ATI catalyst drivers for neophyte: how to optimize?

[JimKiler]

I just got my ATI video card, X1800 XT with 512MB, after generations of Nvidia cards and I have no idea what some of the setting mean, i.e. temporal AA or the other stuff. What do I turn on and what should stay off, I want everything to look nice but if it drops my fps by 50%

any help or links to the knowledge I seek would be appreciated.

 

[LittleNemoNES]

I would almost always use 16xHQ AF. Don't use temporal AA since it will force vsync (looks nice but will have significant Fps issues)
AA -- use as much as a game will take.
Adaptive AA= use performance for most games though source engines are easy on x1k cards so you can use quality adaptive AA. Disable it for games based on OpenGL (not sure if there is a performance drop despite the fact that it doesn't work)
Catalyst AI should always be left @ standard. Off makes the card run in the dark (IE doesn't even know what game it is rendering). CatAI advanced enables shimmering, etc for 'better performance'....no thanks
Some games cause problems with forced options. BF2: don't force AA (16xHQAF is great). Don't force AF for Far Cry. Don't force anything for OpenGL games (doom, etc).

Tweakguides

 

[josh6079]

Don't mess with temporal AA. (It's pretty much worthless)

[*] Set Catalyst A.I. to standard.

[*] Set AA to "Application Controlled."

[*] Set AF to 16x and enable "HQAF". (Turns on the angle-independent AF)

[*] Turn Mipmap settings to "High Quality."

Your fear of the 50% performance hit will really depend on your game, but the biggest performance-hungry factors are generally AA and resolution.