AMD Unveils ATI Catalyst 10.6 WHQL Software Suite

[cadaveca]

Actual support link is still broken:

Server Error in '/' Application.
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Unable to connect to database. Check database connection information and make sure the database server is running.

 

[Hockster]

Well, "spyre" has stated many times in the past that he's just the site admin for AMD.GAME, and doesn't work directly for AMD, so I truly question anything he posts. He contradicts himself too much.

At least they went back to the older driver page format, and everything works there now, except there's no link for release notes, nor the "driver feedback" link.


EDIT: driver feedback link and release notes is now active again. I guess they are working on it while we discuss it.

EDIT2, and finally, driver feedback form says that the form is not for product support, but unsurprisingly, it doesn't provide a link to said support.:shadedshu

Spyre's is a number of things, intelligent is not one of them. His posts at Rage3D are similar in nature and just as useless.

 

[fullinfusion]

Well I must say after comparing CCC10.4 to current ccc10.6 driver using a single 5970....

FREAKING NICE!!!!

2d clocks are at 157-300MHz and working well, I see no artifact's unlike the 10.5cat's!

Playing videos seem crisper... I think ATI has finally did a good thing for this gpu

Cat 10.4 Vantage run everything stock

Cat 10.6 Vantage run everything stock

 

[EastCoasthandle]

It's becoming more apparent that this release is intended for CF.

 

[trickson]

It's becoming more apparent that this release is intended for CF.

I do not agree , This is a performance boost for my single card .

 

[cadaveca]

Yeah, this driver is good, barring the issues that have been present with my cards from day one. I just wish they'd stop saying they can fix them, and getting people's hopes up, when really, if they could fix the issues, they'd have done it ages ago...

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

Am I the only one that thinks ati should switch to doing drivers every other month? Spend that extra time on proper testing instead of using enthusiasts as guinea pigs.

 

[Sapientwolf]

I think I'm going to have to switch back to 10.4a... They keep saying they fixed the loading times for BFBC2 but they're still worse when compared to 10.4. Also BFBC2 was running buttery smooth under 2 HD 4870s, and now it runs like crap... What the hell ATI, get your crap together and get all your fixes implemented into one driver, not scattered about 10 versions...

 

[Steevo]

I think I'm going to have to switch back to 10.4a... They keep saying they fixed the loading times for BFBC2 but they're still worse when compared to 10.4. Also BFBC2 was running buttery smooth under 2 HD 4870s, and now it runs like crap... What the hell ATI, get your crap together and get all your fixes implemented into one driver, not scattered about 10 versions...

If everything works for you in 10.4a why do you update? You have a previous generation hardware, you will still be getting the same files you have installed now again, except the tweaks for the new cards might break your fixes. I don't see a single performance improvement for 4000 series cards at all.


Looking over at the Nvidia thread they have all performance improvements for their 400 series cards and one useless bone for the 200 users, I figured I would throw hat out there for all the Nvidiots reading this thread. Here is the link, read it yourself. http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=124567


6 of one, half a dozen of the other.

 

[OnBoard]

I think I'm going to have to switch back to 10.4a... They keep saying they fixed the loading times for BFBC2 but they're still worse when compared to 10.4. Also BFBC2 was running buttery smooth under 2 HD 4870s, and now it runs like crap...

I smell 10.6a coming Think I'll stick to 10.4a then too, until they release yet another hotfix for the same issue.

 

[Formula350]

I just downloaded them, only 30mins ago, and all the links seem to work for me (mind you I went directly to the site and not by the links in the OP)... Unless that isn't the issue, then nevermind! I also hope they are tailored towards CF, as I'm finally running that after 4+yrs of wanting too I'm a little bummed out that the DiRT2 boost was for a single card, not to mention DX9 >_> Hopefully it'll fix my "issue" (if it actually is one) of the game only using ~65% of both 5770s during game play, yet in the menu area it uses 99%/90% (card 2 has been strangely lower recently).

Since Sneeky closed the other thread. C&P time!

