Catalyst 8.3 drivers, when will they be available and who will benfit?

[massappeal]

yes please people post up some benchies.

 

[ronnn]

Looks like new ati cards will benefit and others won't.

 

[Sylvanas]

Not sure what thread to post this in....so I'll go with this one.

Here is the list of the performance improvements from this release:

Performance Improvements
The following performance gains are noticed with this release of Catalyst?.
? Call of Juarez: Up to 20% improvement is noticed on ATI CrossFireX? configured
systems containing an ATI Radeon? HD38x0 series of product
? Company of Heroes DX10: Up to 17% improvement is noticed, especially at
lower resolutions, on ATI Radeon? HD38x0 products
? Crysis DX10: Up to 15% improvement is noticed on all supported ATI
Radeon? products
? Lost Planet DX9: Up to 36% improvement is noticed across all supported ATI
Radeon? products and in ATI CrossFireX? configured systems
? Shadermark 2.1: Performance scores increased up to 35% across all supported
Radeon? products and in ATI CrossFireX? configured systems
? Unreal Tournament 2004: Up to 10% increase in performance is noticed on
systems containing an ATI Radeon? HD2400, HD2600, or HD3400 series of
products on ATI CrossFireX? configured systems

I haven't had a chance to test this all however when I played Crysis the results were EXCELLENT- The Crysis bench didn't seem to want to work with the 8.2's so I only have 8.3 results which ran fine.

DX9
TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
Play Time: 51.87s, Average FPS: 38.56
Min FPS: 25.08 at frame 1943, Max FPS: 52.67 at frame 96
Average Tri/Sec: 36006824, Tri/Frame: 933870
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
Play Time: 47.61s, Average FPS: 42.01
Min FPS: 25.08 at frame 1943, Max FPS: 68.92 at frame 73
Average Tri/Sec: 39583580, Tri/Frame: 942342
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.97
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
Play Time: 47.95s, Average FPS: 41.71
Min FPS: 24.21 at frame 1947, Max FPS: 68.92 at frame 73
Average Tri/Sec: 39310596, Tri/Frame: 942405
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.97
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)

DX10

TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
Play Time: 65.44s, Average FPS: 30.56
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 47.80 at frame 90
Average Tri/Sec: 28304540, Tri/Frame: 926192
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.99
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
Play Time: 60.72s, Average FPS: 32.94
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 57.02 at frame 69
Average Tri/Sec: 30780346, Tri/Frame: 934414
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
Play Time: 60.61s, Average FPS: 33.00
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 57.02 at frame 69
Average Tri/Sec: 30851288, Tri/Frame: 934944
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)

All results were taken at 1920x1200 0xAA 8xAF with rig in sig all settings medium except sound which was 'high'.

Gameplay:
I noticed Dx10 is now VERY playable on my crossfire setup as frames do not drop below 30 (this is all taken from the first level).....with the 8.2 it was just hitting 30...now its 30 and above- also the framerate is alot more 'stable' (I also noticed there seemed to be no sign of the Powerplay). DX9 is just awesome, with it staying at around the 50's, sometimes dropping to the 40's but generally VERY smooth.

I haven't had a chance to test other cool stuff, next on the list is to try out the GPU aspect ratio scaling and then reinstall UT3 for the AA loving .

 

[Sjors E]

Impressive!

I noticed a substancial fps increase for crysis with my 3850's in crossfire on a P5E mobo.
can't give any definitive numbers yet (need to do some 8.2 comparison first), but somewhere between 15 and 25 %


CPU: Q6600 @ 2.4 Ghz Cooled: TRUE 120
MOBO: Asus P5E
GPU: 2x Saphire Radeon 3850 256MB @ CrossFire
RAM: 4 x 1GB Kingston PC 6400

 

[Sylvanas]

Originally posted by: Sjors E
Impressive!

I noticed a substancial fps increase for crysis with my 3850's in crossfire on a P5E mobo.
can't give any definitive numbers yet (need to do some 8.2 comparison first), but somewhere between 15 and 25 %


CPU: Q6600 @ 2.4 Ghz Cooled: TRUE 120
MOBO: Asus P5E
GPU: 2x Saphire Radeon 3850 256MB @ CrossFire
RAM: 4 x 1GB Kingston PC 6400

Indeed, I think the release notes are spot on with 15% in DX10- but I think DX9 got a very substantial boost aswell.

