ATI driver setup

[CP5670]

I got an unopened X1900XTX off ebay (for $415 shipped ). This is my first ATI card in over seven years, so I'm not familiar with their drivers. What third party programs do I need to set the card up for general usage (game profiles, IQ settings, etc.) and overclocking? I don't want to use CCC and would like to have a minimum of background services running.

I remember seeing a post by someone a while ago (Elfear I think) with a list of instructions on how to set everything up, but I can't find that post now.

 

[straightalker]

The information is probably somewhere on this forum.

It would be a great topic to STICKY up top and include best drivewr sets for both ATI and Nvidia.

Hope someone point us the right direction since the Catalyst 6.4 drivers on my X1800XT are slightly weird. I click on the Catalyst Control Center and it does not open up where i can see it. Though i see it open in the "open programs" list when pressing ALT-CTRL-delete.

 

[Munky]

I just installed the base driver - no .NET framewrk and no CCC. I use Ati Tray Tools to tweak all the advanced settings like HQAF, Adaptive AA, game profiles, color profiles, refresh lock, and much more. To overclock use another program called Ati Tool. Between those two programs you should have all the bases covered.

 

[straightalker]

Thanks munky.

I installed the this entire file - - Catalyst 6.4...

6-4_xp-2k_dd_ccc_wdm_enu_31959.exe

Is the base driver installed from within that? And now do i just uninstal the CControlCenter?

Or do i have to uninstall that whole 6.4 Catalyst exe file, then install a base driver?

I'm going to take your advice and go just with the base driver and the twp programs, ...ATItool with Ati Tray Tools.

thanks

 

[Munky]

If you have the option to uninstall CCC, then do it. It will leave the base driver on your system. Usually on the Ati website there's a separate file that's just the base driver - you can use that one the next time you get new drivers, there's no need to download and install the entire CCC/driver combo.

*edit: and if you have an x1900 card, disable overclocking when installing Ati Tray Tools, otherwise it won't work. If you have an older card like the x800 series, then you can use ATT for overclocking as well, so then you dont need Ati Tool.

 

[CaiNaM]

also consider the regular driver set is not bad (tho i would stick w/ 6.3 as 6.4 seems to have added a few bugs) if you don't feel like trying to overclock above 690mhz core or 1600mhz mem.

both atitool and ati traytools require some workarounds as they are not feature complete (fully functioning) with r520/580. i personally found it's not worth the hassle as CCC works just fine for me.

 

[CP5670]

What features do they not support? I would definitely prefer to use ATI Tray Tools if it uses less memory than CCC.

I have been reading quite a lot of complaints about the 6.4 drivers on various other forums. Can you still get the 6.3 drivers anywhere? (the driver only, without CCC)

I just installed the base driver - no .NET framewrk and no CCC. I use Ati Tray Tools to tweak all the advanced settings like HQAF, Adaptive AA, game profiles, color profiles, refresh lock, and much more. To overclock use another program called Ati Tool. Between those two programs you should have all the bases covered.

Thanks, that sounds like it should do everything I need. Is there some ATI service I need to disable? I remember reading something about that here a while ago.

 

[Munky]

You only need to disable the services if overclocking. If you go to the services admin tool, they would be listed as Ati Hotkey Poller and Ati Smart (or something similar...)

 

[LittleNemoNES]

I dont' see what the big deal about CCC is. I actually find the Control panel for the Omega drivers to be too clunky...

meh.

 

[v8envy]

CCC is horrifyingly slow, and it doesn't chart your GPU's temperature while you're playing a game, unlike ATI Tool. Plus, it doesn't give you very good fan control.

By default my X1800XT hit nearly 90C playing Oblivion. The fan wasn't set to kick on until 100C. With fan set at 50%, I'm looking at 60C. That's functionality you don't get with CCC.

 

[CaiNaM]

Originally posted by: CP5670
What features do they not support?

traytools overclocking feature does not work; ati tools only does overclocking, so you need to run a combination of the two (not a big deal if you have no intention of overclocking).

if you want to overclock, you will need to seperately set up voltage and clockspeed for both memory (memory won't overclock as high due to no timing control) and gpu.

now, if you want to "tinker" with it and enjoy all the different things requiring you to tweak, than that's fine.. i was just stating not everyone wants to hassle with all that, and if you don't plan on trying to attain extreme overclocks, CCC is just simply easier to live with.

I would definitely prefer to use ATI Tray Tools if it uses less memory than CCC.

why? there are no impact on performance cause by the memory used. if you're that concerned about memory usage, there are dozens of winxp services you could turn off to save a helluva a lot more

I have been reading quite a lot of complaints about the 6.4 drivers on various other forums. Can you still get the 6.3 drivers anywhere? (the driver only, without CCC)

that's why i suggested using 6.3 over 6.4. not sure on the driver only, but you can download the full install and disable/remove the components you don't want.

