ATi vs nVidia drivers

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

What I could say, is that what is good, or bad, for one must be good or bad for the other. There is no in betweens or exceptions.

So as a hypothetical example if company A releases great drivers every month while company B releases crappy drivers every month, does that make both companies equal?

Does the act of both companies releasing something monthly automatically imply (to quote you) ?what is good, or bad, for one must be good or bad for the other. There is no in betweens or exceptions??

I mean seriously, what a load of utter nonsense.

I'm just giving you a proper way of looking at things instead of this diatribe of how a monthly driver release is the cats meow, when it clearly is not (unless you happen to have a problem fixed by a given release which would likely make you think kindly on them).

I'd take monthly supported WHQL drivers over unsupported beta scraps leaked akin to diarrhea.

Why only two months ago with ATI?

Because 8.7/8.8 was the first driver I started with after picking up my 4850.

YOU actually did by implying that more frequently released drivers were somehow better.

Compared to nVidia's ?schedule? they are; much better.

The last I will say in this matter is that it doesn't matter how frequently or infrequently drivers are released from either company.

Wow...just...wow. So if the only driver you ever got was the one that came with the CD in the box you?d find that perfectly acceptable?

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

What I could say, is that what is good, or bad, for one must be good or bad for the other. There is no in betweens or exceptions.

So as a hypothetical example if company A releases great drivers every month while company B releases crappy drivers every month, does that make both companies equal?

Does the act of both companies releasing something monthly automatically imply (to quote you) ?what is good, or bad, for one must be good or bad for the other. There is no in betweens or exceptions??

I mean seriously, what a load of utter nonsense.

I'm just giving you a proper way of looking at things instead of this diatribe of how a monthly driver release is the cats meow, when it clearly is not (unless you happen to have a problem fixed by a given release which would likely make you think kindly on them).

I'd take monthly supported WHQL drivers over unsupported beta scraps leaked akin to diarrhea.

Why only two months ago with ATI?

Because 8.7/8.8 was the first driver I started with after picking up my 4850.

YOU actually did by implying that more frequently released drivers were somehow better.

Compared to nVidia's ?schedule? they are; much better.

The last I will say in this matter is that it doesn't matter how frequently or infrequently drivers are released from either company.

Wow...just...wow. So if the only driver you ever got was the one that came with the CD in the box you?d find that perfectly acceptable?

Same thing.

 

[Creig]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003
The last I will say in this matter is that it doesn't matter how frequently or infrequently drivers are released from either company.

I think the majority of gamers would have to disagree with you on this point. If you look at any of the discussions regarding Nvidia vs ATI cards, one of the points that is always brought up in ATIs favor is the frequency of their driver releases.

If both Nvidia and ATI have just released their latest driver and both are experiencing the same issue with the same game, ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month. Nvidia users will have to wait at least four to six months for the same fix unless Nvidia happens to leak a Beta driver that addresses the problem.

Neither programming team has ever created the "perfect" driver. They are continually being tweaked. But the sooner an updated driver can get a fix out to the public, the better it is for the end user.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: Creig

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003
The last I will say in this matter is that it doesn't matter how frequently or infrequently drivers are released from either company.

I think the majority of gamers would have to disagree with you on this point. If you look at any of the discussions regarding Nvidia vs ATI cards, one of the points that is always brought up in ATIs favor is the frequency of their driver releases.

If both Nvidia and ATI have just released their latest driver and both are experiencing the same issue with the same game, ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month. Nvidia users will have to wait at least four to six months for the same fix unless Nvidia happens to leak a Beta driver that addresses the problem.

Neither programming team has ever created the "perfect" driver. They are continually being tweaked. But the sooner an updated driver can get a fix out to the public, the better it is for the end user.

False.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: Creig

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003
The last I will say in this matter is that it doesn't matter how frequently or infrequently drivers are released from either company.

I think the majority of gamers would have to disagree with you on this point. If you look at any of the discussions regarding Nvidia vs ATI cards, one of the points that is always brought up in ATIs favor is the frequency of their driver releases.

If both Nvidia and ATI have just released their latest driver and both are experiencing the same issue with the same game, ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month. Nvidia users will have to wait at least four to six months for the same fix unless Nvidia happens to leak a Beta driver that addresses the problem.

Neither programming team has ever created the "perfect" driver. They are continually being tweaked. But the sooner an updated driver can get a fix out to the public, the better it is for the end user.

False.

no true!

AMD has regular drivers that everyone but reviewers look forward to
- FACT .. AMD does release drivers that fix problems in as little as a month

the *perception* is that Nvidia takes much longer to fix issues

i have both Companies GPUs since May 07
- AMD's method is better

"regular" updates trumps "irregular"

someday Nvidia will catch on, i think

 

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: Creig

...ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month....

