AMD "Never Settle" 12.11 Driver - benchmarks are in!

[Olikan]

Given that GCN was a grounds up built architecture its quite fair to say the learning has taken some time to get MSAA with deferred rendering working well. :thumbsup:

it's not! think vliw-4,
-add several layers of hardware schedulers and data management (ACE units, new scalar unit)

-improve on things that were weak before (like: ROPs and tesselation)
that is GCN...a heavy tweaked vliw-4

 

[sontin]

Nvidia's performance has essentially topped out since May, whereas AMD as made incremental (yet noticeable) improvements in two major driver updates since then.

AMD has/had big performance problems. They needed 5 months to fix their AA performance in Batman:AC. 10 months to fix the Frostbite 2 performance issue. It cost them to many sales.

AMD has also had bigger game bundles in the past year than Nvidia. Not saying Nvida isn't doing stuff to promote their products, but with AMD's seemingly nonstop price cuts and bigger game bundles, on top of getting more games into their gaming evolved program than TWIMTBP lately, they are noticeably making a bigger effort to promote their products than Nvidia. And Nvidia better take notice - they cannot ride the wave of their brand name forever. People ultimately will steer towards the better deal.

What you see is a result of bad sales of the Radeon products. Price cuts and more bundles are marketing instruments to increase them. nVidia did not need it in the last month. It's like saying that BMW should notice that KIA is giving more stuff for free away if you buy a KIA car.

 

[tviceman]

AMD has/had big performance problems. They needed 5 months to fix their AA performance in Batman:AC. 10 months to fix the Frostbite 2 performance issue. It cost them to many sales.



What you see is a result of bad sales of the Radeon products. Price cuts and more bundles are marketing instruments to increase them. nVidia did not need it in the last month. It's like saying that BMW should notice that KIA is giving more stuff for free away if you buy a KIA car.

I'm not disagreeing with what you are saying and in fact partially agree, but moving forward there is 2 1/2 months left in the year and the holiday season (big sales) is upon us. Next gen products aren't expected until March of next year so that leaves quite a bit of time between now and then. And as of right now, when it comes to value and performance, AMD has the very clear advantage.

 

[raghu78]

I understand all of that, however this thread is a discussion of not only a performance increase, but the marketing pamphlet sent out by AMD. My comment was directed at that, not at the people who currently own the card. There is a huge difference there, because what I said has no relation to those people.

My comment was directed at that aspect of this conversation, the people who are considering purchasing a product at the end of it's product cycle prior to the obligatory large price reductions.

I know a lot of people are down about how AMD is currently doing, but I think it's a disservice not to discuss the other aspect of this situation, which is the 10 months into a typical 12 month product cycle "amazing deal" and the obvious other side of it.

A little bit of perspective goes a long ways.

AMD's HD 7970 Ghz and HD 7950 Boost will be replaced by the next gen HD 8900 cards in Q1 2013. Pricing will be depend on the competition's product stack performance and price ( GTX 780 and GTX 770). That is subject to launches in the same time frame. If AMD launches earlier they will have more freedom with pricing as it was at HD 7970 launch. As has been the trend AMD quickly EOLs the older generation products. I guess you did not follow HD 6970 EOL. AMD never cut price on HD 6970. it just quickly stopped production in Q4 2011 while ramping HD 7900 cards. The channel is allowed to sell out of existing stocks. nvidia does the same thing.

I don't know how anybody can fault a holiday game bundle worth 170 bucks. All these games are Q4 2012 releases except Sleeping dogs which released in mid Aug. Obviously this is the perfect time. This is the best game bundle ever by a manufacturer for the holiday season. Instead of appreciating the value for gamers you are criticizing it.

 

[RussianSensation]

Now it makes sense that they given no margin guidance for Q4. That game bundle must hurt their margin...

Why not make an account at Google or Yahoo Finance blogs? From AMD's Q3 financial report, there is no indication HD7000 series discrete cards suffered a margin drop. Actually GPU ASP was up sequentially and year-over-year. The declines in revenue are attributable to lower OEM shipments due to lower demand from the OEM market.

