AMD Catalyst (Modified Build)

[crushilista]

So we can expect that patch tommarow? If so lol.

Can you explain what exactly that patch will do? By the way i'm reading it, I see that it will make OpenGL, OpenCL better. I see you said we need to utilize constant CPU.

Will the new patch basically make those not need constant CPU, and also make benchmarks better? How will they make them better, and will that have an effect on gameplay FPS.

Sorry for the burst of questions, just curious.

[TwL]

Originally Posted by crushilista

I see you said we need to utilize constant CPU.

Will the new patch basically make those not need constant CPU

We have to utilize Constant CPU all the time on everything. games, apps even your windows in IDLE utilizes it. A bit better explaining perhaps.

Consider an 'usage' to be a straight 'line' in every 'driver' while in full use having a lot of caps in 'allowed/optimized usage pass through to CPU'. Now v10.4 had pretty clean 'line' while v10.5 huge caps while AMD/ATI optimized pretty well (not good enough) the v10.6 so the 'line' while you run absolute 100% on GPU(s) and utilize CPU(s) (/ Processing NVIDIA PhysX GPU) would look something like this now:

----.------.-----.--^------------^------------^---------------------------------------

(sorry for crappy demo)

Now consider if we can take those down going '.''s out of there to it's stable on X FPS until jump higher. That would increase the 'Constant CPU' speed and lower "the stress"/bugs.

Very good example case would be the first benchmark of vantage. In the end scene while the 'boat' takes off from water you see an 'jump' in FPS. That would be the drivers making an '.' in the line.

@commonly

I couldn't get my stuff together today, but I have some good news. I found the 'code' path which allows me now to adjust stress to absolute minimum on 'smoke effects' and general parts where games & something like 'vantage' would 'jump'.

bad news is this will not be under v10.6 in any case driver simply doesn't allow it (or has it's own demons).

I try to make an update tomorrow.

[CPC_RedDawn]

Originally Posted by TwL

@commonly

I couldn't get my stuff together today, but I have some good news. I found the 'code' path which allows me now to adjust stress to absolute minimum on 'smoke effects' and general parts where games & something like 'vantage' would 'jump'.

bad news is this will not be under v10.6 in any case driver simply doesn't allow it (or has it's own demons).

I try to make an update tomorrow.

That sounds cool, which driver are you using for this? 10.4b again? These drivers are pretty sweet, never missing a beat in the new MOH Beta 60fps all the time.

With this new patch you are working on does this mean we should be get higher fps in games that use a lot of smoke? Such as BF:BC2?

[crushilista]

@commonly

I couldn't get my stuff together today, but I have some good news. I found the 'code' path which allows me now to adjust stress to absolute minimum on 'smoke effects' and general parts where games & something like 'vantage' would 'jump'.

bad news is this will not be under v10.6 in any case driver simply doesn't allow it (or has it's own demons).

I try to make an update tomorrow.

[/QUOTE]

Thanks for answering my question, I knew what you meant for the most part, but I thought you meant that it was forced 100% on all apps (the processer) which I found odd.... i'm weird ignore that lol.

I really like that you found the smoke effect thing. I'd love to actually be able to look at smoke without my FPS dropping to 1/8th the speed.

[TwL]

Originally Posted by CPC_RedDawn

That sounds cool, which driver are you using for this? 10.4b again? These drivers are pretty sweet, never missing a beat in the new MOH Beta 60fps all the time.

With this new patch you are working on does this mean we should be get higher fps in games that use a lot of smoke? Such as BF:BC2?

yeah, that would be 1 form of effect causing 'jumps' it actually has nothing to do with the point 'it's a smoke'-effect or 'heat style of'-effect. It's actually bug when the program asks driver for 'what to use for' > driver answers with 'how the hell should I know' = jump.. In raw ideal thinking.

@commonly

I will be updating the drivers I can. CFX(10.4) builds for sure. Single card (10.6) I will update, if I can simply dig up how to solve the matter similar sadly it doesn't look good, but gonna do some other updates on that anyway.

[rjc862003]

Originally Posted by m00nlighter

Moreover, many old OpenGL titles work OK in 10.4 and are screwed up beyond recognition in newer versions (texture and shader problems).

