Catalyst 8.6 available

[Mustang]

Available as usual in the following flavours :D

 

XP32 http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx?p=xp/radeonx-xp

XP64 http://ati.amd.com/support/radeonx-xp64.html

MCE http://ati.amd.com/support/radeonx-mce.html

Vista 32 http://ati.amd.com/support/common-vista32.html

Vista 64 http://ati.amd.com/support/common-vista64.html

[Kuky]

I like these drivers... finally Catalyst AI actually increases framerate in LockOn but with watter on high (and probably very high also) I get very strong shimmerring (is that what you call it?) over the water... wateron Medium and it's all good. I think with exact same settings and Catalyst AI on standard I get about 22fps (compared to some 20fps I get with it off) over Novorosysk... come to think of it... maybe should let Fraps make a graph comparison...

Edited June 21, 2008 by Kuky
25fps changed to 22fps as I think 25 was little exagerated ;)

[159th_Viper]

D/L'ing.

 

Cheers Mustang :thumbup:

[Mustang]

Good to see that this is shaping up to be a stable and fast driver :thumbup:

 

According to the following release notes, there are good increases for various apps for 2xxx and 3xxx range cards, so hopefully this is having a knock-on effect with LO :)

 

Catalyst™ 8.6 introduces the following new features:

OpenGL Adaptive Anti-Aliasing Custom Filters support

OpenGL CrossFireX™ (QUAD) support - 3 or 4 GPUs in CrossFire™ mode

Catalyst Install enhancement - No reboot required after Catalyst upgrade install

OpenGL Adaptive Anti-Aliasing Custom Filters support

 

This release of Catalyst™ introduces Adaptive Anti-Aliasing Custom Filters support for OpenGL applications for the HD 3000 Series, ATI Radeon HD 2000 Series of products. Using the Edge Detect Custom Filter, users can enable 12X and 24X Anti-Aliasing. Selecting 4X Anti-Aliasing plus selecting the Edge Detect filter delivers the equivalent of 12X Anti-Aliasing. Selecting 8X Anti-Aliasing plus selecting the Edge Detect filter delivers the equivalent of 24X Anti-Aliasing.

OpenGL CrossFireX™ (QUAD) support - 3 or 4 GPUs in CrossFire™ mode

 

This release of Catalyst™ introduces CrossFireX™ QUAD support for OpenGL applications. Users with any combination of a ATI Radeon™ HD 3870, ATI Radeon™ HD 3850, and ATI Radeon™ HD 3870 X2 graphics accelerators running with 3 or 4 GPUs will be able to run in CrossFireX™ QUAD mode (when used in a CrossFireX™ compatible PC).

 

Users are also able to run in CrossFireX™ QUAD mode while running in extended desktop mode on the Windows Vista desktop.

 

Performance Improvements

 

The following performance gains are noticed with this release of Catalyst™.

3DMark Vantage:10 to 15% gains across all Radeon™ HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products, with larger gains in specific cases.

Call of Duty 4: Performance increases across all Radeon™ HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products, with gains as large as 35% in specific maps.

Call of Juarez DX10: Performance increases between 2 and 9% across all HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products

Company of Heroes (DX10 version): Performance increases between 4 and 10% across HD 36xx and HD 34xx products.

Lost Planet (DX10 version): Performance increases by 1 or 2 fps across all HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products, creating in some cases up to 20% increase.

Lost Planet (DX9 version): Performance increases between 2 and 20% across all HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products

Prey OpenGL: 3-5% gains across HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products.

Quake 4 OpenGL: Up to 8% increase across all HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products.

Shadermark 2.1: Minor improvements across all HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products, with the largest gains appearing on HD 3650 (up to 9%)

ViewPerf 10: Substantial performance improvements across several of the sub-tests, with the largest gains in ugnx (up to 55%), catia (up to 17%) and tcvis (up to 10%) across all of the HD 3xxx and HD 2xxx products.