False.

:roll:

No, it's not false. If I have a bug in Catalyst 8.8 I can look forward to a potential official fix in 8.9. In fact I've already pointed out repeatedly that exactly that happened for some of my bugs.

So what you?re saying is false actually happened, making you wrong.

Honestly, what part of this are you having trouble understanding?

Actually I think you get everything just fine but you're intentionally trying to obfuscate the issue. Why are you doing this? Has someone told you to act this way or are you doing it on your own accord?

I'll keep an eye on it for ya.

You?ll keep an eye out on what? After the Vista debacle we were promised monthly WHQL drivers from nVidia but anyone can see that never happened.

As an example we waited three months between 178.13 and 175.19 and five months between 169.21 and 175.16.

 

[shangshang]

Here's the release notes for Cat 8.9

Resolved Issues for the Windows Vista Operating System (17 items)

· Company of Heroes: Setting the in-game options to maximum levels no longer results in the game exiting to the desktop after the game has completed loading. Further details can be found in topic number 737-32600

· Quake 4: Corruption is no longer noticed during the new game introduction ? Playing a Blu-ray DVD title may result in corruption being intermittently noticed when using certain display resolutions such as 1360x768, 1360x1024, or 1600x1200

· DiRT: Setting shadows to ultra quadCF no longer results in a performance drop being noticed. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37320

· Assassins Creed: Brightness and saturation distortion is no longer observed during game play with ForceAA enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37327

· Grid: Enabling CrossFire and starting a new game no longer results in flickering bands being noticed across the display device. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37331

· Jericho: Corruption is no longer noticed when AA is enabled and the in-game option Advanced Smoothing is enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37332

· Age of Conan: Playing the game for a short period of time no longer results in flickering corruption being noticed. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37333

· Enabling BOB de-interlacing no longer results in a green line being noticed on the bottom of the playback window when playing a 1080i clip. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35895

· Playing certain Blu-Ray DVD titles using the Cyberlink player no longer result in color corruption being noticed. This issue may be experienced under the Windows Vista (32 bit version) operating system when using an ATI Radeon? HD 4870 X2 product

· The Blu-ray DVD movie image no longer fails to rotated when the player window is drag to an extend monitor which rotated 180 degree. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37329

· Switching from h.264 to MPEG2 video titles no longer results in the operating system failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37322

· VC1 streams with Interlaced Frame and Slice features no longer results in picture corruption and flicker in VLD sites. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37324

· Playing a DVD title using the Windows Media Player no longer results in the user defined Avivo Video settings failing to be applied. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37317

· Playing a DVD title using the PowerDVD player no longer results in the PowerDVD player failing to respond when DXVA is disabled, closed captioning is enabled and the user is fast forwarding the DVD title anywhere from 4x to 32x. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37328

· Clicking on the seek slider when playing a DVD title using the PowerDVD player no longer results in corruption being noticed on the playback window. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37323

· Resuming from power saving mode on a system with an HDMI TV connected no longer results in the operating system failing to resume. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37318

· Using a hot-key command to switch between an HDMI display device and any other display device no longer fails. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37330
Resolved Issues for the Windows XP Operating System


Resolved Issues for the Windows XP Operating System (17 items)

· Lord of the Rings: Return of the King: Flickering is no longer noticed when changing chapters

· Stranglehold: Setting the in-game options to 1024x768, and Decals off no longer results in the game failing to respond after a short period of game play

· World in Conflict (DX9): Enabling CrossFire no longer results in flashing corruption and the game intermittently failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37341

· Oblivion: Setting the display option to 2048X1536 and AA to either 8x or 16x, while having the in-game options remain at their default values no longer results in the game failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37342

· Hellgate London: Enabling AA to 8x, AF to 16x and setting Mipmap Detail Level to High Performance, along with AAA set to Performance no longer results in textures being missing when playing the game 8x. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37343

· Witcher: Game corruption is no longer noticed when setting all of the in-game options to their maximum values and having CrossFire enabled along with AA set to 16x and AF set to 8x. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37344

· Spore: Playing the game in a windowed mode on the secondary display device no longer results in poor performance being noticed when AA is set to 8x. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37345

· Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts: Enabling CrossFire no longer results in the displays flashing corruption when setting the in game graphics options to off or their lowest settings. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35118

· Age of Conan: The inventory icons may show corruption when playing the game with CrossFire? enabled. This issue may also be experienced under the Windows Vista operating system as well. Further details can be found in topic number 737-34825

· Catalyst Control Center->Theater Mode->Video Aspect Ratio: The default settings no longer fail to be restored when clicking on the Default button. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37337

· Setting the display mode to 1080p50 and rebooting the system no longer results in the display mode failing to be retained

· Cropped text is no longer noticed when changing the language option and DPI setting from their default values. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37334