 

[massappeal]

Thanks Sylvanas for the marks. It's great to see these drivers helping out every aspect of visual perfrormance. I will do some benchmarking awsell, but I have yet to recieve my 3780 x2. This is only the beginning of great things to come from AMD/ATI.

 

[nubian1]

All this sounds real exciting. I installed 8.3 last night on my Vista64 box but will haven't had the time to play as yet. It's great to see AMD/ATI making finally taking the steps to make the most of their hardware. I really hope this continues.

 

[Apocalypse23]

Originally posted by: Sylvanas
Not sure what thread to post this in....so I'll go with this one.

Here is the list of the performance improvements from this release:

Performance Improvements
The following performance gains are noticed with this release of Catalyst?.
? Call of Juarez: Up to 20% improvement is noticed on ATI CrossFireX? configured
systems containing an ATI Radeon? HD38x0 series of product
? Company of Heroes DX10: Up to 17% improvement is noticed, especially at
lower resolutions, on ATI Radeon? HD38x0 products
? Crysis DX10: Up to 15% improvement is noticed on all supported ATI
Radeon? products
? Lost Planet DX9: Up to 36% improvement is noticed across all supported ATI
Radeon? products and in ATI CrossFireX? configured systems
? Shadermark 2.1: Performance scores increased up to 35% across all supported
Radeon? products and in ATI CrossFireX? configured systems
? Unreal Tournament 2004: Up to 10% increase in performance is noticed on
systems containing an ATI Radeon? HD2400, HD2600, or HD3400 series of
products on ATI CrossFireX? configured systems

I haven't had a chance to test this all however when I played Crysis the results were EXCELLENT- The Crysis bench didn't seem to want to work with the 8.2's so I only have 8.3 results which ran fine.

DX9
TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
Play Time: 51.87s, Average FPS: 38.56
Min FPS: 25.08 at frame 1943, Max FPS: 52.67 at frame 96
Average Tri/Sec: 36006824, Tri/Frame: 933870
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
Play Time: 47.61s, Average FPS: 42.01
Min FPS: 25.08 at frame 1943, Max FPS: 68.92 at frame 73
Average Tri/Sec: 39583580, Tri/Frame: 942342
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.97
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
Play Time: 47.95s, Average FPS: 41.71
Min FPS: 24.21 at frame 1947, Max FPS: 68.92 at frame 73
Average Tri/Sec: 39310596, Tri/Frame: 942405
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.97
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)

DX10

TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
Play Time: 65.44s, Average FPS: 30.56
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 47.80 at frame 90
Average Tri/Sec: 28304540, Tri/Frame: 926192
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.99
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
Play Time: 60.72s, Average FPS: 32.94
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 57.02 at frame 69
Average Tri/Sec: 30780346, Tri/Frame: 934414
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
Play Time: 60.61s, Average FPS: 33.00
Min FPS: 18.92 at frame 1956, Max FPS: 57.02 at frame 69
Average Tri/Sec: 30851288, Tri/Frame: 934944
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: 0.98
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)

All results were taken at 1920x1200 0xAA 8xAF with rig in sig all settings medium except sound which was 'high'.

Gameplay:
I noticed Dx10 is now VERY playable on my crossfire setup as frames do not drop below 30 (this is all taken from the first level).....with the 8.2 it was just hitting 30...now its 30 and above- also the framerate is alot more 'stable' (I also noticed there seemed to be no sign of the Powerplay). DX9 is just awesome, with it staying at around the 50's, sometimes dropping to the 40's but generally VERY smooth.

I haven't had a chance to test other cool stuff, next on the list is to try out the GPU aspect ratio scaling and then reinstall UT3 for the AA loving .

Very Impressive! Thankyou!

 

[StinkyMojo]

More importantly, did anyone test out the Fixed aspect ration setting?!?!

 

[SlowSpyder]

Is it same to assume that any Radeon 38x0 series performance increase will also show up on the Radeon 2900 series? They are, after all, fairly close architecture.

 

[Apocalypse23]

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/...w4LCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

The above is a link to HardOCP's review of the 3870 x2 s in crossfire and a review of actual real world playable results, very informative if you ask me, still shows that current video cards are not powerful enough despite their dual gpus. We need a 2 GB 3870 x2 ATI !!

I think we may be in a situation right now where we need to wait till another year from now for gpu manufacturers to make enough horsepowered video cards to play today's games at big resolutions and high settings properly.

either that or, dual SLI and dual Crossfire is simply not enough, if we are going in that direction then we need some tri crossfire or quad crossfire and quad sli systems in the market...and FAST.