You always seem to talk about how poorly AMD is doing financially but never give props to what the consumer gets in terms of value - right now AMD's line up is not only the fastest but the value is unbeatable too. I don't ever recall AMD offering faster performance and more value at the same time in any GPU generation. I wouldn't be surprised if NV does nothing at all as a lot of their customer base will buy anything with an NV logo.

What i not understand: Why they need 10 months to optimise BF3/Frostbite 2 engine.

At least it was finally improved. Maybe AMD didn't have proper access to the game engine until they teamed up for MOH:W? It took time for NV to squeeze 10% out of Fermi too. It wasn't done in 3 months. During the last 10 months, AMD took away all the major wins NV had - Dirt 3, Skyrim, Batman AC, Crysis 2 and now BF3. While in the games AMD used to lead, NV hasn't closed any gaps except in Shogun 2. There are practically no major games left where NV is winning, but the gaps where it's losing by 15-30% remain. Why hasn't NV closed those gaps since March if their driver team is so great? At least AMD worked hard to improve performance in all the games where it trailed. How is NV's driver team doing in Arma 2, Risen 2, Alan Wake, Crysis, Metro 2033, Dirt Showdown, Sleeping Dogs, Sniper Elite V2, STALKER cop, Bulletstorm, Serious Sam 3, Witcher 2 EE, Anno 2070? etc. still losing in all of them just like from the beginning.

Isn't it a bit late to be getting excited over what will soon become, a last gen product? Isn't that why the prices have dropped, and large game bundles are offered? Inventory needs to be cleared.

The drivers seem to have improved the efficiency/shader throughput. There should be some increase in power consumption. Legit Reviews shows 14W power increase for Vapor-X 7970. When you have a performance delta in GPU demanding games like this, the slightly higher power consumption on an enthusiast system seems like a minor inconvenience:

The improvements in this driver will carry over to HD8000 series since it's GCN once again. Frostbite 2.0 was the last major game engine left where NV had a lead. For people who bought HD7000 cards this generation, it's a pretty nice driver since they not only got more value but now have faster performance compared to GTX600 cards at similar price levels. I think that's a positive development even for existing owners who play games like WOW or BF3. 5-10% more performance for free on average from a driver is a lot since the difference between GTX670 and 680 is about 9-10% and that used to cost $100. For HD7870 owners, AMD gave them 10% for free.

 

[SirPauly]

. This is the best game bundle ever by a manufacturer for the holiday season.

Amazing bundle! It may indeed be the best game bundle offered for the holiday season!

 

[Pheran]

Anyone find it interesting that the 7870 improves much more than the 7850? I've been saying for a while that the 7850 is an underperformer relative to older AMD cards and probably just needed better drivers. Seeing these results makes me think it just isn't well balanced. Lots of memory bandwidth but simply not enough shaders.

That was interesting, but I'm totally happy that my 7870 just got a free 10% performance improvement! I must say that my first AMD video card experience has been nothing but positive so far. It might be a little unbalanced, but it's also nice knowing that turning on AA is never going to starve out the memory bandwidth and make performance drop like a rock (more than the usual hit for AA, I mean).

 

[sontin]

Why not make an account at Google or Yahoo Finance blogs? You always seem to talk about how poorly AMD is doing financially but never give props to what the consumer gets in terms of value - right now AMD's line up is not only the fastest but the value is unbeatable too.

Why should i give AMD props for this? Should i give Opel props for selling their stuff cheaper and with more features than BMW?
AMD is doing because they lost revenue in the last two quarters and Y-Y.

At least it was finally improved. It took time for NV to squeeze 10% out of Fermi too. It wasn't done in 3 months. During the last 10 months, AMD took away all the major wins NV had - Dirt 3, Skyrim, Batman AC and now BF3. While in all the games AMD used to lead, NV hasn't closed any gaps except in Shogun 2. There are practically no major games left where NV is winning, but the gaps where it's losing by 20-30% remain. Why hasn't NV closed those gaps since March?

Maybe you should read a few reviews. The 7970 is now on par with the GTX680 at best. They took nothing away.
And the 7970 is still loosing in Crysis 2 or in some Maps of Max Payne 3 in which bandwidth is not the limiting factor.