· Setting the language option to Polish no longer results in the hot-key Ctrl+alt+C being active resolving issues with Polish keyboards. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37335

· Certain supported languages no longer display cropped text within the Display Options of the Catalyst Control Center. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37336

· Resuming from hibernation mode no longer results in the TV signal failing to be restored. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37338

· Closed captioning no longer fails under the Windows XP and Windows XP Professional x64 Edition operating systems. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37339

· The FM seek function under Windows MCE no longer fails to find radio stations. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37340


Known Issues Under the Windows Vista Operating System (18 items)

· Call of Duty 4 or Crysis: Color corruption may be noticed when running the games in full screen mode with Quad CrossFire? enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35115

· Crysis: Playing the game at a display resolution lower than the native display resolution of a connected 30" display device may result in corruption being noticed when CrossFire? is enabled and having the Catalyst? Control Center scaling the image to full screen. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35111

· Hellgate London: Pressing Alt-Tab to return to the Windows Vista (32 bit version) desktop while playing the game may intermittently result in a translucent image of the game appearing on the Windows desktop. This issue may be experienced on systems containing either an ATI Radeon? HD 4870 X2 or ATI Radeon? 4800 product

· Lost Planet (DX10 version): Some of the in-game display resolutions may fail to be available when using a CRT display device. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35872

· Gears of War: The game may intermittently fail to respond on systems running Windows Vista (32 bit version) and containing an ATI 48x0 series of product when certain having various in-game options set. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37346

· The secondary HDMI Display may turn off when resuming from an S1 hibernation with an HDMI display connected. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31146

· An error message may appear when installing the display driver package through setup.exe. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31577

· Installing an ATI Radeon? X1600 series of product into a system containing an ATI Radeon? HD 2600 series of product with the display driver already installed may result in the operating system entering a continuous reboot. This issue may be averted by removing the ATI graphics driver prior to the installation of the ATI Radeon? X1600 series of product. This issue may also be experienced with the ATI Radeon? X1300 and 1550 series of products. Furtherinformation may be found in topic number 737-33471

· Performing an express install of the Catalyst? Control Center may result in an error message being displayed when rebooting the system. Further details can be found in topic number 737-29532

· Restoring the factory defaults for the Catalyst? Control Center may result in the Catalyst? Control Center title bar intermittently failing to be redrawn when dragging the interface around the Windows Vista (64 bit version) desktop

· Video playback may occasionally appear shaky or jerky when playing a recorded video file using a Webcam to record and Quickplay to playback the file Enabling extended desktop mode and setting the color depth below 16bpp may occasionally result in the secondary display device failing to redraw properly

· Connecting two or more display devices and enabling either extended desktop or clone mode may intermittently result in the operating system failing to respond when running the Auto-tune feature in the Catalyst Control Center -> OverDrive page. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37347

· Setting the desktop resolution to 1600x1200 or greater may result in green pixel corruption being noticed when playing certain games. This issue maybe noticed when using a system running Windows Vista and containing an ATI Radeon? HD 2600 or HD 2400 series of product. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31150

· Attempting to play the HD-DVD title Harsh Times, School for Scoundrels using the Cyberlink player may result in block corruption being noticed. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31155

· Enabling clone mode followed by switching to extended desktop mode may result in the Windows Vista (64 bit version) failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-34125

· Enabling extended desktop mode and setting the color depth below 16bpp may result in the secondary display device failing to redraw properly. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35114

· A green or black screen may be displayed when configuring MCE to ATSC mode. Further information may be found in topic number 737-27622

· Playing a Blu-ray DVD title may result in corruption being noticed when using certain display resolutions such as 1360x768, 1360x1024, or 1600x1200. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35896

· Enabling clone mode followed by switching to extended desktop mode may result in the Windows Vista (64 bit version) failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35766


Known Issues Under the Windows XP Operating System (10 items)

· Connecting a CRT display device as the secondary display and playing a Blu-ray DVD using a Cyberlink player may result in no video playback if extended desktop mode is enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35122

· Connecting a Dual Link Panel to the on-board DVI port, followed by hot plugging a DVI display to the add-on DVI card may result in clone mode becoming disabled when rebooting the machine and the secondary display device remaining blank. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31166

· The display may be come corrupted with 4 bit color depth after hot unplugging the rotated primary HDMI/DFP display. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35116

· Setting the display resolution to 1440x900 or lower may result in corruption being noticed when playing a DVD title. Further details can be found in topic number 737-31168

· Setting the display resolution to 2560x1200 and playing a DVD title may occasionally result in corruption being noticed on sub-menu pages. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37348

· Catalyst? Control Center: Configuring a system with multi-adapters may result in an error message being displayed when running the Test Custom Clocks 737-29953

