AMD 13.9 Tutorial - Get FSX Working Again

[matt127 1]

Hi

 

I have created this tutorial to help all AMD customers with the latest driver (13.9). It appears there are some serious stability issues when using Flight Simulator X with this driver version, specifically users have experienced the crash to desktop when navigating the menus whilst flying. This tutorial involves rolling back your driver to the previous version (13.4). Many people have experienced serious computer problems when trying to do this, the tutorial I have created is the proper way to do it. What this tutorial does not instruct you to do is edit the system registry, delete files or start moving files about. None of this is needed.

 

Step 1

 

Close all open applications

 

Step 2

 

Navigate to the 'Control Panel', select 'Hardware and Sound' and then 'Device Manager'

 

Step 3

 

Right click on your graphics card under the 'Display adapters' header and click 'Disable'

 

You will need to do this for however many entries of your graphics card you have under this header. Only disable duplicates, do not disable other entries such as 'Intel® HD Graphics 4600'. At this point you will probably notice that your screen resolution has changed. Do not worry, this is normal and you should not change your resolution back. Here we are disabling the graphics card drivers that we want to uninstall, so that the computer knows to use an alternate and doesn't try to look for our AMD card when it's not present.  

 

Step 4

 

Close the 'Device Manager' and return to the 'Control Panel'. Using the menu bar at the left of the 'Control Panel', select 'Control Panel Home', then 'Programs' and 'Programs and Features'

 

Step 5

 

Right click on 'AMD Catalyst Install Manager' and click 'Change'

 

This will take us through the process of uninstalling the current driver version presently entertaining our graphics card.

Please refer to this link as provided by AMD when going through the uninstall process - http://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/GPU57RemoveOldGraphicsDrivers.aspx

 

Step 6

 

Once the uninstall process has completed, close all applications and restart your computer as advised by the uninstall wizard.

 

Step 7

 

As set out by AMD in their guide: To verify that the AMD Catalyst Drivers and all related software has been removed from the system, return to the 'Program and Features' list, and check that no AMD entries are found. If there are AMD specific entries still listed, remove them using the above process.

 

Step 8

 

Navigate to the following link http://support.amd.com/en-us/download/desktop/previous?os=Windows%208%20-%2064 and select the 13.4' download link. Download the 'Catalyst Software Suite', when prompted select 'Save'

 

It is important that you select 'Save' as we want to make sure that when we run the program later, we are running it with full administrative privileges.

 

Step 9

 

Navigate to the folder in which you saved the 'Catalyst Software Suite' and right click on the file, selecting 'Run as administrator'. Follow the install process, making sure that you select 'Express Install' when asked

 

Step 10

 

Once the new driver version has downloaded, before doing any other tasks restart your computer. Your new driver version should now be installed.

 

You can check that your new driver has been installed by right clicking on the 'Catalyst Control Centre' icon at the bottom right of your desktop and selecting 'About'. The version number should read 'Version 2013.0328.2218.38225.

 

Thanks for reading this tutorial. If you need any help with the above process then please don't hesitate to contact me.

 

I hope this help!

 

Many Thanks

[Jim Young 2,356]

Very nice!  Hope it helps others who might be having issues.

 

Best regards,

Jim

[dhicks001 0]

Thanks for this. I read that AMD are no longer supporting DirectX 9 or the drivers needed to run FSX.

 

Terrible move as far as I'm concerned. I've already purchased a new Nvidia card to replace my 7950 that I'm using at the moment.

[matt127 1]

Thanks for this. I read that AMD are no longer supporting DirectX 9 or the drivers needed to run FSX.

 

Terrible move as far as I'm concerned. I've already purchased a new Nvidia card to replace my 7950 that I'm using at the moment.

No problem and really? I don't blame you. It's a shame. I've looked at a lot of benchmarks and the 7990 seems to kill the Titan and 690, but stability issues are a put off.

[cvearl 60]

Thanks for this. I read that AMD are no longer supporting DirectX 9 or the drivers needed to run FSX.

 

Terrible move as far as I'm concerned. I've already purchased a new Nvidia card to replace my 7950 that I'm using at the moment.

 

Huh?! Where did you read that AMD are no longer supporting DX9?

 

FYI - AMD has never made thier drivers to specifically "work with FSX". FSX uses DX9 and AMD has always had support for DX9.

 

The recent driver "13.4" works perfect with FSX as did most of the previous drivers. All that is wrong now with the BETA's is one file in the driver hangs FSX when using the menu or exiting. Hopefully they fix that. You can use the atiumdag.dll from 13.4 and pop it into the FSX root folder if you want to run the newer 13.11 BETA drivers (Battlefield 4 enhanced and support for the new r9 series).

 

But FSX could stop working on nVidia as well! There have been driver versions that worked better than others. It's the same for both brands in my experience. Anyway. Again. If a person needs to use BETA 13.11, while you have 13.4 installed, grab this file...

 

C:\Windows\system32\atiumdag.dll and keep a copy of it somewhere and then uninstall 13.4 and do a full install of 13.11

 

Then put that atiumdag.dll from 13.4 you kept right into the ROOT of FSX (not back in Windows system32 folder) and you should be fine. Read that in another thread but I cannot find it right now. I might test this tonight myself. Then we can update this thread and others.

 

Oh and if people think that that is bad... We have been doing this with Windows 7 as a fix for FSX since the beginning. In order to fix the Menu Crash Bug in FSX in Win7, we have been placing the Windows XP uiautomationcore.dll file in the root of FSX so it can run without crashing in Win7.

 

Welcome to using legacy unsupported games in new OS's and hardware driver environments.

 

Charles.

[matt127 1]

I would say the performance is better on the top ATI cards than than that of nvidia but that's just my opinion.