BTW: Fermi had never such problems. It looks that something is strange with GCN so they need to fix all the problem on an application basis.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

AMD's HD 7970 Ghz and HD 7950 Boost will be replaced by the next gen HD 8900 cards in Q1 2013. Pricing will be depend on the competition's product stack performance and price ( GTX 780 and GTX 770). That is subject to launches in the same time frame. If AMD launches earlier they will have more freedom with pricing as it was at HD 7970 launch. As has been the trend AMD quickly EOLs the older generation products. I guess you did not follow HD 6970 EOL. AMD never cut price on HD 6970. it just quickly stopped production in Q4 2011 while ramping HD 7900 cards. The channel is allowed to sell out of existing stocks. nvidia does the same thing.

I don't know how anybody can fault a holiday game bundle worth 170 bucks. All these games are Q4 2012 releases except Sleeping dogs which released in mid Aug. Obviously this is the perfect time. This is the best game bundle ever by a manufacturer for the holiday season. Instead of appreciating the value for gamers you are criticizing it.

I hope not, prices were pretty bad at release and their inablity to gain market share while having the first to market advantage should be a lesson to them.

Nvidia doesn't do that with their older products, that's why I got a 470 in Nov 2010 for $180 instead of $350. You can find the 480 on Newegg for between $170 and $200 as well as other 40nm products like the GTX 570 for $230. If AMD doesn't do that, all the more reason to push inventory clearance prior to a new release.

I'm not so much faulting as raising objections, if you look at my sig I have not adopted a 28nm product yet. If anything these bundles are targeted at people like me, and to some extent people who are looking for an additional card. My concern as posted is that value of the games is subjective, and this isn't my first GPU pony ride so I'm aware that an eight month old product is near the end of it's cycle to be replaced by newer, better, faster. So what part of this bundle is compelling to someone like me, someone who hasn't jumped on the 28nm bandwagon yet? The worth of the games themselves is subjective, the price point is still exceedingly high at $400+ for a product we all know is going to be last gen in short order.

Yes it's the top GPU for this generation, however that will mean absolutely nothing in short order, so why is it still commanding such a large price premium? Now I know I'll catch flack for this because the 680 is still there as well, but my point is that I haven't bought a 680 and AMD is not in the same position as Nvidia. That's why they're offering these deals, they need sales and personally I don't think they've justified it - at least for me.

 

[Olikan]

Why should i give AMD props for this? Should i give Opel props for selling their stuff cheaper and with more features than BMW?
AMD is doing because they lost revenue in the last two quarters and Y-Y.

yes! long live to Opel...the best choise when someone is smart enought to don't give shit about "brand value"

...to bad that re-selling an Opel as a used car is very bad :'(

 

[Maximilian]

Impressive stuff!

BF3 has the best engine current available IMO, 8 threads, decent graphics without being too much of a hog, stable. Its important for a graphics card to be good at this because engines like that will become more and more common.

Props to AMD on this one :thumbsup:

 

[SlowSpyder]

Why should i give AMD props for this? Should i give Opel props for selling their stuff cheaper and with more features than BMW?
AMD is doing because they lost revenue in the last two quarters and Y-Y.

Maybe you should read a few reviews. The 7970 is now on par with the GTX680 at best. They took nothing away.
And the 7970 is still loosing in Crysis 2 or in some Maps of Max Payne 3 in which bandwidth is not the limiting factor.

BTW: Fermi had never such problems. It looks that something is strange with GCN so they need to fix all the problem on an application basis.

I think there is a difference between fixing and optimizing. I wouldn't say what AMD had out before 12.8's was broken, I would say that it certainly needed refinement. But finding more performance is a bonus, those of us who bought an AMD card did so on the benches that were out at the time and felt it was a good move. So getting more performance only sweetens things later.

And I don't think the car analogy you are using applies here. Nvidia and AMD are the only two players in the discreet gaming card market, and they compete at the same price points for the most part. BMW doesn't care if Kia slashes prices by 50%. But Ferrari would probably care if Lamborghini slashed prices on their cars, and they were the only two high performance car manufacturers (imagine the others do not exisit). Sure there are enough Ferrari fans to keep things going for now, but eventually those Lambo's that perform the same to better and cost a lot less will start to look pretty attractive to even the hardcore Ferrari fans.