· Enabling pull down detection in the Catalyst? Control Center may result in flickering being noticed when playing a video clip using the Cyberlink PowerDVD player. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35121

· Enabling pull down detection in the Catalyst Control Center may result in flickering being noticed when playing a video clip using the Cyberlink PowerDVD player. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35121

· Avivo Video color settings may fail to be applied in the video when played using PowerDVD. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37350

· Avivo Video color settings may occasionally fail to be applied in the video when played using PowerDVD ? Enabling pull down detection in the Catalyst? Control Center may intermittently result in flickering being noticed when playing a video clip using the Cyberlink PowerDVD player. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35121

· Playing a DVD title on a display device that is rotated by 90 degrees may occasionally result in the player failing to play the title. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37351

· Playing a Blu-ray DVD title using PowerDVD may result in the movie previews appearing corrupted. Further details can be found in topic number 737-37349


====================================


So in Cat 8.9, there were 34 issues resolves, and 28 issues unresolved. Some of the unresovled issues were carryovers from Cat 8.8, and some of the unresolved issues were not in 8.8 but were newly introduced. Just an observation.

But one unresolved issue for Vista (which I bolded above) dealing with installation caused me hours of headache!

When I searched the ATI site for topic "737-31577", I found this:

737-31577: Radeon? X1800 series: An error message may appear when installing the display driver package through setup.exe

The information in this article applies to the following configuration(s):

* Radeon? X1800 series
* Windows Vista 32-bit Edition
* Windows Vista 64-bit Edition
* Windows XP Professional
* Windows XP Home Edition
* Windows XP Media Center Edition
* Windows XP Professional x64 Edition

Symptoms:
An error message may appear when installing the display driver package through setup.exe

Solution:
Currently there is no solution.ATI Engineering has been advised of this issue and is investigating. Any updates will be published when they become available.


How in the world could ATI have released a software package with such basic installation error when they knew about it, is beyond me! Imagine releasing a software that the customers can't install it because your installation package doesn't work. That is unacceptable in my book. But luckily Google has the answer to ATI's issue which ATI has no solution to. Amazing. I love how ATI say things like "further details can be found on topic number #####", and then you do a search on the topic number only to come back with "Currently there is no solution...". And then you Google up your issue, and sure enough some dude already figured out a work-around. Just love it.

 

[Cookie Monster]

Ive been waiting for a fix for powerplay ever since ive purchased my card. Having to resort to BIOs flashes, editors and the like shouldn't be called for. Been waiting for 3 months. Its strange to know that a GTX260 idles at a lower power consumption rate than the HD4850.. Some cards do idle at 2D clocks of 160/500. Thats a huge difference from 500/750.

Anyway, lets cut to the chase. Just what is the difference between WHQL and beta? One is MS certified. The other isnt. Its as simple as this. Im confused at why some people put alot of emphasis on WHQL drivers. The only thing it tells a user is that it has passed all stability, functionality and other related tests in an environment setup by MS. Just how does this relate to your system, one may never know until we know exactly how drivers are certified by MS.

As long as the selected driver provides the best stability and performance for your system, it doesn't matter whether or not its WHQL. (IMHO)

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster
Ive been waiting for a fix for powerplay ever since ive purchased my card. Having to resort to BIOs flashes, editors and the like shouldn't be called for. Been waiting for 3 months. Its strange to know that a GTX260 idles at a lower power consumption rate than the HD4850.. Some cards do idle at 2D clocks of 160/500. Thats a huge difference from 500/750.

Anyway, lets cut to the chase. Just what is the difference between WHQL and beta? One is MS certified. The other isnt. Its as simple as this. Im confused at why some people put alot of emphasis on WHQL drivers. The only thing it tells a user is that it has passed all stability, functionality and other related tests in an environment setup by MS. Just how does this relate to your system, one may never know until we know exactly how drivers are certified by MS.

As long as the selected driver provides the best stability and performance for your system, it doesn't matter whether or not its WHQL. (IMHO)

I've had a few WHQL drivers, installed from the MS Windows Update page, crashed. It's pretty humorous that after reverting to the previous drivers, I have to tell Windows Update to ignore the WHQL drivers by checking the "do not remind me again" box. Funny as hell.

 

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: shangshang

So in Cat 8.9, there were 34 issues resolves, and 28 issues unresolved. Some of the unresovled issues were carryovers from Cat 8.8, and some of the unresolved issues were not in 8.8 but were newly introduced. Just an observation.

I'm not really sure what the point of that was unless you're going to do some kind of comparison with nVidia. At that stage it becomes tricky as none of these have ever been listed in the readme yet some have been around since November 2006.

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster

The only thing it tells a user is that it has passed all stability, functionality and other related tests in an environment setup by MS.