I wonder if it is possible to backport the new DXVA .cap and .dll from 10.6 to 10.4 AND enable Mosquito Noise Removal and Deblocking for 4x series (and hopefully for 3x series too). Have a strong gut feeling that announcing support for these features in 5x series ONLY is just a marketing trick by ATI, same as Microsoft's not so clever ruse with DirectX 10 and Windows Vista.

Offtopic: I am thorougly amazed at your competence: a true hacker indeed. You alone have managed to produce a stable driver while the whole bloody team of full-time devs and testers have f..ked up two or three releases already. Ever worked for Matrox?
(I used to have Matrox G400 and G550. And I still miss the image quality, and DRIVER RELIABILITY. It's a shame that that Parhelia core didn't made it...)

there was never a RUSE xp never support dx10 for a reason ( all them hacks to renable it where/are pure non functional bs "
as for ogl breaking in recent versions its to be expected old games are old

[m00nlighter]

TwL and mods, please excuse me for this offtopic post. Delete if necessary.

Originally Posted by rjc862003

there was never a RUSE xp never support dx10 for a reason ( all them hacks to renable it where/are pure non functional bs "

Exactly. And the one and only reason was to force users so that they move to Vista (it is not an OS, it's a v-word in IT community).

Originally Posted by rjc862003

as for ogl breaking in recent versions its to be expected old games are old

Abso-effing-lutely nothing should be EXPECTED TO BE BREAKING in ANY new version. That's what testing dept takes care of, in any decent software development company. ATI driver team just sucks big time, all the way back to ATI Rage.
Talking about old games: Deus Ex turned ten yesterday. Is it old? If so, name, say, five new games that are at least equal to DX in terms of gameplay experience and script nonlinearity .
Unreal is well over ten years old. People still play it online and make single player mods for it (check OldUnreal). Is it old? Not to them I think. Not to me, too.

[TwL]

Hmm, don't have much time to read as going to sleep, but I did finish the building now on new editions. Took me a freaken another 5 hours(and probably several days on top of that) to figure that code I was looking for was inside the the control center load code.

I will add them here for now and tomorrow to 'first page'. They are 'experimental' because only way I get around the performance was to destroy some of 'catalyst control panel'-code (and on 10.6 case even this is absolute bare able. The 10.4a code is few times more powerful than 10.6, but that's fine since that also suits to CFX even better & on Multiple Display setups.) which means that there is around 7 second lag on catalyst control center simply because some moron on ATI decided to include optimization code directly to control panel DLL files since 10.4b.

Now, Control Panel maybe slow as hell, but the drivers are probably fastest damn things there is in this world. Cladly you only need to setup the control panel settings usually 1 time or twice and simply run the drivers.

Links:

v10.4a + Modifications:

x86 / 32-bit:
ZippyShare - MediaFire - Sendspace
MD5: 2bf9338bef3476a93bdc676a735ba3f8

x64 / 64-bit:
ZippyShare - MediaFire - Sendspace
MD5: 8361327259793763f155e2eebe0932d5

v10.6 + Modifications:

x86 / 32-bit:
ZippyShare - MediaFire - Sendspace
MD5: baaa028bfedd49ecac5251cd8ad61dc5

x64 / 64-bit:
ZippyShare - MediaFire - Sendspace
MD5: 7dcc9a26960ba04396e1f588c1337096


As for now I am out of code again from AMD/ATI and those 2 will be the best existing builds there is for general performance over CFX/Single Card and multiple display systems for now.

For those with multiple screens:
You will need to edit the profiles accordingly to first page for the 10.4a (best choice here) to be stable 'IDLE' clocks to survive the restarts. Also MSI Afterburner has an bug in this case in clocks. So, watch out on that. Minimum startup IDLE 2D clocks would be at 400Mhz/700Mhz. That will do on 0.950-1.038v(950-1038 inside 'profiles.xml').

Also everyone should note. You do not need nor want 'Application Profiles June 17'. Those are inside the drivers already.

[crushilista]

So... do I install this over or do I need a clean install like previous? I remember you saying something about nonrebooting patch.