 

[Rvenger]

NM

 

[RussianSensation]

Why should i give AMD props for this? Should i give Opel props for selling their stuff cheaper and with more features than BMW?

AMD is offering more value than ever to the consumer. Unless you are an AMD investor, this is a positive development for gamers. I guess you like it when companies keep prices high and don't offer gaming bundles or release drivers that improve performance 5-10%. I mean NV charged $100 more for GTX680 over 670 for 9-10% more performance. Whatever floats your boat I guess. I'll take 7% more performance for free on average.

Maybe you should read a few reviews. The 7970 is now on par with the GTX680 at best.

HD7970 competes with GTX670, not 680 and wins.
HD7970 GE competes with GTX680 and wins.

Consumers can get an 1100mhz HD7970 Ghz for $450 with 3 free games. That's faster performance than any GTX680 and more value and Gigabyte charges $580 for Gigabyte GTX680 4GB.

They took nothing away.

Sure they did, they took BF3 as the last major game where NV's GTX600 series had a foothold. Now NV has nothing major where it wins and still 15-20 games where it trails to AMD. HD7000 series is a more well-rounded card and closing BF3 was the last area necessary to have a faster card in 4 out of 4 most GPU demanding games (Metro 2033, Crysis 1/Warhead, BF3, Witcher 2 EE).

And the 7970 is still loosing in Crysis 2 or in some Maps of Max Payne 3 in which bandwidth is not the limiting factor.

HD7970 competes with GTX670 not 680.

HD7970 GE beats GTX680 in Crysis 2. Same for MP3.

I think you are missing a key development here - AMD has continued to work hard on improving drivers across the board, in games where it was leading and in games where it was losing. That adds value to current owners. NV on the other hand has done little in this regard wrt games where it was losing to the competitor. Not everyone who owns an NV card plays BF3 only. It seems you are criticizing AMD for taking this long to improve performance in the games where their cards trailed but not criticizing NV at all in any of the games where it continues to lose by 15-20%.

BTW: Fermi had never such problems. It looks that something is strange with GCN so they need to fix all the problem on an application basis.

Oh really, just ask BFG10K about GTX470 driver issues in OpenGL games between Windows XP and Windows 7. NV took at least 6+ months to optimize drivers for Fermi and squeeze out more performance. I know as I owned them and I saw those driver performance improvements trickle over time. When you say AMD had problems, so did NV. The difference is AMD already had the fastest card since June and with these drivers took BF3 as the last major game NV had any lead in, while NV did literally nothing to close the gaps in the games where it was trailing other than Shogun 2. You can say AMD's drivers needed improvements and AMD finally delivered, while NV's drivers needed improvement and they twirled thumbs for 7 months. Where are NV's driver improvements in 10-15 games where they are losing?

 

[raghu78]

I hope not, prices were pretty bad at release and their inablity to gain market share while having the first to market advantage should be a lesson to them.

Nvidia doesn't do that with their older products, that's why I got a 470 in Nov 2010 for $180 instead of $350. You can find the 480 on Newegg for between $170 and $200 as well as other 40nm products like the GTX 570 for $230. If AMD doesn't do that, all the more reason to push inventory clearance prior to a new release.

I'm not so much faulting as raising objections, if you look at my sig I have not adopted a 28nm product yet. If anything these bundles are targeted at people like me, and to some extent people who are looking for an additional card. My concern as posted is that value of the games is subjective, and this isn't my first GPU pony ride so I'm aware that an eight month old product is near the end of it's cycle to be replaced by newer, better, faster. So what part of this bundle is compelling to someone like me, someone who hasn't jumped on the 28nm bandwagon yet? The worth of the games themselves is subjective, the price point is still exceedingly high at $400+ for a product we all know is going to be last gen in short order.