This isn't quite true. WHQL results are submitted from third party systems used by the tester and additionally Microsoft may test on a range of their systems too.

The tests guarantee that they won't FUBAR the system in the ways tested by Microsoft.

Besides, releasing WHQL drivers every month shows an attitude of commitment to driver support, something that unscheduled releases do not.

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster

As long as the selected driver provides the best stability and performance for your system, it doesn't matter whether or not its WHQL. (IMHO)

But that's just it; some of nVidia's beta drivers are shocking, especially the leaked ones. I've used some betas that crashed the system so hard they corrupted some of the files of the game I was running when the system crashed, requiring me to reinstall the game. This is why I never bother with leaked betas any more.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: Creig

...ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month....

False.

:roll:

No, it's not false. If I have a bug in Catalyst 8.8 I can look forward to a potential official fix in 8.9. In fact I've already pointed out repeatedly that exactly that happened for some of my bugs.

So what you?re saying is false actually happened, making you wrong.

Honestly, what part of this are you having trouble understanding?

Actually I think you get everything just fine but you're intentionally trying to obfuscate the issue. Why are you doing this? Has someone told you to act this way or are you doing it on your own accord?

I'll keep an eye on it for ya.

You?ll keep an eye out on what? After the Vista debacle we were promised monthly WHQL drivers from nVidia but anyone can see that never happened.

As an example we waited three months between 178.13 and 175.19 and five months between 169.21 and 175.16.

I think you need to calm waaaaaaaay down. It's true from your perspective because your particular issue was handled. Others were not as I have noted. So enough with the "what part of this am I having trouble understanding" garbage please.
By the way, Nvidia did just release another WHQL driver (178.13's). I'm sure there are fixes in it, as well as issues not addressed, and maybe things that worked before but do not now..

Just because there is "hope" that something will be fixed in a month, doesn't mean it will be.
You got lucky. Others did not. This is a fact. This is real. Deal with it. Be fair. Done.

 

[OCGuy]

Are we talking about a company that didnt even have the "real" drivers out for the 4 series until weeks after its launch? What a joke.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: Ocguy31
Are we talking about a company that didnt even have the "real" drivers out for the 4 series until weeks after its launch? What a joke.

No. We are talking about both companies and their drivers. Who cares about the 4 series launch? That was a bunch of yesterdays ago. Right now, they are doing quite well.

 

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

I think you need to calm waaaaaaaay down. It's true from your perspective because your particular issue was handled. Others were not as I have noted. So enough with the "what part of this am I having trouble understanding" garbage please.

Seriously, your rhetorical games are really getting tiresome. Let's look at that quote again.

Creig said:

ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month

Your response was:

False

Since ATi release official drivers once a month you're either trolling or you're claiming ATi?s drivers never contain any fixes. If neither apply there?s no possible way your answer could be ?false?.

Again I have to ask what the point of your rhetoric is? It?s almost like you?re trying to hide nVidia?s driver inferiority by deflecting the issue whenever possible.

We know ATi don't have perfect drivers. We never claimed otherwise.
We know some issues carry over more than one month. We never claimed otherwise.
We know monthly drivers don?t guarantee all issues will be fixed in one month. We never claimed otherwise.

I really don't understand why you keeping going off on these irrelevant tangents.

What was said was that monthly WHQL drivers are far better than 3-4 monthly WHQL (up to 6 months) unscheduled releases and that ATi users know exactly where they stand because a driver will be coming next month, unlike an nVidia user. And because of a monthly schedule ATi's drivers potentially deliver fixes faster than nVidia?s.

Honestly, it?s not rocket science.

By the way, Nvidia did just release another WHQL driver (178.13's). I'm sure there are fixes in it, as well as issues not addressed, and maybe things that worked before but do not now.

And for those that didn?t get fixes that's another 3-4 months they?ll have to wait, up to 6. Meanwhile an ATi user can potentially have their issue fixed next month. See the difference?

Just because there is "hope" that something will be fixed in a month, doesn't mean it will be.

Likewise whether you have hope or not doesn?t change the fact that with ATi the fix could be as little as a month away. Hope doesn?t deliver fixes, drivers do.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

I think you need to calm waaaaaaaay down. It's true from your perspective because your particular issue was handled. Others were not as I have noted. So enough with the "what part of this am I having trouble understanding" garbage please.

Seriously, your rhetorical games are really getting tiresome. Let's look at that quote again.

Creig said:

ATI users can look forward to seeing it resolved in as little as one month

Your response was:

False

Since ATi release official drivers once a month you're either trolling or you're claiming ATi?s drivers never contain any fixes. If neither apply there?s no possible way your answer could be ?false?.

Again I have to ask what the point of your rhetoric is? It?s almost like you?re trying to hide nVidia?s driver inferiority by deflecting the issue whenever possible.