[TwL]

you really really need to install it clean and with the new clean-up with it.

heh, you do not even wanna know how many times I rebooted to get this together you can reboot twice.

[crushilista]

Originally Posted by TwL

you really really need to install it clean and with the new clean-up with it.

heh, you do not even wanna know how many times I rebooted to get this together you can reboot twice.

Lol alright. So this is supposed to be faster overall basically? If so than that's awesome if it's stable. I'm assuming it's the same cleanup as before, yes?

[BeoWulf_]

Same 1o1 as before.. with a slighty modified ati_****_cleaner file..

and yea. it's a little bit faster.. in what i've tested so far.. HOMM5 TOTE, MW2 and so far all good.. a couble of FPS faster than previous version 272.. 5-6 in MW2, and 30-40 in HOMM5 TOTE.. gonna test further.. and report back.. Vantage scored the same +/- 50p but i've learned that it's not everything..

And about that CCC "slow" thing he mentiones.. i have had no issues with slow CCC or something like that.. if anything i feel it's faster..

and i have not had any "bugs" reguarding clocks in MSI afterburner..

So far so good...

[crushilista]

I got a bluescreen error with this driver and had to reinstall Windows 7. I have all my old stuff in a folder so I guess it doesn't matter, but this doesn't make sense when I followed all the removal instructions to the letter.

[crushilista]

The 10.4 version didn't install correctly for me, had a lot of errors for some reason. The 10.6 went right on though perfectly. I'll report back with how good it is.

[crushilista]

I just tried the drivers and they are awesome! I went 175 points higher in the FF14 benchmark then I did with the last ones you made. Thank you so much for making drivers that actually work right. The bluescreen was just a fluke that happened because of old ATI stuff.

[CPC_RedDawn]

which one is meant to be the fastest? 10.4a or 10.6?

EDIT:

Just installed 10.4a and all went well this time. Installed as sweet as a nut. Event my desktop feels faster too.

So we dont need the app profiles. Did not see them in the install list when installing these drivers? Are the built into the driver it self?

Will test some games out and report back.

Thanks again for your hard work mate. You didnt have to do this, but you did. All the support you need from me you will get!

EDIT2: Just tested, CSS, MW2, and BF:BC2. Whilst MW2 seems smoother dont think the fps has improved much. On maps such as Rundown, Estate, the game slows down to around 58fps in places. CSS seems a lot better even with the new updates this game runs much better than the previous build. And BF:BC2 I dont think I have ever had such a good driver for this game, maps load times are excellent, and performance even with tons of smoke is great. Used to dip as low as 35fps in parts but now I aint seen it go below 40fps. 5fps to me is a big difference.

[TwL]

Originally Posted by crushilista

I got a bluescreen error with this driver and had to reinstall Windows 7. I have all my old stuff in a folder so I guess it doesn't matter, but this doesn't make sense when I followed all the removal instructions to the letter.

Ok, thanks for the information.

I have come to conclusion on this message that this is 'AMD Motherboard' related only as this is second AMD motherboard that BSODs on me on here. User L!QUID had same issue on v10.6 Experimental driver no longer than week ago. Could you please tell me which driver were you testing when this happened and did the BSOD/crash happen in after clean-up process OR after you got back to windows & installed new driver ???

(There is exactly 3 possible reasons this could ever happen and I want to know which it is.)

-edit-

hmm, could you still answer the question, but I think I know what you did.

Am I correct, if I say: You removed 'All ATI Software' > You had second driver so you had to use 'device manager' to remove it > ran clean up > rebooted (> BSOD) OR (> installed new driver > BSOD straight after you logged in) ???


@CPC_RedDawn

v10.4a is faster for 100% sure. 10.6 is bullsh1t driver, but since people kept going over my head on Vantage and other benchmarks I just had to build it as it's probably fastest driver there is on this world when it comes to simply benchmarks.

As for 'using in games' it's no where near as fast as 10.4.

App-profiles:
No Application Profiles are inside the driver, if you would look to your '%windir%\system32' now you would notice the same 64KB .blb file on ATI files is there from 'AppProfiles-June 18'. I used it as generic Application profile file on this release.