Yes it's the top GPU for this generation, however that will mean absolutely nothing in short order, so why is it still commanding such a large price premium? Now I know I'll catch flack for this because the 680 is still there as well, but my point is that I haven't bought a 680 and AMD is not in the same position as Nvidia. That's why they're offering these deals, they need sales and personally I don't think they've justified it - at least for me.

Nvidia took a lot of criticism for GTX 480 and GTX 470 at launch. the initial negative impression had a severe impact on the product brand and affected pricing. GTX 580 and GTX 570 had a much more positive reception. you did not watch GTX 580 prices before most of the cards went out of stock at the e-tailers like newegg. the lowest prices were USD 380 for 1.5 gb versions while the 3gb versions sold for 500+. even now there is a GTX 580 for 430 and refurbished for 350. .

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...=1&srchInDesc=

GTX 580 with duke nukem coupon for 430. Compare that against a HD 7970 Ghz selling for 450 bucks with a 3 free game bundle and a 20% discount coupon for a 4th one.

Frankly there are people who will always buy Nvidia given its the more dominant company with the stronger brand and reputation. But there are many gamers who are brand agnostic and look for the best performance and also for attractive deals. This promotion is targetted at those people.

One another thing which has happened is Nvidia has made a huge sweep of OEM notebook graphics with Kepler. AMD has lost out on the mobile discrete GPU market and the market share numbers will back that up. That is due to AMD's poor marketing and also due to Nvidia's superior Optimus technology. AMD's Enduro has had a rough start. Hopefully AMD is able to improve the market share with HD 8000 series mobile wins.

So AMD is forced to improve desktop GPU sales to offset mobile discrete GPU sales losses. Anyway if you would rather pay more and get a Nvidia card suit yourself.

 

[tviceman]

NM.

 

[blastingcap]

Let's stay on topic and not take the trolls' bait.

Running 2-3 energy guzzling Fermis in one's own system and then inexplicably making a fuss about 14 watts is hypocritically hilarious, but at least it's on topic despite the hypocrisy.

Trying to make this thread into an extension of the existing, multiple threads about AMD's finances is not on topic when we're talking about a performance driver update.

 

[96Firebird]

Let's stay on topic and not take the trolls' bait.

Running 2-3 energy guzzling Fermis in one's own system and then inexplicably making a fuss about 14 watts is hypocritically hilarious, but at least it's on topic despite the hypocrisy.

Trying to make this thread into an extension of the existing, multiple threads about AMD's finances is not on topic when we're talking about a performance driver update.

So you put him on ignore, and now you keep talking about him?

I'd say this is derailing the thread more than the discussion he was having did...

 

[raghu78]

The holiday game bundle is not worth $170. Only two games are free.

For the HD 7900 cards its definitely worth 170. 3 free games - Sleeping Dogs, Farcy 3 , Hitman Absolution and a 20% off discount coupon for MOH Warfighter.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/amd-never-settle-program-gives-040100767.html
http://blogs.amd.com/play/this-holiday-never-settle/

for HD 7870, HD 7850 and HD 7770 Ghz its 60 bucks. Farcry 3 free download and 20% off on MOH Warfighter

 

[lavaheadache]

Is there any concrete info on when the holiday bundle goes into effect? I just may dive into another card when that happens

 

[Rvenger]

Is there any concrete info on when the holiday bundle goes into effect? I just may dive into another card when that happens

Superbiiz is offering it and so is Newegg on some.

 

[chimaxi83]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure there's still nobody that cares about the golden unicorn value that you see in your 470s Balla You couldn't upgrade, great, get over it, move on. Those of us who did upgrade are enjoying the improvements we've been getting just from drivers.

Also, what the hell does financial standing have to do with the performance improvements and bundles they're giving us, the consumers? Do you seriously think people are basing their video card purchasing decisions on quarterly earnings reports? Get real.

I understand some of you guys feel the need to run damage control, but how about make a thread where you guys can discuss meaningless (to the consumer) subjects to make your company look better? Alternatively, there's always ABT for that

Anyway, can't wait to try this out Going to compare numbers against my 1475 MHz DC II 680, which already loses in some testing to a 1200 MHz 7970.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

So you put him on ignore, and now you keep talking about him?

