Tuesday, March 4th 2008
ATI Catalyst 8.3, Hybrid CrossFire and CrossFireX Announced
AMD today announced its latest graphics driver release to advance the Ultimate Visual Experience for PC gaming enthusiasts and casual gamers alike. Expected to be available for download starting March 5, ATI Catalyst 8.3 is a milestone software update in delivering both CrossFireX for Windows Vista - the world's first quad-GPU support, and scalable, cost-effective three GPU support - as well as ATI Hybrid Graphics Technology for casual gamers. These multi-GPU capabilities provide gamers a more realistic and immersive experience allowing them to play at high resolutions with demanding image quality settings, and at a better value than competing multi-GPU solutions.
"AMD packed ATI Catalyst 8.3 with a double-barreled set of leading technologies to simultaneously push the Ultimate Visual Experience to new heights and to a wider population of PC users," said Rick Bergman, senior vice president, AMD Graphics Product Group. "We deliver industry firsts that make a visible difference to PC users, whether it's CrossFireX and the first ever quad-GPU performance on Windows Vista, or ATI Hybrid Graphics that bring a new level of performance to mainstream PC platforms."
Advancing Multi-GPU Gaming with CrossFireX
Through three- and four-GPU configurations in CrossFireX, gamers can see multi-GPU performance scaling across a range of today's most popular DirectX 9 and DirectX 10 games on Windows Vista -- up to 3.2 times the performance over a single GPU2 in some scenarios. The flexible architecture of CrossFireX allows for the mixing and matching of high-performing ATI Radeon GPUs. Any ATI Radeon HD 3850, ATI Radeon HD 3870 or ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 cards can be combined to harness the power of up to four GPUs. CrossFireX also supports a wide range of platforms, enabling many gamers to take advantage of three- and four-GPU gaming on their existing hardware.
Boosting Game Performance through ATI Hybrid CrossFire
ATI Catalyst 8.3 also introduces ATI Hybrid Graphics support for Windows Vista. An industry first that is unique to AMD processor-based platforms, ATI Hybrid CrossFire delivers a significant 3D performance boost. Up to 70 percent increases in performance are possible in some gaming scenarios3 based on PCs comprised of an AMD 780G motherboard and ATI Radeon HD 3400 Series graphics product in Windows Vista. ATI Hybrid Graphics also support up to four independent displays through the SurroudView feature for those who want to maximize productivity.
Additional Innovations Found in ATI Catalyst 8.3
Beyond multi-GPU configurations in CrossFireX, ATI Catalyst 8.3 introduces a number of new features including:
ATI Catalyst 8.3 is scheduled to be available as a free download starting Tuesday, March 4 online at http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html.
Source:
AMD
"AMD packed ATI Catalyst 8.3 with a double-barreled set of leading technologies to simultaneously push the Ultimate Visual Experience to new heights and to a wider population of PC users," said Rick Bergman, senior vice president, AMD Graphics Product Group. "We deliver industry firsts that make a visible difference to PC users, whether it's CrossFireX and the first ever quad-GPU performance on Windows Vista, or ATI Hybrid Graphics that bring a new level of performance to mainstream PC platforms."
Advancing Multi-GPU Gaming with CrossFireX
Through three- and four-GPU configurations in CrossFireX, gamers can see multi-GPU performance scaling across a range of today's most popular DirectX 9 and DirectX 10 games on Windows Vista -- up to 3.2 times the performance over a single GPU2 in some scenarios. The flexible architecture of CrossFireX allows for the mixing and matching of high-performing ATI Radeon GPUs. Any ATI Radeon HD 3850, ATI Radeon HD 3870 or ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 cards can be combined to harness the power of up to four GPUs. CrossFireX also supports a wide range of platforms, enabling many gamers to take advantage of three- and four-GPU gaming on their existing hardware.
Boosting Game Performance through ATI Hybrid CrossFire
ATI Catalyst 8.3 also introduces ATI Hybrid Graphics support for Windows Vista. An industry first that is unique to AMD processor-based platforms, ATI Hybrid CrossFire delivers a significant 3D performance boost. Up to 70 percent increases in performance are possible in some gaming scenarios3 based on PCs comprised of an AMD 780G motherboard and ATI Radeon HD 3400 Series graphics product in Windows Vista. ATI Hybrid Graphics also support up to four independent displays through the SurroudView feature for those who want to maximize productivity.