[MerolaC]

Thank you a lot for the new packs!
But, I'm banging my head on the wall.
I've downloaded the 10.6 driver KNOWING that the officials are utter crap for games and even with your optimizations, are not as bad as the officials, but still bad. Miracles can't be done, lol
So, i guess it's time to download 10.4a pack.

Thank you!

[TwL]

@MerolaC

Yeah, come to conclusion v10.5 was actually first uter crap. They just continued same idioticy through v10.6. v10.4 is actually a lot faster
than 10.5 or 10.6 but 10.5-10.6 are more stable (in a sense of FPS). The v10.4 WHQL was actually fastest possible driver there is, but that
has issue of yet again 'unfinished features where not to WHQL', lol. So, v10.4b was added on 5.4. and 10.4 was added on 7.4. and I
cannot understand but they broke several things between this period of time.

I mean some serious sh1t Like 'DirectDraw After v10.4b build 5.4' = Has never worked again. Control Panel speeds affecting CPU utilization
= has never been corrected again and list goes on and on. It's like this.. They have broken an functional feature in every single release since
5.4. and fixed high-end features 1 after another continously breaking features to get them working.

So, my only way to be sure to get you guys a 'true' performing build which I had tested numerous occasions on CFX systems was the 21.4.
build driver base which was 'correction driver' released even before WHQL as 'alpha build' which re-enabled all the disabled features
with new data and this was also only build which natively had good OpenGL base and was best stability consider for new speed/updated DirectX.

[MerolaC]

All i can say is, oh ****ing hell :S
At least, i am grateful that our cards aren't smoking and burning all over (yet at least) lol

Thanks for the informative post. I just hope the do something good for 10.7
I guess we are all hoping for this xD

[TwL]

Originally Posted by MerolaC

All i can say is, oh ****ing hell :S
At least, i am grateful that our cards aren't smoking and burning all over (yet at least) lol

Thanks for the informative post. I just hope the do something good for 10.7
I guess we are all hoping for this xD

Lol, trust me ATI/AMD removed me that right to burn/smoke any cards sadly. They have now days so restrictive code that I am surprise
that I got even this far and by looks of it (v10.6). They are not intending to keep me running as they block a lot of features and they
actually locked 3 file chain simply so that no one can modify the chain they build which I did on v10.6 anyway, heh, but no worries, if this
continues there's always little debug tools to get the code open. I just don't want to modify any and keep it as official as possible it's
not question can I use 'Process debuggers and hack the code open' I just hope it doesn't come in to that.

Although, probably on that stage the best solution would be the same path as ********* is taking and mod the source code clean up,
but I know for 100% sure, if this happens I'll stop building as these drivers were meant to be 'functional' not like now 'I have to break
things to get speed out of drivers'. Hopefully subject to change.

[crushilista]

Originally Posted by TwL

Ok, thanks for the information.

I have come to conclusion on this message that this is 'AMD Motherboard' related only as this is second AMD motherboard that BSODs on me on here. User L!QUID had same issue on v10.6 Experimental driver no longer than week ago. Could you please tell me which driver were you testing when this happened and did the BSOD/crash happen in after clean-up process OR after you got back to windows & installed new driver ???

(There is exactly 3 possible reasons this could ever happen and I want to know which it is.)

-edit-

hmm, could you still answer the question, but I think I know what you did.

Am I correct, if I say: You removed 'All ATI Software' > You had second driver so you had to use 'device manager' to remove it > ran clean up > rebooted (> BSOD) OR (> installed new driver > BSOD straight after you logged in) ???


@CPC_RedDawn

v10.4a is faster for 100% sure. 10.6 is bullsh1t driver, but since people kept going over my head on Vantage and other benchmarks I just had to build it as it's probably fastest driver there is on this world when it comes to simply benchmarks.

As for 'using in games' it's no where near as fast as 10.4.

App-profiles:
No Application Profiles are inside the driver, if you would look to your '%windir%\system32' now you would notice the same 64KB .blb file on ATI files is there from 'AppProfiles-June 18'. I used it as generic Application profile file on this release.