[Mustang]

Hmmmm, seems theres a hotfix for these new 4xxx series cards here based on 8.6

http://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&questionID=35298

 

according to a guy called "Spyre" (an ATi beta tester) over at Rage3D http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33926017

"It improves earlier cards a bit too."

 

going to give them a try out :)

[Alex_rcpilot]

Cool! I keep experiencing minor problem while installing current driver utility. Since I've just started re-installing my WinXP, I won't have to update the driver from the prvious version, hope this will help.

[Kuky]

I definitely like there sets of drivers :) Even though Catalyst AI turned on gives shimmering on the water when water is set to high, there is no shimmering at all when water is set to Very High :D

 

Good job for ATI guys with Catalyst 8.6 the long wait was worth it :)

[FA_Crazy-Canuck]

Ooh new drivers. Been very busy at work. I have to set them up later today and let you know the results. I found a marked increase in fps with .5.

 

Mustang what cards are you referring to for the hotfix?

 

Thanks for posting.

[Mustang]

Mustang what cards are you referring to for the hotfix?

 

Thanks for posting.

 

Well, they are supposedly aimed at improving the brand new 4xxx range cards ( see here for an example http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-ati-radeon-hd-4850-review-force-3d--powercolor/ )

[FA_Crazy-Canuck]

Thanks Mustang.

 

Kuky, could you post for me your settings for the 3870X2. I would like to compare to mine. Thanks in advance.

[Kuky]

Is that for LockOn settings Canuck?

[FA_Crazy-Canuck]

Yes for lock on. If you have settings for IL2 post them as well. I have two different settings for these games. Lock on does not like the IL2 settings.

[Kuky]

Hey Canuck, I don't have IL-2 installed any more so can't help you with that

 

For LockOn I always use 4xAA / 4xAF / V-Sync On and enable Adaptive AA. With this latest Catalyst 8.6 I found I can use Catalyst AI enables but only with Water in LockOn set to Medium or Very High, as High gives me bad slouds shadow flickering on the water. The Catalyst AI enabled now gives me nice increase in framerate, BUT just yesterday I find all of a sudden in mission (flying online) I got the stuttering which I had before. That stuttering is related to onboard Crossfire and what would happen is frame rate would be jumping from 60 to 100+ every second or so... and it's bad. Last night I tried ALT/TAB and it kind of stopped, but came up again later on, so in the end I decided to disable Catalyst AI again... still doesn't seem 100% reliable setting for me.

 

if you wanted to know some other specific info right now my Graphics.cfg looks like this:

 

Precaching

around_camera = 100000;

around_objects = 100000;

 

Camera

near_clip = 0.1;

middle_clip = 2;

far_clip = 80000;

structures = {60, 10000};

trees = {100000, 10000};

dynamic = {100, 9000};

objects = {3000, 50000};

mirage = {3000, 5000};

surface = {20000, 40000};

lights = {60, 8000};

lod = 2;

 

 

ShadowLevel = 2;

LightsLevel = 2;

MirrorsLevel = 2;

TextureLevel = 2;

WaterQuality = 1;

EffectOptions = 3;

Exhaust = 1;

FogQuality = 1;

SceneFile = "High";

 

 

LandLodDistances

LandDay

L01 = 20000;

L12 = 40000;

 

LandNight

L01 = 20000;

L12 = 40000;

 

MFD

L01 = 20000;

L12 = 30000;

 

 

OldLandNoise

perSquare = 5;

perSquare2 = 150;

front = 1000;

back = 20000;

top = 5000;

map_high = 20000;

bottom = 200;

noisemax = 1;

noisemin = 0;

 

 

FogParam1 = 12;

FogParam2 = 0.8;

ObjectFogMultiplier = 0.6;

[FA_Crazy-Canuck]

Thanks Kuky, I will try it out and let you know what I find.

 

Thanks again.