We know ATi don't have perfect drivers. We never claimed otherwise.
We know some issues carry over more than one month. We never claimed otherwise.
We know monthly drivers don?t guarantee all issues will be fixed in one month. We never claimed otherwise.

I really don't understand why you keeping going off on these irrelevant tangents.

What was said was that monthly WHQL drivers are far better than 3-4 monthly WHQL (up to 6 months) unscheduled releases and that ATi users know exactly where they stand because a driver will be coming next month, unlike an nVidia user. And because of a monthly schedule ATi's drivers potentially deliver fixes faster than nVidia?s.

Honestly, it?s not rocket science.

By the way, Nvidia did just release another WHQL driver (178.13's). I'm sure there are fixes in it, as well as issues not addressed, and maybe things that worked before but do not now.

And for those that didn?t get fixes that's another 3-4 months they?ll have to wait, up to 6. Meanwhile an ATi user can potentially have their issue fixed next month. See the difference?

Just because there is "hope" that something will be fixed in a month, doesn't mean it will be.

Likewise whether you have hope or not doesn?t change the fact that with ATi the fix could be as little as a month away. Hope doesn?t deliver fixes, drivers do.

If you insist. What could I say? I've said my piece, and so have you. I'm fine with it.
Cheers.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
What was said was that monthly WHQL drivers are far better than 3-4 monthly WHQL (up to 6 months) unscheduled releases and that ATi users know exactly where they stand because a driver will be coming next month, unlike an nVidia user. And because of a monthly schedule ATi's drivers potentially deliver fixes faster than nVidia?s.

Honestly, it?s not rocket science.

It's also not that simple.

1. All NVIDIA driver releases, beta or WHQL, go through the same testing. NVIDIA just opts not to pay MS for their testing on some.

2. WHQL drivers are not inherently better, they've just been tested by MS. There are many examples of issues existing with WHQL drivers, and a company opting to pay MS to certify drivers that still contain issues doesn't mean they're better drivers.

3. Your example is what's known as "anecdotal evidence" and can't be used to prvve anything. For example, ask an ATi MAXX owner how long it took for Win2K drivers. (never happened) Ask Ben Skywalker how long it took for a "Sacrifice" fix- years. All graphics companies have ongoing driver issues, it's very hard to categorically say one is better than the other based on your own limited experience.

4. You know I can link to articles that say NVIDIA's drivers were "better" at a point in time, just as I can articles that say ATi's were. Moot point.

Seems a lot of wasted effort to me on something that can't ever be proved one way or another.

 

[Zstream]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: BFG10K
What was said was that monthly WHQL drivers are far better than 3-4 monthly WHQL (up to 6 months) unscheduled releases and that ATi users know exactly where they stand because a driver will be coming next month, unlike an nVidia user. And because of a monthly schedule ATi's drivers potentially deliver fixes faster than nVidia?s.

Honestly, it?s not rocket science.

It's also not that simple.

1. All NVIDIA driver releases, beta or WHQL, go through the same testing. NVIDIA just opts not to pay MS for their testing on some.

2. WHQL drivers are not inherently better, they've just been tested by MS. There are many examples of issues existing with WHQL drivers, and a company opting to pay MS to certify drivers that still contain issues doesn't mean they're better drivers.

3. Your example is what's known as "anecdotal evidence" and can't be used to prvve anything. For example, ask an ATi MAXX owner how long it took for Win2K drivers. (never happened) Ask Ben Skywalker how long it took for a "Sacrifice" fix- years. All graphics companies have ongoing driver issues, it's very hard to categorically say one is better than the other based on your own limited experience.

4. You know I can link to articles that say NVIDIA's drivers were "better" at a point in time, just as I can articles that say ATi's were. Moot point.

Seems a lot of wasted effort to me on something that can't ever be proved one way or another.

I believe we are talking about AMD here Rollo not a nine year old driver team from another company....

Your first two points contradict themselves. Are you aware of the WHQL process? You can not pay MS to certify drivers if it fails the WHQL testing.

 

[solofly]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
Since ATi release official drivers once a month you're either trolling or you're claiming ATi?s drivers never contain any fixes. If neither apply there?s no possible way your answer could be ?false?.

I don't know why you're acting so surprised. These sales people have an agenda, sell sell sell, whatever it takes to brainwash the weak to get their money. Anytime talking to them is a waste of valuable time that will get you nowhere.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: Zstream
I believe we are talking about AMD here Rollo not a nine year old driver team from another company....

Ok let's go with that.
Is it your position AMD is writing the drivers for ATi these days? I know ATi is part of AMD now, but I would be very surprised if AMD staff supplanted ATi staff writing drivers for ATi products.