[cvearl 60]

No problem and really? I don't blame you. It's a shame. I've looked at a lot of benchmarks and the 7990 seems to kill the Titan and 690, but stability issues are a put off.

 

Why even look at the 7990. SLI and xFire do next to nothing in FSX anyway and of course they have various issues abound depending on game. Get a fast single!

 

770Ti is coming from nVidia to Counter the r9 280X (which is $299 BTW)

780Ti is coming from nVidia to Counter the r9 290X (which will be $599 I think)

 

The R9 290X is in the hands of all the big sites and I think the NDA lifts in a few days. But there is some leaked data out there. The 290X looks to beat the GTX780 (ouside of FSX world) which is going to cause price drops and wars in the stores.

http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/msi_radeon_r9_280x_twinfrozr_gaming_oc_review,1.html

http://www.legitreviews.com/chinese-website-leaks-amd-r9-290x-benchmarks_126550

 

So if you want to spend 7990 kind of money... Get either the 290X when it comes or the 780Ti which I bet will both be $600 and be stable and not have SLI/Crossfire issues. This will be in Novemeber on the shelves I am betting. r9-280x is already hitting the shelves. Battlefield 4 was made for AMD if you are into that kind of thing.

 

I see no reason FSX will have a problem with either. And if your into P3D v2.0, it will be DX11 and I suspect all 79XX and R9 based cards will do well in that as well.

 

C.

[cvearl 60]

Huh?! Where did you read that AMD are no longer supporting DX9?

 

FYI - AMD has never made thier drivers to specifically "work with FSX". FSX uses DX9 and AMD has always had support for DX9.

 

The recent driver "13.4" works perfect with FSX as did most of the previous drivers. All that is wrong now with the BETA's is one file in the driver hangs FSX when using the menu or exiting. Hopefully they fix that. You can use the atiumdag.dll from 13.4 and pop it into the FSX root folder if you want to run the newer 13.11 BETA drivers (Battlefield 4 enhanced and support for the new r9 series).

 

But FSX could stop working on nVidia as well! There have been driver versions that worked better than others. It's the same for both brands in my experience. Anyway. Again. If a person needs to use BETA 13.11, while you have 13.4 installed, grab this file...

 

C:\Windows\system32\atiumdag.dll and keep a copy of it somewhere and then uninstall 13.4 and do a full install of 13.11

 

Then put that atiumdag.dll from 13.4 you kept right into the ROOT of FSX (not back in Windows system32 folder) and you should be fine. Read that in another thread but I cannot find it right now. I might test this tonight myself. Then we can update this thread and others.

 

Oh and if people think that that is bad... We have been doing this with Windows 7 as a fix for FSX since the beginning. In order to fix the Menu Crash Bug in FSX in Win7, we have been placing the Windows XP uiautomationcore.dll file in the root of FSX so it can run without crashing in Win7.

 

Welcome to using legacy unsupported games in new OS's and hardware driver environments.

 

Charles.

 

Oddly there is no atiumdag.dll in 13.4 in the Windows\system32 folder.

 

C.

[matt127 1]

The purpose of this tutorial is not to be moving folders about and having to even touch the system folder. This is the correct way to roll back a driver without all of that.

[cvearl 60]

The purpose of this tutorial is not to be moving folders about and having to even touch the system folder. This is the correct way to roll back a driver without all of that.

 

Sorry. Did not mean to hijack. I was on a different subject. How to keep 13.11 but this was your thread for rolling back to 13.4 and it was quite fine as is.

 

Charles.

[3-2-1-Now 126]

Charles - great post!

 

A general note on ANY driver/firmware: some are better than others. Find one that works, and stick with it!

 

If you run Beta drivers and then complain that they do not work correctly, you're just crazy.

 

I run 12.10, FYI. It works - why change it?

 

@Matt127: are you running Windows 8? You don't say which OS you are running.

 

Best regards,

Robin.

[matt127 1]

Im not uninstalling drivers so my operating system is irrelevant

[cvearl 60]

Apparently atiumdag.dll is available in 13.5 and not 13.4.

 

Your options for ATI right now are... Stick with 13.4, which you can roll back as per this thread if you went forward to 13.9, 10 or 11. Orrrr....

 

If you want the speed increase in other games outside of FSX you can apparently steal the 13.5 driver atiumdag.dll file and pop it into the FSX root. A few people claim that stops the fatal errors atiumdag.dll is causing in drivers 13.9 and beyond in FSX. I have yet to try this.

 

Once the non BETA driver arrives, I hope they have tweaked atiumdag.dll so it stops doing this in FSX.

 

C.

[VPA481 27]

Hi,

 

Thanks so much for this tutorial.

 

However, even if I follow it carefully step by step, the uninstall process finishes each time with a BSOD. A normal reboot after that gives a BSOD "System service exception". A restore allow me to turn it back on, but that nightmare 13.9 is still there.

 

Any help would be apreciated.

 

 

Emmanuel.

[cvearl 60]

Hi,

 

Thanks so much for this tutorial.

 

However, even if I follow it carefully step by step, the uninstall process finishes each time with a BSOD. A normal reboot after that gives a BSOD "System service exception". A restore allow me to turn it back on, but that nightmare 13.9 is still there.

 

Any help would be apreciated.

 

 

Emmanuel.

 

In your case, this is what I would do.

 

Download 13.9 again just in case.

Download 13.4 to have it ready.

Download .net 4.0 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=17851

Reboot

Install .net 4.0

Reboot

Install 13.9 complete over top of itself.

Reboot

Go into the Control panel in Windows and go to Programs

With the Catalyst Install Manager do a COMPLETE removal of ALL AMD Software and boot when asked.

 

If it comes up fine, proceed...

 

Install COMPLETE and EXPRESS 13.4 driver.

reboot

 

Did that work?

 

C.