The reason why you don't see it as a problem is because you don't understand what's going on. Let me explain it for you. Reference design video cards don't have an official heat sink. They only use the cover that comes with the card. That cover is what provides thermal protection for the GPU, mosfets, ram, etc all in one. On one end it works very well as long as the gpu down clocks to 157/300. But on the other hand if you increase 2D clocks you have the potential for thermal throttling and other issues because the GPU along with it's components are no longer being cooled properly like they should IMO.

I have read a few posts where people are having similar problems and it's no surprise to me. I just find it odd that they would use such a rookie fix knowing that those with reference designed video cards don't actually have a heatsink designed to deal with the added heat and added voltage.

That is actually incorrect. The reason they changed the 2D speeds is due to the performance drop people running multi-monitor have noticed. Also it seems to have fixed an issue for some with Flash content, but that wasn't the intent of the idle speed increase with 10.5 I don't even remember what I was searching for that I stumbled on to that bit of info, but it lead me to the AMD Game forums where a user was curious why his idle clocks are 400/1200. I actually miss those speeds, but oh well!

How increasing the clocks as a fix to what you talked about, is a bit confusing to me... If they wanted to fix it, they could just force an increase to the idle fan speed. Unless I'm misunderstanding what you are referring to Either way, doesn't really matter I guess heh

EDIT: hah Seems I suffered from my own advice of not reading the whole thread before posting Although I must confess I thought Sneeky's was the last post when I scrolled back up to quote

Anyways, I confirmed what cadaveca said, and vice versa.

But I actually like the HD5000 cards, Cad. I admit that not being able to keep the low clocks is pretty lame, at least they are trying to help the other users out with a temp fix. I do think they could've gone about it a different way though, with something like an IF-THEN, where IF USER = MULTI-MONITOR, THEN SET CLOCKS 400/xxxx (I can't imagine it needing 1200MHz on the mem). Hell it wouldn't even have to do that, just if there is multi-monitor make the cards run in Media clock mode (600/900 I think)!

My biggest grief so far is that I can't find a program that lets me clock/volt the cards how I want to! Afterburner doesn't go down past 400/600MHz and 1.000V. ASUS's crappy ass program (Smart Doctor or something) doesn't even WORK (DLL error) and then when I did hack it to work by using some of the iTracker 2 files, it doesn't offer what I'm after either. To be fair, the last "modified" date on the program was 2002! So I can understand it's lacking of abilities. If iTracker 2 would work on non-ROG cards, I'd be a happy camper since it seems to have all sorts of options I'm after :\

 

[finndrummer]

the idle clocks-voltages are high only when we overclock the gpu and this is just annoying, so can we bypass this easily by setting 2D(157/300)/3D profiles with afterburner ?

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

Also it seems to have fixed an issue for some with Flash content

So that's possibly why 10.5 has resolved issues with flash causing crashes on client builds. My guess is some cards had unstable memory at the lower clock speeds.

 

[Helper]

Looking over at the Nvidia thread they have all performance improvements for their 400 series cards and one useless bone for the 200 users, I figured I would throw hat out there for all the Nvidiots reading this thread. Here is the link, read it yourself. http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=124567

6 of one, half a dozen of the other.

I'm playing Batman: Arkham again w/ AA and Physx. You ATi fanboi can't even get any AA because of your crappy software support.

We're live at the biggest Arkham fight! Steevo, you got what it takes? I doubt it hahah

 

[cadaveca]

Formula 350...I like the cards too...when only using one monitor.

The DP connection on these cards is BROKEN. They need to do a product recall, as far as I am concerned, and both Dell and Sapphire seem to agree. Dell, well, who cares, they quoted me unknowingly in thier response to me, but Sapphire even said that the DP issues MUST be hardware-related. I did get Sapphire to add a PDF to thier bios-flash files, so I know that they, at least, listen to thier consumers.