Thanks, that sounds like it should do everything I need. Is there some ATI service I need to disable? I remember reading something about that here a while ago.

disable the 'ATI HOTKEY POLLAR' service (you'll need to reboot directly so it doesn't start back up). after you do this you will be in 2d mode all the time (2d voltages and clocks) so you will need to adjust both voltage and clocks with atitool to get the stock 3d clocks of your card.

when overclocking, you're going to have to adj voltages manually as well the fan settings and find the "sweet spot" where you have max clocks & decent cooling.

 

[CP5670]

if you want to overclock, you will need to seperately set up voltage and clockspeed for both memory (memory won't overclock as high due to no timing control) and gpu.

now, if you want to "tinker" with it and enjoy all the different things requiring you to tweak, than that's fine.. i was just stating not everyone wants to hassle with all that, and if you don't plan on trying to attain extreme overclocks, CCC is just simply easier to live with.

That's fair enough. I'm usually ready to spend some time with third party utilities to get everything just the way I want it.

why? there are no impact on performance cause by the memory used. if you're that concerned about memory usage, there are dozens of winxp services you could turn off to save a helluva a lot more

Doesn't it need to run in the background? A lot of people say it's a real memory hog, and I would rather have the memory available for programs. As for closing all the pointless Windows services, I did that long ago. It's just me, I like to have my system squeaky clean.

I read that Madshrimps guide on overclocking these cards. It's quite informative, but it only mentions the XT's stock voltages, not those of the XTX. Does anyone happen to know what those are?

 

[LittleNemoNES]

1.425 for XT and 1.450 for XTX. The madshrimps OC guide was kinda weak...

Here's a thread that has a LOAD of info on the x1900 cards:

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=440151&page=1&pp=30

Excerpt:
:shocked:
El<(')>Maxi
1900XTX - 922/900 - 1.575 GPU, 2.275 VDD - Dry Ice

:shocked::shocked::shocked::shocked:

 

[CaiNaM]

Originally posted by: CP5670
Doesn't it need to run in the background? A lot of people say it's a real memory hog, and I would rather have the memory available for programs. As for closing all the pointless Windows services, I did that long ago. It's just me, I like to have my system squeaky clean.

as i have 1.6gb free memory, i really don't think saving 25mb by not having CCC installed is really going to make a significant impact

 

[CP5670]

bump

I have the card set up now with a decent overclock. The subjective speed improvement over my old 7800 GTs in games where the vsync previously wasn't working is pretty remarkable, even when both the online benchmarks and the actual framerate readings favor the GTs. There is definitely something funny going on with SLI in these games, well beyond the normal tearing effects. I'll post more on that in a few days once I have made some more observations.

Anyway, I am having a problem where a number of games are rendered too dark. Deus Ex looks particularly bad, but it's a problem in many other games too. It seems that the brightness adjustment in ATI Tray Tools (in the color settings menu) is only being applied to the windows desktop and not to any games, which I think might be the cause of this problem. Is there a way to apply the brightness adjustments to everything? Some old games don't have any brightness settings of their own, so I can't set it in there.

If I can get these brightness issues worked out, this card is looking like a real winner for my purposes. It's great to have D3D triple buffering, some decent AF and no more alt-tab crashes in Freespace 2, and the HDRish shader thing also seems to have potential once I figure out how to tone down the effect.

The stock cooler is loud, but it's actually not as bad as I thought. I use the default 27% speed in windows and 75% in games, and both sound fairly acceptable to me (although I use headphones in games anyway). It only really sounds annoying when the fan speed suddenly changes, so I keep it fixed at that speed in games.

Also, does adaptive AA work in OpenGL games? I can't find that option in Tray Tools for OGL game profiles.

 

[TanisHalfElven]

the one thing i found most hatefull of CCC was if is tried to open it while some progrmas were open (still plenty of free memory...checked using task manager) it opened after 5 minuted. tray tools is hel of a lot faster.

 

[BFG10K]

What third party programs do I need to set the card up for general usage (game profiles, IQ settings, etc.) and overclocking?

Base ATi driver + ATi Tray Tools is all you need.

Is there a way to apply the brightness adjustments to everything?

Yes, create and save a gamma setting in ATi Tray tools and then bind a hotkey to it. Then when you're in the game hit the hotkey to brighten the game.

Also, does adaptive AA work in OpenGL games?

No unfortunately. SSAA in OpenGL games on single cards is one of the advantages nVidia currently enjoys over ATi.

 

[CP5670]

I set the gamma correction in the ATI Tool 2D/3D profiles and it fixed that darkness issue. Thanks for the help.

 

[CCityInstaller]

Originally posted by: v8envy
CCC is horrifyingly slow, and it doesn't chart your GPU's temperature while you're playing a game, unlike ATI Tool. Plus, it doesn't give you very good fan control.

By default my X1800XT hit nearly 90C playing Oblivion. The fan wasn't set to kick on until 100C. With fan set at 50%, I'm looking at 60C. That's functionality you don't get with CCC.

I use CCC with Rivatuner to control my fan and monitor temperatures. I simply set my Accelero X2 to run @ 100% load at windows startup, and never see temps above 60C. The fact that the fan is dead silent is also welcome .