If they are, I'd frankly be more inclined to trust ATi staff, who have many more years experience writing graphics drivers. I don't think AMD staff have any experience writing graphics drivers.

Or are you saying AMD "cleaned house" and now have all new graphics driver programmers? Again, I'd trust ATi over them, had no problems with my ATi drivers up to the 1800 series.

Originally posted by: Zstream
Your first two points contradict themselves. Are you aware of the WHQL process? You can not pay MS to certify drivers if it fails the WHQL testing.

I probably just wasn't specific enough for you to get what I was saying.

Point 1: I meant NVIDIA does the same QA on Beta and WHQL releases, so the only testing you miss is MSs. Unless you think NVIDIA is in the habit of writing drivers that wouldn't pass WHQL, the same QA happens from their end.

Point 2: I was trying to say that a driver that passes WHQL isn't necessarily a "better" driver. A non WHQL could be better, or vice versa. People make too much of WHQL IMO- it's no guarantee of anything other than it passed the tests MS runs. If a company tests for the same type of things, the certification is somewhat unnecessary. Also, there have been lots of WHQL drivers for a lot of products that have all kinds of problems. Last, a beta driver with no issues for the software you're trying to run beats a WHQL driver with issues for the software you're trying to run.

WHQL is no silver bullet, or guarantee of driver quality.

 

[extra]

Point 2: I was trying to say that a driver that passes WHQL isn't necessarily a "better" driver. A non WHQL could be better, or vice versa. People make too much of WHQL IMO- it's no guarantee of anything other than it passed the tests MS runs. If a company tests for the same type of things, the certification is somewhat unnecessary. Also, there have been lots of WHQL drivers for a lot of products that have all kinds of problems. Last, a beta driver with no issues for the software you're trying to run beats a WHQL driver with issues for the software you're trying to run.

WHQL is no silver bullet, or guarantee of driver quality.

Amen to that. I've hard whql cert. drivers that blue screened my machine, and then upgraded them to beta drivers and had it work great.... (for nvidia card in that case btw). Why did this thread seem to devolve into a ton of pointless bickering about nothing?

also: look at the specific games your wanting to play, some play better on one card or another.. (for example i think bioshock performs way better on the 4850...or maybe i have it backwards)

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: extra
Amen to that. I've hard whql cert. drivers that blue screened my machine, and then upgraded them to beta drivers and had it work great.... (for nvidia card in that case btw). Why did this thread seem to devolve into a ton of pointless bickering about nothing?

Pretty common in video forums, unfortunately.

Originally posted by: extra
also: look at the specific games your wanting to play, some play better on one card or another.. (for example i think bioshock performs way better on the 4850...or maybe i have it backwards)

These cards are so close in performance I'd say it really comes down to whether you prefer 8X AA/DX10.1/tesselator (4850) to PhysX/CUDA/stereoscopic (9800GTX+).

If you're talking 4X16X gaming up to 19X12, flip a coin, they're pretty equal.

 

[Spike]

I find it hard to believe that nVidia does the same QA on their beta drivers as well as the WHQL. From a buisness perspective it does not make alot of sense to put in alot of time into a driver that they won't be spending the money on to get MS to approve. Unless nvidia really has the good of the consumer in mind and wants to make sure even their "unapproved" drivers are as perfect as could be and somehow I doubt that, from either company. I'm not calling you a liar as I don't have proof either way, it just does not make much sense to me.

To the topic at hand, IMO it really comes down to the games you play, the money you are willing to spend, and, to a lesser extent, the maker/support of said card. Personally in this case I would take the 4850 as it plays the games I like a little better, has better HTPC features (what I would used it for) and the cost is similar. If the games you care about are on par and the cost is about the same I would go for the 9800 due to the better vendors (eVGA, BFG, XFX, etc...) but thats just me. The physx, CUDA, 10.1 etc... are all nice but to me that have not proven their worth yet so I go based on the games I want. If those features become integral parts of the games I love to play then that will effect my decision but until then it's all about the core game performance.

Good luck!

Originally posted by: apoppin

Look for a hot deal the day you are ready to buy

Stupid hot deals, I was ready for a 4670 or 4830 for my HTPC and then those 9600gso's had to go on such great sale. Now I have one of those coming and hopefully it will work well in my HTPC... either way it has to be better than then the 7800GT it's replacing.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: Spike
I find it hard to believe that nVidia does the same QA on their beta drivers as well as the WHQL. From a buisness perspective it does not make alot of sense to put in alot of time into a driver that they won't be spending the money on to get MS to approve. Unless nvidia really has the good of the consumer in mind and wants to make sure even their "unapproved" drivers are as perfect as could be and somehow I doubt that, from either company. I'm not calling you a liar as I don't have proof either way, it just does not make much sense to me.

I got that straight from NVIDIA, what their reasons are for doing this, I would guess it's in their best interest to test all drivers they release.

