ATI Catalyst 9.4 Released

[Ketxxx]

techreport blames custom coolers and lack of advice to consumes for ati cards going under.

And I've seen a few on here say the exact samething. Air flow has always been an issue ever since ati and nvidia brought sli/crossfire to the market. Motherboard makers have been lazy in placement of the pcie slots.

Lots of targets to point your finger at.

Custom coolers aren't to blame, they help the cause greatly. If you want to point the finger in that direction it should be pointed squarely at the manufacturers, stock cooling is terrible 99% of the time. The irony is a lot of stock cooling could be pretty good with minor redesign and minimal cost increases.

 

[fullinfusion]

Custom coolers aren't to blame, they help the cause greatly. If you want to point the finger in that direction it should be pointed squarely at the manufacturers, stock cooling is terrible 99% of the time. The irony is a lot of stock cooling could be pretty good with minor redesign and minimal cost increases.

Gee so your saying stock coolers suck? im using a 3870x2 and at 41% fan speed..... im running the highest temp of 52c while gaming..... so i wouldn't say stock coolers suck bro!

 

[Altered]

Well my 1950XTX cards in crossfire only got to 61c. I think its more of the fan settings on the cards. My cards would run quite warm high 70s until I adjusted the fan speed to 80% then 63c max no matter what. My new 4870 does quite well with just factory set fan speeds it also runs about 60c and rarely flickers to 70% mostly stays at 60% fan speed. All of my other ATI cards 9600pro 1950pro 9800Xt and X800XL all did quite well especially if the fan speeds were adjusted manually.

 

[Mussels]

No games reach load temp as high as Furmark's load temp ...

furmark uses 100W more power than any game, when measured at the wall. makes my PSU pretty sad.

 

[Altered]

furmark uses 100W more power than any game, when measured at the wall. makes my PSU pretty sad.

Are you serious?

 

[Mussels]

Are you serious?

Boot: 330W
Idle: 310W
Furmark: 550W
Fallout 3 : 360-380W

I have no power saving on the CPU, and i'm about to get a new PSU - the OCZ is holding up but the furmark result scares me a little.

(ok its not 100W, but its alot more)

 

[Altered]

Interesting

 

[Mussels]

Interesting

that extra heat on peoples cards has to come from the power, so it does make sense.

 

[Altered]

that extra heat on peoples cards has to come from the power, so it does make sense.

I presume the large amount of power consumption is due to you running Crossfire?

 

[Mussels]

I presume the large amount of power consumption is due to you running Crossfire?

yup yup. the idles also high because i disabled speedstep.

 

[Altered]

Yeah my 1950XTX cards dim the lights in this room when going into 3D mode. It has actually tripped the breaker when my wife's PC was on in the same room. Haven't noticed it since going to 1 HD4870. I disabled speedstep as well.

 

[ShadowFold]

Yeah my 1950XTX cards dim the lights in this room when going into 3D mode. It has actually tripped the breaker when my wife's PC was on in the same room. Haven't noticed it since going to 1 HD4870.

When I got my 2900XT crossfire setup going it did the same thing, even killed the electricity in my room for a week, had to call an electrician

 

[Mussels]

Yeah my 1950XTX cards dim the lights in this room when going into 3D mode. It has actually tripped the breaker when my wife's PC was on in the same room. Haven't noticed it since going to 1 HD4870. I disabled speedstep as well.

I just noticed you have the DFI x38 board - i'm getting the DFI x48 which is basically the same. Hows it treating you?

 

[Altered]

When I got my 2900XT crossfire setup going it did the same thing, even killed the electricity in my room for a week, had to call an electrician

Yeah my house is a little old but it is mine. The crusty fire hazards and all. I did have a all new breaker box installed a couple a years ago but I need to get it rewired.

 

[Altered]

I just noticed you have the DFI x38 board - i'm getting the DFI x48 which is basically the same. Hows it treating you?

I love it my last 2 boards were DFI and I am not looking to change any time soon. Tech support has been more than easy to get a response from and the boards are excellent quality. No compatibility issues at all. I have had all kinds of ram in it and it never gave any trouble. My only complaint if it is one is the NB runs a little warm while gaming 45c but I plan to WC one day. Heatpipe looks nice just a tight fit yo get a fan on it where it blows through the fins (fins run north n south) on the NB. Video card is on one side and CPU cooler is close on the other. Probably could if I removed the cooler first then put a small 40mm fan in there first.
I had the P35 DK before this one it was a great board as well.

 

[Braveheart]

does it work to just download 9.4 with 9.3 already installed or should i uninstall it first?

 

[Mussels]

barevheart: i installed over the top, no problems.

 

[Altered]

does it work to just download 9.4 with 9.3 already installed or should i uninstall it first?

My ATI experience is
Uninstall
then reboot into safe mode go in as admin run a driver cleaner
then reboot into windows normally and install new drivers.
Usually works without issues for me.

 

[Altered]

barevheart: i installed over the top, no problems.

No issues with crossfire? Maybe they got that resolved if its working now. I plan to get a matching card to mine to crossfire one day. (like I need it )

 

[Mussels]

No issues with crossfire? Maybe they got that resolved if its working now. I plan to get a matching card to mine to crossfire one day. (like I need it )

the people who always have problems are the ones who use driver cleaners... i always wondered if its because they used the cleaners previously that they have the problems.

 

[ShadowFold]

I can't figure out how to install them on Win7. When ever I try to do a manual install it says they are up to date but GPUZ says this

 

[Altered]

the people who always have problems are the ones who use driver cleaners... i always wondered if its because they used the cleaners previously that they have the problems.

Well for the 1950 series cards there is a large amount of people who had issues trying to get crossfire to work properly. Using a cleaner was the only way I could get out the old conflicting pieces that would cause the crossfire enable/disable box to stay working consistently. Otherwise one time you boot up it may be grayed out and no crossfire was available and the next reboot it might or might not be available. Early versions of crossfire had issues I am glad to know they are getting easier to deal with. I have used a cleaner ever since then but even before I used one just overkill in those days maybe I cant remember last week much less years ago.

 

[Altered]

I can't figure out how to install them on Win7. When ever I try to do a manual install it says they are up to date but GPUZ says this
http://gpuz.techpowerup.com/09/04/10/7a8.png

My GPU-Z has the same June 25 2008 date, but in Device mgr it shows 3/16/09

 

[r1rhyder]

The date in GPU-Z is the release date of the video card. :shadedshu

 

[Mussels]

The date in GPU-Z is the release date of the video card. :shadedshu

oh laaaawl.