I'd say this is derailing the thread more than the discussion he was having did...

I actually never knew what the power increase was, that's why I asked. I was under the impression it was nothing, but even what it is is trivial for the performance increase it provided. I think these are great drivers, I never said otherwise.

@raghu78

I think you're simply confusing AMD's price structure at launch, they never increased price/perf, all they did was add two additional cards at a higher tier of performance (the 7950/7970) which both occupied higher performance tiers than they had prior, and higher price tiers as well. It would stand to reason that the 6970 and 6950 cards did not decrease in price as they were already direct competitors to the 7850 and 7870 and for awhile a worse perf/price ratio unless you considered OC'ing.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure there's still nobody that cares about the golden unicorn value that you see in your 470s Balla You couldn't upgrade, great, get over it, move on. Those of us who did upgrade are enjoying the improvements we've been getting just from drivers.

Also, what the hell does financial standing have to do with the performance improvements and bundles they're giving us, the consumers? Do you seriously think people are basing their video card purchasing decisions on quarterly earnings reports? Get real.

I understand some of you guys feel the need to run damage control, but how about make a thread where you guys can discuss meaningless (to the consumer) subjects to make your company look better? Alternatively, there's always ABT for that

Anyway, can't wait to try this out Going to compare numbers against my 1475 MHz DC II 680, which already loses in some testing to a 1200 MHz 7970.

That's nice, but it doesn't change the fact that AMD is offering these bundles and better perf/price because they aren't getting the sales they want. If you have a better explanation I'd love to hear it, rather than roll eyes it might be a nice change of pace if you were a bit more constructive.

I'm happy for you, I think it's great. I never said anything bad about the drivers, not once in this entire thread.

Drama isn't helping, but to answer your question - it makes the point. AMD isn't making these offers out of the goodness of their hearts, so it begs the question is it enough to entice people so late in the product cycle. That was my point, nothing more you can leave your emotions behind in your response.

I don't think you understand what a discussion is, this isn't damage control. I couldn't care less, hopefully this drives GK110 to market quicker if anything. I see that as a good thing, however I'm not sure it will it's just not that compelling. There are lots of forums, jealousy is over-rated.

You should make a thread for that, I've never seen an on air 1475MHz 680 before!

 

[taltamir]

Didn't they just release the 12.10 driver? (12 = 2012, 10 = October... its now Oct 22nd 2012.)
There are a few weeks yet until the 12.11 driver actually comes out so isn't it a bit premature to call your benchmark that?

 

[RussianSensation]

The last AMD card I had was a 4850 and at the time yes it was ongoing issue, I'm sure you could track down the info. In any case the jump in image quality I got going from a 4850 to a 460 blew my mind and I've since lost interest in AMD gpu's.

I went from HD4890 to GTX470s and saw no improvement in 3D image quality other than the ability of GTX470 to have way more performance that allowed it to use much higher settings. Not sure where you are getting that HD4850 had sacrificed image quality. I think there was an AF/mip-map transition issues in Half-Life 2 that computerbase investigated but it didn't affect new games and it affected HD6800 series (it was a change in CCC panel that resulted in Performance textures instead of Quality. This was fixed if you moved the slider to High Quality). When you buy your GPU, if you want the best image quality for NV or AMD, you move everything to Highest Texture/Image quality not performance optimized. So again, if you set the CCC panel properly, HD4850 would have put out very good image quality regardless of AI optimizations done with that 1 driver. When you say GTX460 was "mind-blowingly" better in image quality, that's just your opinion. Without images or videos, it's hard to take your post seriously, especially to those of us who owned both HD4800 and GTX400 series back to back and followed that Catalyst High vs. Performance texture quality issue, that like I said only affected HD6000 series, not 4000 series, and was fixed with the next version.

Again, it doesn't seem to just be heat. I get artifacts in Skyrim and AB shows the card to be barely hitting 45 degrees. But this is a little off topic, so I'll just make another thread.

Do you get artifacts at stock speeds? What happens if you bump the voltage to 1.25V? Sometimes high voltage actually can cause artifacts. Try to lower your voltage and your overclock.