Catalyst Control Center - do I really need it?

[taq8ojh]

For years, I refused to install CCC because I thought it was major bloat to system. Eventually I stopped giving a damn (seeing there was no performance hit to it whatsoever and memory it used was reasonable), but only used it to overclock my cards.
Lately I started thinking about using MSI Afterburner for that purpose, and that got me thinking, do I really need CCC for anything? I never touched a thing in there. I don't use any profiles, and by default it seems set to use application settings, be it a game or media player or whatever.

Let's hear some opinions.

 

[Mushkins]

I install it because more often than not I run into the one-off game that has an issue and the fix seems to be "go into CCC and set xyz to blah blah blah."

Can you probably achieve the same thing with a mixture of d3doverrider and msi afterburner? Yeah.

Personally, I use all three in tandem, CCC is far from a program bloated enough to bog down a system. Never had a problem with any of them.

 

[blackened23]

Erm, do you game or just mine? If you're gaming I would use it for the profiles and override settings which are useful now and then. I did not ever find CCC bloated at all when I used it with 7970s. IMO, bloat would imply a program that causes unnecessary system resource utilization - something that drags system performance down for no good reason. A lot of antivirus programs fall under this category. I do not think CCC falls in that type of category, it is very lightweight and doesn't use any appreciable amount of resources. At least, that was the case throughout 2012 with 7970s and i'm sure it hasn't changed in terms of resource usage since then.

Anyway, I find myself using override settings especially for older games a lot - SSAA is useful on the AMD side, with nvidia I use adaptive vsync, FXAA, transparency SS, driver AO among other things quite often. I couldn't imagine using either AMD or NV without driver CP functionality for gaming. It does add to the gaming experience quite a bit especially for older games - especially for games without built in AA, MLAA (AMD) and FXAA (nvidia) does wonders. Although MLAA is quite blurry in comparison, it is definitely better than no AA IMO.

Of course if it is primarily a mining rig, I wouldn't bother. You don't really need it in that case. Also, if you're 100% sure that you'll never use override settings in any games and want a program only for GPU overclocking, you also don't need CCC. Afterburner does that just fine. I have to say, though, that i'm surprised that you would never use any override settings for any game - I love those features for older titles. Really adds to the experience as I mentioned.

 

[taq8ojh]

I do game, but it's always very few games that run perfectly anyway, and I never felt any urge to mess with these settings. I also never use any form of AA in any game - but to be honest the only thing I know about AA is that it blurs edges of everything, which is supposed to look better, but I feel exactly the opposite way, so I don't touch it.

Going through all the options I still cannot find anything that would seem even remotely useful to me.

 

[blackened23]

Well if you just want overclocking I guess you don't need CCC. I use override settings quite a bit but for someone who never uses them, I guess CCC wouldn't add much for you.

Then again, it doesn't hurt anything either I don't really think CCC is bloated. That seems to imply too much system resource utilization, which CCC does not do - it's very lightweight from what I remember. Can't imagine that changed. It's a small program.

 

[taq8ojh]

Yeah like I said, I change my opinion on that at some point. It's a bit annoying in that it takes a bit long to start, but you don't need to touch it too often anyway.

I am talking strictly about the functionality here. Guess I will try to read up on AA a little.

 

[Z15CAM]

Disable the AMD CCC Overdrive and keep the rest. Replace Overdrive with Hardware Monitor Pro, MSI Afterburner, CPU-Z and GPU-Z. Forget about stupid Over-Bloated MB Software Utilities like ASUS AI and learn CMD line for Afterburner re-voltage GPU mv off-sets, eg: "MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,16" for a +138mv offset

MB UTILITIES: Core Temp v1.0 RC5 [64], CPU Park Control (C6) v1.5.0.4 [64], CPUID HWMonitor Pro v1.16 [64], CPU-Z v1.63 [64], GPU-Z.0.7.4 [86], HWINFO [64], Precess Explorer v15.40 [86], RealTemp v3.7.0 [64], SpeedFan 4.47.

BENCHING: AIDA64 Extreme 2.70.2200 Final, AS SSD Benchmark v1.7.4739.38088, ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.47, LinX, MaxxMEM2_Preview v1.99 [86], PassMark v8 [64], Prime95.

DISK UTILITIES: Dataram RAMDisk V4.0.0, MsInfo32, trimcheck-0.4, HpFlash v2.0.6 [86] - USB DOS BOOT, Windows7-USB-DVD-tool and MS SYS-Prep. KNOW your Win 7 and 8 UFI Boot Diskpart Commands to prepare and partition HDD's and SSD's with correct off-set for Win Installations or GHOST Over-Writes.

DRIVER TOOLS: Driver Sweeper v3.20, WinDriver Ghost Enterprise Edition v3.02.2996, MS Device HardWare Wizard.

REGISTRY TOOLS: CCleaner v3.2.8 [64], ERUNT v1.1. Be aware RegVac v5.02.05 is great for Win 32-Bit OS's but deadly for Win 64-Bit OS's - Not that I don't keep in mind to write a script for Ray Geides and his wonderful registry app to handle 64-Bit Win OS's.

... etc, I can't list all my FTP. I DON'T CRASH and only down when the Power goes out ;o)

 

[thedosbox]

Yeah like I said, I change my opinion on that at some point. It's a bit annoying in that it takes a bit long to start, but you don't need to touch it too often anyway.

What sort of setup are you using that it takes a long time to start? Because the last time I used it (13.9) it was pretty quick.

