The AMD Driver Thread

GoogalyMoogaly · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:02

I realise there are people that would've defended AMD if they re-released the Omega driver with a different name, but I think what's annoying a lot of other people tis that it was over 3 months for not a lot.
If this driver was released in January then it'd be fine I'd guess and nobody would really complain.
But 3 months for a handful of Crossfire profiles (which is apparently as much down to game changes as AMD's driver team) and a few profile updates what was in the driver?
A few bug fixes and known issues, as per normal. Possibly not 3 months worth.
P-L-P (or whatever) Eyefinity profile for ONE card in the range. I'm not sure how popular the 285 is.
And a minimal Freesync implementation that currently won't affect very many. Same thing annoyed me with Nvidia's DSR which doesn't seem 100% with multi-GPU setups.
No FPS limiter?
No new VSR options? (resolutions or supported cards)

For a 3+month driver you'd expect AMD would want to release it with some actual content. Maybe stuff that people wanted? Instead of crossfire profiles for games everyone completed about 2 months ago.

If this driver was supposed to be released when it's ready, why was it released? :-)

pugheaven · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:04

There dont' seem many happy bunnys on here at the moment... I've just downloaded Dying Light... see how it runs :-)

bemaniac · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:08

tommybhoy · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:09

The question shouldn't be why was it released(Freesync) Googaly, but why did AMD choose not to release a driver on a per/couple of game basis, instead of sitting on profiles.

That decision maker should be given the boot imo.

humbug · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:09

Edit good point ^^^^ this is the Free-Sync Driver so not really pointless. but still.....

GoogalyMoogaly said:
I realise there are people that would've defended AMD if they re-released the Omega driver with a different name, but I think what's annoying a lot of other people tis that it was over 3 months for not a lot.
If this driver was released in January then it'd be fine I'd guess and nobody would really complain.
But 3 months for a handful of Crossfire profiles (which is apparently as much down to game changes as AMD's driver team) and a few profile updates what was in the driver?
A few bug fixes and known issues, as per normal. Possibly not 3 months worth.
P-L-P (or whatever) Eyefinity profile for ONE card in the range. I'm not sure how popular the 285 is.
And a minimal Freesync implementation that currently won't affect very many. Same thing annoyed me with Nvidia's DSR which doesn't seem 100% with multi-GPU setups.
No FPS limiter?
No new VSR options? (resolutions or supported cards)

For a 3+month driver you'd expect AMD would want to release it with some actual content. Maybe stuff that people wanted? Instead of crossfire profiles for games everyone completed about 2 months ago.

If this driver was supposed to be released when it's ready, why was it released?

I was expecting 4K VSR, a FPS limiter and perhaps some other goodies with this release. A fresh new interface.

I'm a bit disappointed, i'm not a CF user so this new driver to me seems the same as the last one. I hope its not going to be to much longer for some more proper goodies.

Nexus18 · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:11

I knew it would be a beta driver but still 4 (?) months for a "only" a beta driver that hasn't really added/fixed/improved that much (given the time it has taken!) and seems to be pretty buggy in comparison to previous beta drivers....

Any idea how long until the final version of the driver will be done? Are we talking about days, weeks or months?

I know matt and a few other people keep saying that this is just a one of and drivers will resume to the normal 1 month release time frame but I just have a feeling that this is going to be a lot more frequent

D.P. · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:12

Bonjour said:
Sorry, I don't usually do this, but I had to pick this up. Whilst awesome, the DAC Alpha can't really be considered a 'desktop' part (Mr. Bug was even careful to include the word 'desktop'). It's primary applications were in workstations and servers.

You can't take the development of x86-64 away from AMD. It brought 64-bit processors to the masses and put Intel on the back foot, prompting them to bring an entire processor line to a premature end (there were a couple more iterations of the P4 architecture planned) and forced them to seriously up their game.

On-topic.. thanks for the drivers. Will probably be purchasing FC4 later today to give it a whirl. I think AMD's drivers generally are excellent, but can understand the frustration in waiting for Crossfire profiles. I've just used the time to catch up with some of my back catalog.

There were plenty of 64bit processors out before AMD came along, sun sparc, mips R400, ibm powerpc, etc. Cray had 64bitnprocedors going back a long time.
The amd part was the first x86 compatible 64bit cpu.
Tge fact that many of the earlier 64bit cpua were used in workstations and servers is fairly irrelevant, there was simply no need for it in consumer orientated desktops, and wasn't a need for years after.

And the x64 extension us just horribke. Intel it about64 is a far nicer architecture than the archaic x86.

andybird123 · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:26

Nutella33 said:
Good logic though. Nvidia take the mick and its AMD's fault.

Well, nvidia didnt force AMD to flood the channel with 2 year old cards and then not release their new ones... But they have taken advantage of that fact

GoogalyMoogaly · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:27

humbug said:
Edit good point ^^^^ this is the Free-Sync Driver so not really pointless. but still.....

I was expecting 4K VSR, a FPS limiter and perhaps some other goodies with this release. A fresh new interface.

I'm a bit disappointed, i'm not a CF user so this new driver to me seems the same as the last one. I hope its not going to be to much longer for some more proper goodies.