I removed all ATI software via the control panal and used express to do so. I then used ****cleaner on it. I rebooted, and just like the last time this happened, the flag for Windows 7 got 1/4 the way making the flag, it froze for a second, then a bluescreen that said like 0x000007B or something like that popped up. I was using your experimental driver for single cards before hand, 32 bit. Another user named Ice on this forum also had the bluescreen problem, but with another driver that you didn't edit. He also has a AMD motherboard.

[TwL]

Originally Posted by crushilista

I removed all ATI software via the control panal and used express to do so. I then used ****cleaner on it. I rebooted, and just like the last time this happened, the flag for Windows 7 got 1/4 the way making the flag, it froze for a second, then a bluescreen that said like 0x000007B or something like that popped up. I was using your experimental driver for single cards before hand, 32 bit. Another user named Ice on this forum also had the bluescreen problem, but with another driver that you didn't edit. He also has a AMD motherboard.

yeah, 'AMD Motherboard' is one possible explain, but I do not think that is the issue is here now. I think the issue is actually on driver removal.
Did you check that the driver you removed actually got removed and there was 'standard VGA display adapter' before you clean up ?

As I think I know where the issue here is now and that what you say above is exactly the kind of error/bsod I am thinking here. Really bad
one too since if the cleanup is executed and driver removal is done by 'windows' this means windows through you were hacking it's drivers
and BSOD is unavoidable and in worst case, if there were driver still in system while clean up it would think that there should be an driver file <somewhere>.

Either way I am gonna be going through the code today 1 more time on x86 side. Have to see as they changed something on the code there differently than on x64 on few specific versions so I am going to check those up.


@commonly

I am sorry of the 'Experimental Builds' catalyst 5-7 seconds apply settings lag. I am still working on this to get it corrected, but it would look
like ATI driver team did some pretty damn bad damage while they included optimizations on their 'catalyst desktop driver'.

The lag is for now/with any at the moment drivers unavoidable to driver function as fast as it does. Only possible speed up would be, if
you would 'fix' an .NET installation in system (as this would optimize the .NET code for which catalyst uses). Lets just hope what ever comes
from AMD next it's an correlation A. to DD CAL, B. Correction to their own damn 'catalyst desktop driver' C. Fix for processing through. So, we
can get an decent build driver up.

I included this note now to main/first post on 2 parts:

Originally Posted by TwL

CRITICAL NOTE:
There is an issue with modified builds of catalyst v10.6 installed specific style and you will BSOD/Crash, if you
have to 'remove' driver through 'device manager'.
(meaning you have updated over drivers before and it won't remove the driver when you 'remove all ATI software')
You MOST do extra reboot before clean up because windows will think you are hacking it's drivers otherwise.
Also not to people owning 'AMD motherboards' I suggest you steer hell away from v10.6.
(Affecting: experimental and 'final build v2.72 'single card'-driver')

[crushilista]

Yay! I'm a guieniepig! Saved are all of you lol. I'm going to get 10.4 again and try it..... So how do I remove this exactly?

[TwL]

Originally Posted by crushilista

Yay! I'm a guieniepig! Saved are all of you lol. I'm going to get 10.4 again and try it..... So how do I remove this exactly?

As said on above 'if you have to use device manager':
1. go to 'programs and features' as usual 'remove all ATI Software' > express.
2. open device manager / run.. > devmgmt.msc
3. see that there is 'Standard VGA Display Adapter', if there is not you have to:
- remove the 'ATI Radeon HD xxxx Series' driver & check remove driver files
- right click on 'Display adapters' > click 'Scan for hardware changes'
(Do this so many times you come up to 'Standard VGA Display Adapter' and ignore all reboot questions)
4. reboot the machine
5. Now run the clean-up process and install as usual OR install the new driver with out Clean-up to be 100% sure it doesn't fail because of 'AMD motherboard'.

on step 5., if you wanna see if it is the 'AMD motherboard' do clean up otherwise just install. Would appreciate the clean-up so I would
know does removal of 'HKLM\software\AMD' or 'ATI' files in system actually affect this bug. Also would help me to correct removal/install instructions on first page.

note also that this should also work on 10.6.