Anyhow, I found it useful to be able to configure vsync and different levels of AF on a per-game basis.

 

[smackababy]

CCC I install, but you know what is bloat? That garbage Gaming Evolved trash they won't let you uninstall. It doesn't work (it "optimized all my games with the lowest possible settings for a 290...) and it spams you with crap whenever you enter and exit a game. No thanks, I don't want achievements and points for loading a game. GTFO.

 

[blackened23]

So is that a forced install with every AMD driver nowadays? Geforce experience can basically be ignored (and is also an optional install), it's there if you want to use it but it doesn't spam you. Sounds like the AMD version is just a pain.

 

[blackened23]

What sort of setup are you using that it takes a long time to start? Because the last time I used it (13.9) it was pretty quick.

Anyhow, I found it useful to be able to configure vsync and different levels of AF on a per-game basis.

Yeah, that's weird. CCC was always an instant popup for me whenever I used it.

 

[taltamir]

For years, I refused to install CCC because I thought it was major bloat to system. Eventually I stopped giving a damn (seeing there was no performance hit to it whatsoever and memory it used was reasonable), but only used it to overclock my cards.

CCC was horrible bloat. it got better. Its still clunky and sluggish to use but doesn't slow down your PC elsewhere. I am not a fan of the installer coming with ads though

 

[smackababy]

So is that a forced install with every AMD driver nowadays? Geforce experience can basically be ignored (and is also an optional install), it's there if you want to use it but it doesn't spam you. Sounds like the AMD version is just a pain.

It is not forced, but unlike Nvidia, AMD has yet to learn about "clean installs", so unless you manually uninstall their previous driver, parts you choose not to install in the new ones are not removed. And it wouldn't be so bad if it didn't spam you with nonsense. I don't care if I am level 3 in some bullcrap designed for people not smart enough to set their own settings.

Oh well, tonight I get to uninstall / reinstall everything to my new SSDs.

 

[taq8ojh]

Just a side note - everytime I get the idea to use MSI Afterburner again and check the appropriate section of its home forum, I realize just how ENORMOUS di** that Unwinder (the author) guy is. I haven't seen SO much arrogance and lack of manners in a single human being in at least five years.

 

[Morbus]

I never used the CCC with my old X1950Pro and HD4890 1GB. Simply because I never had any use for it, and it starts on startup and adds context menu entries and whatnot. Ain't nobody got time for that!

Reading you guys' experience with it makes me glad I shifted to the green side again. AMD and their drivers are just a pain in the ass most of the times. And I'm sorry to say it, but that's just it.

 

[Red Hawk]

Reading you guys' experience with it makes me glad I shifted to the green side again. AMD and their drivers are just a pain in the ass most of the times. And I'm sorry to say it, but that's just it.

What I do is I go into Programs & Features, right click "AMD Catalyst Installation Manager", and click "Change". That brings up a menu where you can select to install or uninstall AMD drivers and software, or express uninstall ALL AMD drivers and software. I just do the express uninstall, restart my PC, then install the new drivers. Basically a clean install, and it's fairly straightforward. I will note however that I've seen the express option uninstall AMD chipset drivers as well, along with things like USB drivers, when I tried doing it on a friend's AMD-based laptop. It's not a concern for an Intel user, but AMD CPU users should avoid the express option and directly pick what software they want to uninstall.

It is not forced, but unlike Nvidia, AMD has yet to learn about "clean installs", so unless you manually uninstall their previous driver, parts you choose not to install in the new ones are not removed. And it wouldn't be so bad if it didn't spam you with nonsense. I don't care if I am level 3 in some bullcrap designed for people not smart enough to set their own settings.

Oh well, tonight I get to uninstall / reinstall everything to my new SSDs.

Actually, the "AMD Gaming App" isn't listed when you uninstall drivers through the utility I just described above. It's installed as its own separate app, and shows up as "Raptr" in Programs and Features. Presumably you can uninstall it completely separate from the rest of AMD's drivers.
On topic, I like Catalyst Control Center just fine. I don't overvolt, so Catalyst's overclocking controls work without the need for a third party utility (I only switch on MSI Afterburner when I feel like recording a gameplay video, which is rare). They introduced individual, user-modifiable graphics profiles for applications a year or two back, so that's good for doing things like forcing antialiasing or tweaking the texture filtering. There's also things like display color balance and global video color options; I've rarely touched those but they seem useful if you're picky about those things. My only complaint about the CCC is that I've seen it take a while for the window to appear after clicking on the icon in the taskbar, but it appeared pretty instantaneously just now when I clicked it so perhaps AMD has cut away some of the bloat.

Ultimately just about everything the CCC does and more can be done by third party utilities such as Afterburner. I think the question can be rephrased as "Do I need more than one graphics utility running at the same time?", to which the answer is no. If I were in your position I'd remove it if you were to start using Afterburner, if for no reason than to keep it from cluttering things. Always good to trim off unneeded applications from your PC.

 

[thedosbox]

I never used the CCC with my old X1950Pro and HD4890 1GB. Simply because I never had any use for it, and it starts on startup and adds context menu entries and whatnot. Ain't nobody got time for that!

Reading you guys' experience with it makes me glad I shifted to the green side again.

nvidia adds a "nvidia control panel" entry to the context menu, a "nvidia display driver" service and the "geforce experience" on startup.

The only difference from AMD being that the "geforce experience" can be uninstalled separately.