Using an active adapter makes the problem occur less often, however, I still have issues with the monitor connected to the DP port(whether using an active adapter or not), and the monitor will say that the signal is NOT 1920c1080 and 60hz. Why this problem occurs...I have no idea...but Dell said it was due to insufficient signal strength. This can result in the DRM chain being broken, and the monitor staying on, but displaying no image, or the monitor will simply give an error, but I'm 100% sure now that teh DRM thing is merely a symptom of the problem, and not the problem itself.

The cursor thing...happens on both the DP and the standard connectors. If you move the cursor to another screen, it will be fine, but go back to the one that showed the corrupt cursor in the first place, and it will still be corrupt.

Before the "fix", the cursor would be screwed on that monitor until reboot, and now, it goes away as randomly as it appears...so while they've partially fixed it, it;s realyl annoying in-game...it;'s not something that is confined to 2D rendering.

Monitor flicker, for the most part, was fixed with bios editing, so this crap about the higher clock speeds being a fix for that issue is not true at all. It also has NO EFFECT in how the card here clock...so I have no idea why Terry would even say that, except to shut people up.

the idle clocks-voltages are high only when we overclock the gpu and this is just annoying, so can we bypass this easily by setting 2D(157/300)/3D profiles with afterburner ?

Mine are high 24/7. The only thing here that causes it is multi-monitor, as I do not clock using software...I will edit the bios to prevent such issues from occuring.

 

[Formula350]

the idle clocks-voltages are high only when we overclock the gpu and this is just annoying, so can we bypass this easily by setting 2D(157/300)/3D profiles with afterburner ?

Nope :\ Read my post, I mentioned that I haven't found a program yet that allows for such low clocks. Afterburner doesn't let you clock lower than 400MHz core, 600MHz mem and no less than 1.00v on the core.

 

[Steevo]

I'm playing Batman: Arkham again w/ AA and Physx. You ATi fanboi can't even get any AA because of your crappy software support.

We're live at the biggest Arkham fight! Steevo, you got what it takes? I doubt it hahah

http://forums.eidosgames.com/showthread.php?t=97806

Welcome to last year fucktard.

 

[EastCoasthandle]

That is actually incorrect. The reason they changed the 2D speeds is due to the performance drop people running multi-monitor have noticed. Also it seems to have fixed an issue for some with Flash content, but that wasn't the intent of the idle speed increase with 10.5 I don't even remember what I was searching for that I stumbled on to that bit of info, but it lead me to the AMD Game forums where a user was curious why his idle clocks are 400/1200. I actually miss those speeds, but oh well!

That information was posted and never correct by catalyst himself and from a Admin who at times can get information from the development team. You maybe of another opinion but the truth remains that reason for the drivers came directly from the horses mouth. Perhaps in the future it would benefit your credibility to go directly to the source. You may think it has something to do with multi-monitors but if the source says otherwise then that's all I can go by.

How increasing the clocks as a fix to what you talked about, is a bit confusing to me... If they wanted to fix it, they could just force an increase to the idle fan speed. Unless I'm misunderstanding what you are referring to Either way, doesn't really matter I guess heh

You misunderstand a lot as the answer to this is in the post you quoted. Again, reference designed 5870 that I have does not come with a separate heat sink. When coming out of 3D clocks the metal cover doesn't compensate for the higher thermal load in part do to the higher voltages. Remember, that plate is trying to cool critical components on the video card.

EDIT: hah Seems I suffered from my own advice of not reading the whole thread before posting Although I must confess I thought Sneeky's was the last post when I scrolled back up to quote

I'm glad we agree because your response was getting way out there.

Anyways, I confirmed what cadaveca said, and vice versa.

But I actually like the HD5000 cards, Cad. I admit that not being able to keep the low clocks is pretty lame, at least they are trying to help the other users out with a temp fix. I do think they could've gone about it a different way though, with something like an IF-THEN, where IF USER = MULTI-MONITOR, THEN SET CLOCKS 400/xxxx (I can't imagine it needing 1200MHz on the mem). Hell it wouldn't even have to do that, just if there is multi-monitor make the cards run in Media clock mode (600/900 I think)!

There should be an option no doubt but according to catalyst the fix was more geared towards dual card. And from a Admin 120Hz monitors.

