPS)...

I mention the FPS because I find it funny that its stuttering yet I'm still getting solid FPS, no drops.

The issue also stops when I I'm in a menu or use Steam, UPlay or Origin overlay. So I can actually see the game under the overlay, still working, things still happening and it stops shaking...

Temps:

CPU 35°C ~ 39°C

GPU 42°C ~ 47°C

Perfectly normal and was the same before the driver update.

Full System Specs:

ASUS Sabertooth 990FX

AMD Phenom II X6 3.3GHz

16GB of DDR3 Corsair Vengance RAM

ATI Radeon HD 6950 2GB by SAPPHIRE TECH

750W Power Supply

~The rest hardly matters

Rumors/Other ideas:

1. I have also read that some people needed to re-flash the GPU however I really don't feel like I need to do this.

2. 13.2 was released but I'm hesitant to update again, however it does "Significantly improves latency performance..."

3. 13.3 is also in the works but not sure if it is any better.

Anybody have any ideas? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

-Julian

[Broxigar]

Same issue here and also running 2x 6950s with crossfire enabled and disabled depending on what I do.

Solution will probably be to roll back to 12.11 or 12.12.

[Noligion]

I'm running crossfire 6950's and I'm not having this problem.

[FireDart]

Same issue here and also running 2x 6950s with crossfire enabled and disabled depending on what I do. Solution will probably be to roll back to 12.11 or 12.12.

Sadly I did try rolling back to 12.11 and still no good.

A interesting thing is the issue stops when I I'm in a menu or use Steam, UPlay or Origin overlay.

So I can actually see the game under the overlay, still working, things still happening and it stops shaking...

I also run double monitors however unplugging one does not seem to fix the issue.

I'm going to try booting with only one connected since I'm not sure if it inits some kind of script for multi-monitors (Anybody know?).

Any body have any other ideas?

[TechFan@ic]

Download the clean uninstall utility from AMD , use it, restart your system & install 13.2 = fixed .

[FireDart]

Download the clean uninstall utility from AMD ' date=' use it, restart your system & install 13.2 = fixed .[/quote']

As you posted this I was in the progress of doing that.

Following this guide: http://forums.amd.com/game/messagevi...&enterthread=y

Ran the AMD Uninstall Utility

Rebooted

Ran Drive Sweeper

Rebooted

Installed 13.2 Beta 3

Rebooted

Still Not working.

Did the same process for 13.1, 12.10 & 12.11 Beta 11.

I'm now back at 12.11 Beta 11 (Was the original Driver I had with no problems before upgrading too 13.1). Still having the same problem.