Yeah, I get that it was a Freesync driver, but it's the minimum they could get away with.
Limited number of cards supported, alouth that may not change until we see new hardware. Also, no multi-GPU support, surely with 1440p and 4K resolutions as well as 1440p being up to 144Hz, surely this is when you'd want multi-GPU setups?
Also it seems reasonable to me that a number of customers that buy the initial Freesync monitors may well be the enthusiasts that have spent the money on a 295x2 or multiple cards.

tommybhoy · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:29

humbug said:
I was expecting 4K VSR, a FPS limiter and perhaps some other goodies with this release. A fresh new interface.

I'm a bit disappointed, i'm not a CF user so this new driver to me seems the same as the last one. I hope its not going to be to much longer for some more proper goodies.

Not too fussed about the other stuff outwith mgpu profiles and not really wanting the fresh interface as I get on well with the one in place just now, hoping if one does come they have a classic option.

I think the delay is more down to 390X drivers getting worked on, HBM may work entirely differently idk.

Nexus18 said:
I know matt and a few other people keep saying that this is just a one of and drivers will resume to the normal 1 month release time frame but I just have a feeling that this is going to be a lot more frequent

If there is going to be this sort of time frame, I for one would have no hesitation in moving completely to the dark side.

AMD may as well shut up shop, they'll have haemorage customers even more, but I'll wait and see what happens as TX is the only gpu that would give me any kind of noticeable increase but I tend to keep my trousers fastened when i bend over.

eddyr · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:31

pugheaven said:
There dont' seem many happy bunnys on here at the moment... I've just downloaded Dying Light... see how it runs

I'm happy at the moment, who else is happy? Raise your arm(s) and type.

Bonjour · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:34

Happy regarding the state of my drivers.

Not happy that some oik nicked the door mirror covers off my car while I was playing football.

Ian Evey · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:43

bemaniac said:
ah dammit.............coincidence or the new driver. My GPU is artefacting with all drivers now at stock settings. I'm saying new drivers killed my 295x2. Time to RMA to OCUK.

Does your single 290 work fine with the new drivers?

Gregster · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:44

Bonjour said:
Happy regarding the state of my drivers.

Not happy that some oik nicked the door mirror covers off my car while I was playing football.

That sucks dude...I take it no CCTV there?

mz/x · 21 Mar 2015 at 17:55

AMDMatt said:
Samsungs monitors are not quite ready yet, but they will be here soon.

"soon" is a relative term. Tomorrow? 1 week? 2 week? 1 month?
All recent AMD communications imply that these monitors are literally on the delivery trucks to the stores.

We know the monitor makers ....

I find it amateurish that no solid release date has been announced after missing the promised release date. It simply does not build trust. Under trust I meant for AMD and Samsung. In essence, even a bad news of a delay with an honest detailed explanation is better than saying nothing.

What do you mean by "not quite ready yet"?
Matt, can you share with us a release date?

Bonjour · 21 Mar 2015 at 18:01

D.P. said:
There were plenty of 64bit processors out before AMD came along, sun sparc, mips R400, ibm powerpc, etc. Cray had 64bitnprocedors going back a long time.
The amd part was the first x86 compatible 64bit cpu.
Tge fact that many of the earlier 64bit cpua were used in workstations and servers is fairly irrelevant, there was simply no need for it in consumer orientated desktops, and wasn't a need for years after.

And the x64 extension us just horribke. Intel it about64 is a far nicer architecture than the archaic x86.

I agree about IA64. The Itaniums were stonking processors, though prohibitively expensive.

A criticism of x86-64 could be that it's drawn x86 out longer, when it could have been scrapped a number of years ago.

Bonjour · 21 Mar 2015 at 18:05

Gregster said:
That sucks dude...I take it no CCTV there?

No CCTV at the club car park unfortunately.

I've found a seller on eBay with loads of them (Mini mirror covers), suspiciously based in the area our opposition came from.

Now to give these new drivers a test drive...

Nexus18 · 21 Mar 2015 at 18:28

tommybhoy said:
If there is going to be this sort of time frame, I for one would have no hesitation in moving completely to the dark side.

AMD may as well shut up shop, they'll have haemorage customers even more, but I'll wait and see what happens as TX is the only gpu that would give me any kind of noticeable increase but I tend to keep my trousers fastened when i bend over.

hehe

I wouldn't touch the titan x even with a barge pole!

Not sure what I would do as I wouldn't want the 970 due to 3.5GB VRAM and the 980 is a rip of for what it is as well...

I just hate this whole being tied to one GPU brand and g/free sync monitor crap! Saying that, I can see nvidia having no option but to drop gsync and being forced to support adaptive/free sync at some point.....

LtMatt · 21 Mar 2015 at 18:30

mz/x said:
"soon" is a relative term. Tomorrow? 1 week? 2 week? 1 month?
All recent AMD communications imply that these monitors are literally on the delivery trucks to the stores. We know the monitor makers ....

I find it amateurish that no solid release date has been announced after missing the promised release date. It simply does not build trust. Under trust I meant for AMD and Samsung. In essence, even a bad news of a delay with an honest detailed explanation is better than saying nothing.

What do you mean by "not quite ready yet"?
Matt, can you share with us a release date?

I don't know the release date for Samsung monitors sorry, you'd need to ask them. What i meant was if they were ready, they'd be here by now along with the other FreeSync panels that OcuK stock.