The AMD Driver Thread

[LtMatt]

??

Will ask, not familiar with that game.

 

[LtMatt]

Quickly tried the drivers with Witcher3 and am happy so far.
Gpu usage 86% on both cards, fps = 60fps with Hairworks ON, Shadows and foliage distance set to High, AA off, everything else Ultra, 16x tesselation in CCC, Sweet FX.

AA on drops fps to 30fps which is weird
Didn't see flicker unless AA is turned on. It was minor anyway, not a lot like in AFR mode.

Good stuff.

pCARS is running much better than in any drivers I've installed on Windows 8.1, including modded Windows 10 drivers, from my brief test so far.

I got 12fps (~30%) extra on the grid start at Spa, compared to my previous AMD driver, using the low settings I had in place earlier on Thursday night.

Same performance as before for me too under crossfire. Forcing AFR friendly gives me the performance boost I should be seeing but textures still a flickering mess.

Edit: Ignore that, forgot to delete the profile I had. Nice, solid performance boost now with no flickering so far. Happy

The recommended optimisations have been expanded to include crossfire now. Turning off TemporalAA in the render.ini doubled my fps on xfire 290. There's no need to disable all AA in game though, I think that option is just for people who don't want to edit .ini's.

http://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/Optimizing-The-Witcher-3.aspx

Good to hear guys!

Everyone playing The Witcher 3 with Crossfire, please follow the tips in the KB, it will improve your experience greatly.

http://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/Optimizing-The-Witcher-3.aspx

Disable TemporalAA as above ^. Doing this you can then experiment with in game AA enabled, and see what works best for you.

 

[LtMatt]

Thanks for the Witcher xfire implementation, now get cracking on the Elite profile please *cracks whip*

Heard loud and clear over Elite Dangerous guys, I promise it's been requested and I'm pushing for it to be included as soon as is possible. I'm afraid i cannot give you more than this for now, but trust me I'm making it clear that we want this included in a future driver.

 

[LtMatt]

Wait, so TW3 profile doesn't actually work properly? I'm downloading the driver so haven't been able to check.

EDIT: Just read notes



WHAT. THE. ****.

So for a crossfire profile we get some half-arsed garbage?

They were between "a rock and a hard place" so they've just released it "as is", this is gonna get ugly <popcorn out>

We suggest to disable AA as it currently causes negative Crossfire scaling and flickering. However with it disabled Crossfire works well with around 80-90% scaling, depending on the resolution and hardware used. We felt it was worth releasing in this state rather than waiting (however long) until this issue was fixed between the dev and us. We also wanted to get our Project Cars fixes out as soon as possible. We spent time creating a detailed KB for our customers to ensure they get the best possible experience in The Witcher 3 with Crossfire enabled.

 

[LtMatt]

is this not the already leaked 15.5 driver that had already appeared on Guru3d last week?

Nope, I'd recommend using the real thing rather than a driver that we didn't officially post.

I don't know what else is missing, but the leaked driver has no profile for The Witcher 3.

 

[LtMatt]

AMDMatt do we need to install the Catalyst Control Centre to get the crossfire profiles to work, I don't use it and find it can cause stuttering with Afterburner on my 7990.

Are you sure it's Catalyst Control Center causing that? Because i don't see that issue and i use a 7990, Catalyst Control Center and afterburner.

What settings are you using in Afterburner?

To answer your question though, yes you should be able to avoid using it without issue. However you will lose the ability to use custom Crossfire profiles.

 

[LtMatt]

Thanks for posting drivers Matt.

I cant seem to find the profile for Witcher 3 though? I added the .exe to CCC reduced tessellation to x16 but cant see the profile?

I don't think the profile is selectable at the moment like some others, but it's in there.

 

[LtMatt]

Well at least that's one barrier out of my way towards buying The Witcher 3, now I just need to finish Dragon Age Inquistion and I'm good to go.

I don't suppose there is any news or updates on the Xfire FreeSync drivers though Matt? It is getting rather annoying having a grands worth of kit (295x2 and BenQ XL2730Z) sitting here and not being able to get full performance out of them

If you haven't heard from me, no updates I'm afraid.

I've just fired up pcars with the latest driver...now this is what AMD should have delivered on release of the game!

2x290s running everything maxxed out with a respectable 80-85 fps It has transformed the game!

Many thanks AMD...although you can't help but think there is still some more performance to eek out in Xfire! Better late than never I suppose!

Good to hear.

 

[LtMatt]

Hi how do i enable freesync for one card i have disabled the second card and enabled fs in ccc panel is that all i need to do, or do i need to turn on vsync in game?

With Crossfire disabled in Catalyst Control Center and FreeSync enabled, you should be good to go.

 

[LtMatt]

so i dont need vsync enabled in game then?

FreeSync gives you a choice, you can choose to have Vsync on or off while using it and this will affect the behaviour depending on if you're inside or outside the FreeSync range. Try both and see which experience you prefer? Or you can enable FreeSync and lock the FPS to the upper range of the supported FreeSync range of your monitor.

Personally speaking, I'd like Vsync off and FreeSync enabled as there is no noticeable tearing with higher refresh monitors anyway, and most importantly, you get less input lag!