My biggest grief so far is that I can't find a program that lets me clock/volt the cards how I want to! Afterburner doesn't go down past 400/600MHz and 1.000V. ASUS's crappy ass program (Smart Doctor or something) doesn't even WORK (DLL error) and then when I did hack it to work by using some of the iTracker 2 files, it doesn't offer what I'm after either. To be fair, the last "modified" date on the program was 2002! So I can understand it's lacking of abilities. If iTracker 2 would work on non-ROG cards, I'd be a happy camper since it seems to have all sorts of options I'm after :\

The ability to edit the profile.xml no longer has any effect for me. We really wouldn't need a 3rd party program for something we could tweat ourselves.

 

[Helper]

http://forums.eidosgames.com/showthread.php?t=97806

Welcome to last year fucktard.

I'm sorry, I made a mistake by replying you.

 

[Steevo]

I'm sorry, I made a mistake by replying you.

http://www.russiablog.org/DontFeedtheTrolls.jpg

I still think you are funny.

 

[Dippyskoodlez]

Dirt2 - DX9 - HD5970
Those words repel like similar polarized magnets in that sentence.

Who would own a Dx11 card and a Dx11 game yet play it not in DX11, not even in Dx10 but Dx9 ?

Barely any purpose to increase Dx9 performance :shadedshu

Perhaps it uses some dx9 shaders/instructions in conjunction with DX11? I'm sure each DX builds upon past code.

However, Kinda nice to finally actually be relevant when a new driver upgrade comes out, I'm normally a generation behind

 

[boulard83]

Dirt2 is as nearly nothing that is really DX11. Its mostly a DX9/10 game.

 

[Formula350]

That information was posted and never correct by catalyst himself and from a Admin who at times can get information from the development team. You maybe of another opinion but the truth remains that reason for the drivers came directly from the horses mouth. Perhaps in the future it would benefit your credibility to go directly to the source. You may think it has something to do with multi-monitors but if the source says otherwise then that's all I can go by.

You misunderstand a lot as the answer to this is in the post you quoted. Again, reference designed 5870 that I have does not come with a separate heat sink. When coming out of 3D clocks the metal cover doesn't compensate for the higher thermal load in part do to the higher voltages. Remember, that plate is trying to cool critical components on the video card.

Well considering I thought that the official AMD forums was source enough, I apologize for thinking so Though I'll be happy to read a link that you deem to be "the source". I'm also sensing a language barrier here, because I don't quite understand what you mean by "metal cover" and if you mean literally what I'm reading, then what a fan shroud would have to do with the components and not coming in contact with them. Or if you mean heatsink, why anything other than reference would have a problem when "coming out of 3D clocks". When you leave an application where the 3D clocks are used, the card would only COOL DOWN since it would then be in 2D mode... It's not so much what you are talking about that is confusing me, but how you are saying things. I understand everything individually, but when you put them together like that it just isn't coherent (again at least to me it isn't heh).

I'm glad we agree because your response was getting way out there.

That wasn't intended for you, or in relation to your post, so I'm sorry but I wasn't agreeing with you at all It was in regards to what Cadaveca had posted.

There should be an option no doubt but according to catalyst the fix was more geared towards dual card. And from a Admin 120Hz monitors.

The ability to edit the profile.xml no longer has any effect for me. We really wouldn't need a 3rd party program for something we could tweat ourselves.

Well I run dual cards and have had no such issues with 157/300 operation. Mind you I only have a Samsung 2233BW monitor, but nothing else has been of any trouble...

I wasn't able to get anything useful out of the XML file personally. Didn't appear like there was anything pertaining to clocks and voltages, that I could find at least. All I want to be able to do is be able to setup a profile for 3D clocks, voltages and fan speeds and then a profile for 2D clocks, voltages and fan speeds. So far the only program I found that offered it was ATi Tray Tools, but it seemed to be having problems with changing clocks on both cards and it was freezing the PC when I clicked apply :\

 

[Formula350]

Dirt2 is as nearly nothing that is really DX11. Its mostly a DX9/10 game.