They also told me in the same email that the leaked drivers are the ones that commonly have problems, because they aren't done and haven't been through full QA yet.

Testing their beta drivers would be self serving- they want their customers to have as good of an experience as possible (and buy more parts) and they likely save a fair amount of money not getting every driver certified.

BTW- I'm not saying either the 4850 or the 9800GTX has "better drivers"- I'm just pointing out "WHQL /= Better".

 

[bryanW1995]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: BFG10K
What was said was that monthly WHQL drivers are far better than 3-4 monthly WHQL (up to 6 months) unscheduled releases and that ATi users know exactly where they stand because a driver will be coming next month, unlike an nVidia user. And because of a monthly schedule ATi's drivers potentially deliver fixes faster than nVidia?s.

Honestly, it?s not rocket science.

It's also not that simple.

1. All NVIDIA driver releases, beta or WHQL, go through the same testing. NVIDIA just opts not to pay MS for their testing on some.

2. WHQL drivers are not inherently better, they've just been tested by MS. There are many examples of issues existing with WHQL drivers, and a company opting to pay MS to certify drivers that still contain issues doesn't mean they're better drivers.

3. Your example is what's known as "anecdotal evidence" and can't be used to prvve anything. For example, ask an ATi MAXX owner how long it took for Win2K drivers. (never happened) Ask Ben Skywalker how long it took for a "Sacrifice" fix- years. All graphics companies have ongoing driver issues, it's very hard to categorically say one is better than the other based on your own limited experience.

4. You know I can link to articles that say NVIDIA's drivers were "better" at a point in time, just as I can articles that say ATi's were. Moot point.

Seems a lot of wasted effort to me on something that can't ever be proved one way or another.

I can't believe that you and keys are still arguing this point. It is fundamentally better to get drivers every month than at random intervals. Most people feel that Nvidia used to have significantly better drivers, today that situation is reversed. When 8800gtx and all of its derivatives were dominating many people had no choice but to deal with weaker driver support and hope for change, but now that amd is actually competitive again this weakness is becoming for of a pressing issue for nvidia imho. You can keys have some sway with the nvidia brass; tell them to spend some of those great profits that they made last year to start writing ****ing drivers in a more timely manner. You guys know that I think huang hung the moon (say that 5 times fast), plus nvidia is poised with their next release to get the "I hate the top dog" customers back, but they need to learn from their mistakes if they expect to reclaim their graphics leadership position.

 

[BFG10K]

Originally posted by: nRollo

1. All NVIDIA driver releases, beta or WHQL, go through the same testing. NVIDIA just opts not to pay MS for their testing on some.

Then why doesn't nVidia officially support their betas?

Also how is that ATi can deliver monthly WHQL drivers but nVidia can't even deliver monthly betas?

There are many examples of issues existing with WHQL drivers, and a company opting to pay MS to certify drivers that still contain issues doesn't mean they're better drivers.

Likewise there are many examples of beta drivers having issues while WHQL drivers do not.

Given the choice between an unsupported beta and a supported WHQL, I'd pick the latter. Likewise I?d pick an officially supported monthly release schedule over an unscheduled (and sometimes unsupported) release schedule. Additionally, waiting six months for a WHQL GPU driver (quite common with nVidia) is piss-poor driver support, no two ways about it. I think even S3 and Intel release drivers faster than that.

About the only two people arguing against regular supported drivers are also nVidia focus group members, and that speaks volumes.

3. Your example is what's known as "anecdotal evidence" and can't be used to prvve anything.

Actually it can be used to prove a lot. For my selection of games I?m less likely to run into issues on ATi than I am on nVidia; in fact I?ve historically found this since the 9700 Pro when ATi got their act together with regard to driver support.

I?ve had terrible driver issues with nVidia and many issues persisted for months without even an acknowledgement. With ATi I might find the odd game might not work properly but I?ve never had anything close to the DEP issue (which lasted about six months) or the Unreal 2 stuttering fiasco (which lasted about 18 months).

Even now people are asking me to test legacy games on my 4850 and I?m finding they work fine while they fail on all nVidia DX10 hardware (e.g. Project IGI, Red Faction, etc).

Testing their beta drivers would be self serving- they want their customers to have as good of an experience as possible (and buy more parts) and they likely save a fair amount of money not getting every driver certified.

Save money? LMFAO.

ATI is bleeding hundreds of millions of dollars per quarter yet they still manage monthly WHQL drivers. If anyone needs to save money it?s them, yet they?re still committed to driver quality.

What?s nVidia?s excuse? Laziness and arrogance, that?s what. The point was made earlier about people putting up with the 8xxx series? drivers because there was no performance competition, but no more. And we clearly saw nVidia shit themselves with price drops because of it.