TechReport did a deep dive on FreeSync and i recommend giving it a read. I think you'll find it very enlightening.

AMD has built some flexibility into FreeSync's operation: the user can choose whether to enable or disable vsync for frames that exceed the display's timing tolerance. Consider what happens if frames are coming in from the GPU too quickly for the display to keep up. With vsync enabled, the display will wait a full 6.94 ms before updating the screen, possibly discarding excess frames. (G-Sync always behaves in this manner.) With vsync disabled, the display will go ahead and update the screen mid-refresh, getting the freshest information to the user's eyes while potentially introducing a tearing artifact. Since variable refresh is active, the screen will only tear when the frame rate goes above or below the display's refresh range.

Giving users the option of enabling vsync in this situation is a smart move, one that I fully expect Nvidia to copy in future versions of G-Sync.

Source
http://techreport.com/review/28073/benq-xl2730z-freesync-monitor-reviewed/3

 

[LtMatt]

I used the setting you put in the original 7990 thread, and undervolt to 1.135v, I have to close either CC or afterburner or I notice stuttering. I will try the new drivers over the weekend. Thanks.

Can you show me a screenshot of the settings you're using in Afterburner please?

 

[LtMatt]

Thanks for the drivers. Matt I really like how you invest you own money to different card configs like getting that 7990 even having whole battalion of 290x's at you disposal. Gives you the ability to elaborate down to userlevel and test their settings in action. Really appreciate this.


About drivers, I get average 10 fps over 15.4 drivers, but only few fps over modded win10 drivers. I just hope you guys can get that lower overhead from those win10 drivers transferred to official drivers aswell.

Any progress on this, or waiting bigger driver upgrade for Fiji?

That's why i do it. I won't lie, i get some hardware for free, but a lot of the gpu's i pay for myself simply because it allows me to do my job better. Oh, and it's kindof a hobby.

Thanks for the feedback.

 

[LtMatt]

Just to confirm, what is usually the best way to install new drivers:

- install on top of current ones
- uninstall current then restart and install new ones
- uninstall, run DDU and install new ones

Also, are these still the best settings to use in AMD ccc for pretty much every game?

TL : DR

Uninstall old drivers. Restart. Download and install new drivers. Restart.

Official Method

For instructions on how to uninstall or install the AMD Catalyst Software Suite, you may refer to the following support resources:

• How-To Uninstall AMD Catalyst™ Drivers From A Windows® Based System
• How-To Install AMD Catalyst™ Drivers For A Windows® Based System

I'd recommend leaving Catalyst Control Center settings at default, typically. Most (but not all) of our performance optimisations are performed on the Standard texture preset.

I hope you get one of the new AMD Radeon (name pending) for your troubles.

I'll probably get four though i expect I'll be paying for most, if not all of them.

 

[LtMatt]

Any updates on the issues that myself and other 280X owners were having with GTA V and BF: Hardline, Matt?

No, I'll post as soon as there is.

 

[LtMatt]

Thanks Matt,only had chance for quick go on pcars,there is an improvement for me,but in decent weather and large grid I'm still having to chop settings down a lot more than I'd have thought at 1440,will experiment more later.
Mind you with ai turned to 80% in pcars they behave like kamikaze drivers
so I might end up cranking settings and treating as more of a tt game,ai spends more time overtaking fully on grass than tarmac! good for a laugh though.
Least dirt rally looks and plays brilliant.

Noted Tony, thanks.

Dirt Rally performs nicely for all and it uses some AMD Graphics Technology, the source code of which is available on our website.

 

[LtMatt]

Is that a dig at anyone?

Just explaining why the game 'plays and looks brilliant'. How many other games in recent times can you describe using both of those terms?

 

[LtMatt]

Then you should consider yourself lucky. I and many other 280x Xfire owners suffer from dismal GPU usage (60% or so) with horrific stuttering and occasional artifacting. My CPU (sig) should not be a problem.

Unfortunately GTA V is quite heavy on the cpu and you will see a benefit from using an 8 Core/8 Threaded cpu, especially once you introduce more than one gpu. As such, CrossFire will never perform optimally when the second gpu is being partially held up.

 

[LtMatt]

Leaked drivers still artifact in GTA. Any update when we can use our hardware to play a game properly?

Does 15.5 address this problem?

Thanks

Marc69 this problem is going to be addressed in either a future game update or a updated Catalyst driver. At the moment, the issue is still present. I don't have a further update on this yet I'm afraid.

Matt, see when installing the drivers and you get the choice of what to install etc.

What is acp application and should I bother installing it?

Also is amd accelerated video transcoding worth installing even though I use madvr (video renderer) with mpc?

You can safely install it all. The ACP Application is actually related to True Audio processor, which is present on all GCN 1.1 and 1.2 chips.

 

[LtMatt]

So, naff all again for steamos/linux then Matt That will be 6 months in a few days since last driver .

Upon checking the most recent Linux driver is 14.12, sorry Pete.

 

[LtMatt]

Witcher crossfire drivers are holding up well. Very smooth with the optimisations suggested. Could use a little AA, but all good at the moment. Holding up well on the 295x2

Good to hear.