From my understanding, Microsoft stopped calling it DirectX 11, and it is something silly like just DirectX now. Reason being something due to them not releasing any true DX11 package, but it is just actually an update to DirectX 10.1 *shrug*

If you look at the DiRT2 directory though, it has two shader related folders "DX9" and "DX11". So that sort of confirms part of what I mentioned, in an obscure way at least. Since there isn't a DX10 folder, one can assume that "DX11" actually encompasses DX10 as well and that perhaps they are basically one in the same Just speculation on my part though, not intended to be factual at all.

Oh and I hadn't installed 10.6 yet, just the Crossfire Profiles, but it would seem that they have made my issue with load balancing WORSE. I just raced the Ensenada BAJA course, under the Rookie class, which takes place basically at night and the loads per card were never above 60%!! The few times I glanced at the OSD it was 57% each card Hopefully when I install 10.6, that gets fixed :\

 

[EastCoasthandle]

Well considering I thought that the official AMD forums was source enough, I apologize for thinking so Though I'll be happy to read a link that you deem to be "the source". I'm also sensing a language barrier here, because I don't quite understand what you mean by "metal cover" and if you mean literally what I'm reading, then what a fan shroud would have to do with the components and not coming in contact with them. Or if you mean heatsink, why anything other than reference would have a problem when "coming out of 3D clocks". When you leave an application where the 3D clocks are used, the card would only COOL DOWN since it would then be in 2D mode... It's not so much what you are talking about that is confusing me, but how you are saying things. I understand everything individually, but when you put them together like that it just isn't coherent (again at least to me it isn't heh).

I see, you don't understand my post but that didn't stop you from saying that information is incorrect? This is rich indeed, thanks for the laugh. As for the "source", it was already provided. Just scroll up a bit.

That wasn't intended for you, or in relation to your post, so I'm sorry but I wasn't agreeing with you at all It was in regards to what Cadaveca had posted.

I don't think we need to argue here. The response is still fitting.

Well I run dual cards and have had no such issues with 157/300 operation. Mind you I only have a Samsung 2233BW monitor, but nothing else has been of any trouble...

The truth of the matter remains the same, it was done for a dual card according to what he provided.

I wasn't able to get anything useful out of the XML file personally. Didn't appear like there was anything pertaining to clocks and voltages, that I could find at least. All I want to be able to do is be able to setup a profile for 3D clocks, voltages and fan speeds and then a profile for 2D clocks, voltages and fan speeds. So far the only program I found that offered it was ATi Tray Tools, but it seemed to be having problems with changing clocks on both cards and it was freezing the PC when I clicked apply :\

If you are not able to find it why are you arguing with me? You don't know what the metal plate on the card is nor can you find voltage, gpu/memory information in the xml file.

I believe you are only frustrating yourself here as your knowledge on what was provided does show to be limited I'm afraid.

Edit:
I'll try to explain it a bit more.
The card I have comes with a metal plate that cools the vregs/mosfets, ram, etc. That plate IMO isn't the best for cooling. Because of that when returning back from 3D overclocks (which CCC allows) I don't see the card getting cooled when at 400/1200. This is in part do to the higher voltages at 400/1200. When it down clocked at 157/300 temps would always go back to normal in part do to the lower voltages needed at 157/300 (got it?). Now per catalystmaker's tweet he said that the increase in 2D clocks was the direct result for dual card. After looking into this a bit more I found a post by Spyre (an Admin at AMD forum) stating that it was also for 120Hz monitors. Which is included in the release notes of Cat 10.5 (IE: support for 120Hz monitors, etc).

Now here's the problem. I (as well as others) do not have any issues using the original 2D clocks but do have problems with the higher 2D clocks (IE: higher temps, possible throttling, etc). So it only makes sense that we are given the option to return back to 157/300. For those that need the higher 2D clock rate give them the option as well.

So in the end there is really nothing to argue about. If you are not effected by either case then you really aren't making much of a point.