Additional Innovations Found in ATI Catalyst 8.3
Beyond multi-GPU configurations in CrossFireX, ATI Catalyst 8.3 introduces a number of new features including:
- DirectX 10.1 and Tessellation Support: ATI Catalyst 8.3 marks the first time DirectX 10.1 support for the ATI Radeon HD 3000 series, and tessellation support for the ATI Radeon HD 3800 series have been made available to developers.
- Anti-Aliasing enhancements: ATI Catalyst introduces anti-aliasing support for all Unreal Engine 3.0-based games running in DirectX 9 mode. ATI Catalyst also allows users to enable the Custom Filter Anti-Aliasing filters (box and wide tent) while running in CrossFire Super Anti-Aliasing modes, providing superior image quality.
- HydraVision support for Windows Vista: HydraVision support is now included in ATI Catalyst Control Center for Windows Vista. HydraVision enables users to efficiently organize multiple applications across single or multiple displays. You may configure up to nine virtual desktops, and divide the Windows Vista desktop into definable areas helping to easily move and organize multiple applications.
- Digital Panel GPU image scaling: For those using widescreen displays, ATI Catalyst now allows users to enable GPU-accelerated scaling to maintain the aspect ratio of the display while providing superior image quality.
- Advanced Video Quality controls: With ATI Catalyst 8.3, multimedia enthusiasts get further control over video quality. Using the new edge enhancement feature, the level of sharpness of video content can be adjusted. Through the new noise reduction feature, ghosting artifacts can be removed while preserving the details of the original video. The new slider controls can be found in the All Settings page of the Avivo Video tab found in ATI Catalyst Control Center.
ATI Catalyst 8.3 is scheduled to be available as a free download starting Tuesday, March 4 online at http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html.
83 Comments on ATI Catalyst 8.3, Hybrid CrossFire and CrossFireX Announced
"the world’s first quad-GPU support, " kek
Well, it's officially the 5th here on the West coast, and we're still on the 8.2's.
Anyone wanna volunteer to do a comparison test between 8.1's, 8.2's, and 8.3's on a 3870??? :D I would, but I'm in pieces at the moment.
Originally Posted by v4npro View Post:
vista 32bit only drivers?
RagDoll_Effect
Maha Guru
:
Works here on vista 64 bit
"Yeees, Crysis is 5fps faster in the benchmark That's a big jump because I have everything on very high except shadows. In the benchmark, it goes right up to 5fps faster.
Tested in 3dmark 06 with my 2900XT and it's about the same... but I think some of the Guru's with 3870 x2's will see heaps of performance gain, especially in games."
it continually amazes me how you get a great card, then it just keeps getting BETTER and BETTER with each driver release.
if you add up all the improvements as a % since an ATI cards release that equates to one hellova % increase in performance
^^
You guys should see my Pre 8.3 scores already on my profile, but its 19362:toast:
Hope good luck to me.
^^
Oh, and welcome to the forums!
I had not built a new system in about 4 years and am very happy with this sytem, it's been 100% stable. The ATI Drivers keep getting better, it pays to do some research on which upgrade path you want to go when building a new system.
So far the 3870 has been an incredible card and very good for gaming.
:D
I'm glad y'happy with your new build, be proud of it and if you feel it's worth showing in the Case Mods gallery, don't be afraid to show it off (if you want the constructive criticisms).
Actually I hit a personal best with these new drivers, now these scores are with the card overclocked to the max of 878 Core and 955 mem but as you can clearly see that this cards score before was 19362 In 3d mark, and I have just broke the 20k barrier with these new drivers on the same OC settings. Of course do not try this unless you can get your stock cooler fan to stay on permanently because the card has some issues with the auto sensor that only this fix worked for me. Saw that the card was struggeling when the auto temp/fan settings where juicing up or slowing down, so I kept it the same at 100% under any load. Loud but proud.
:toast:
So, will this driver allow 2x HD 3870-X2 ?
What CPU do you have? and at what clock speed? I've been trying to break 20k but it's having none of it. I've got my X2 at 890 core and 1050 mem, my CPU is a Q6600 at 3.9Ghz.
Sorry, trying to get the hang of this forum stuff.
So here is my before 8.3 installation
and here is my after 8.3 installation
\m/
I'm interested in how the HD2900 XT fares.