Wednesday, May 20th 2015
It's Now Been Over 160 Days Since a Catalyst WHQL Release
As of today (20/05/2015), it has been over 160 days since AMD released a WHQL-signed Catalyst driver update, in what is a clear sign of decay in the company's after-sales support for the consumer graphics market. Once tuned to a near-monthly release of its Catalyst Software suite, which added optimzations for new games, improved upon support for existing ones; CrossFire multi-GPU support profiles; even if not adding support for new GPUs; AMD slipped into quarterly WHQL release cycle in 2013-14. It now seems to have deviated from even that.
The company's last WHQL-signed Catalyst release was Catalyst 14.12 Omega WHQL, which released on 09/12/2014, 161 days ago. The company has since only released two "Beta" drivers, notably Catalyst 15.4 Beta, with optimization for Grand Theft Auto V, and AMD FreeSync support. In contrast, NVIDIA adopted a faster driver update cycle than its previous monthly GeForce WHQL driver releases, under its "Game Ready" driver program. New WHQL-signed releases predate almost every AAA PC game release. There's still no word on a Catalyst WHQL update, and with launch of new graphics cards slated for the third week of June, it's unlikely that the company will release one interim. By then, it will have been 196 days since a Catalyst WHQL driver release. Such a slow driver update cycle would do little to inspire confidence in buying the next-generation Radeon product, even if it establishes a performance lead over GeForce.
The company's last WHQL-signed Catalyst release was Catalyst 14.12 Omega WHQL, which released on 09/12/2014, 161 days ago. The company has since only released two "Beta" drivers, notably Catalyst 15.4 Beta, with optimization for Grand Theft Auto V, and AMD FreeSync support. In contrast, NVIDIA adopted a faster driver update cycle than its previous monthly GeForce WHQL driver releases, under its "Game Ready" driver program. New WHQL-signed releases predate almost every AAA PC game release. There's still no word on a Catalyst WHQL update, and with launch of new graphics cards slated for the third week of June, it's unlikely that the company will release one interim. By then, it will have been 196 days since a Catalyst WHQL driver release. Such a slow driver update cycle would do little to inspire confidence in buying the next-generation Radeon product, even if it establishes a performance lead over GeForce.
161 Comments on It's Now Been Over 160 Days Since a Catalyst WHQL Release
so amd release driver. don't pay microsoft, don't get whql certificate = named it beta driver
meanwhile nvidia release driver. pay microsoft, get whql certificate = named it whql driver
I can't help but feel like this is a bit of fear mongering, and apart from maybe that Cars game which might need a new driver (which AMD also said they were committed to bringing out soon) I mostly see their drivers performing very well.
Especially when you compare the performance of AMD cards to Nvidia's non-Maxwell generation, where the Titan and 780 Ti used to be stronger than their AMD counterparts the latter now outperform them in newer games.
I'm all for keeping manufacturers on their toes and all, but basing quality solely on 1 metric, and putting down some fairly baseless claims about the future viability of AMD in general is in my opinion not really beneficial to anything but pageviews/sensationalist journalism.
On a side note, they seem to be far from standing still in their windows 10 driver branch. See this thread (which happens to also shine light upon the major deficiency of AMD's current driver).
Edit: I tend to forget about crossfire it seems...
Capitalising on a AAA release with a new driver is also great PR for any company. It's win-win for user and company. I get the subtle impression that the driver department either no longer exists (outsourced), or is comprised of very very few people.
Meanwhile, Nvidia releases drivers every week and all of them bsod on alt-tab. So...what was the problem here ?
If every game needs a "Optimization" driver it just feeds the ever growing trend of shitty pc ports and poorly optimize game by lazy developers cutting corners for reason to minimize cost and raise profits.
When I read the headline all I could think was "slow-news day?"
I hate having to click that 'skip' button every damn month or so... I had to this morning--probably because AMD saw this post. :P
Only if games actually would have issues would a new driver be needed and well with GTA5 etc they did with a beta driver.
Asking for "optimization" for a game is just senseless. Optimization means nothing in itself.
Its almost like people want driver (insert higher number) just for the higher number and not for it doing anything apart from the claim that a game is now more optimized.
Very rarely have new drivers ever significantly improved performance, it always has more to do with making sure games dont crash or texture loading issues or the like.
If there are no issues, then there really is no need for a new driver.
I suggest you try to completely uninstall(with 3rd party software like DDu) and reinstall your drivers , maybe even reinstall windows completely.
Also, stop repeating the same stupid mantra about the WHQL stuff. AMD repeatedly stated the "betas" were just as stable as the WHQL version, and the ONLY difference is the four letters.
I wouldn't have expected such stupid and useless thread from a staff member.
- News poster posts factual information regarding recent events, nothing opinionated, merely stating facts and informing readers of the present situation
- Some readers then proceed to rain down all hell upon news poster, making various angst-filled comments for no particular purpose other than to hate on the information provided
Don't shoot the messenger. The only reason people are getting all defensive is because of the lifelong feud that still (stupidly) exists between NVidia and AMD.Asus haven't released a decent Xonar driver in years but nobody defends them for being "too busy" or "good enough".