CATALYST™ 3.8 Rating

***Zardon*** · Oct 8, 2003, 02:02 PM

Rate the newest release of the CATALYST drivers on a scale from 1 through 10.

10 being a PERFECT figure and 1 being terrible, please vote and detail your opinions.

mike2h · Oct 8, 2003, 02:15 PM

i think zardon wants REAL, INFORMED, ratings. not a 10 just because they have been released.

WildChild · Oct 8, 2003, 02:28 PM

For what I use em for they are a TENNNNNNNNNN

**MIG-31** · Oct 8, 2003, 02:46 PM

for me i vote ten for the time being.instantly noticed a increase in quake 3 and nolf 2.still to try my other favs yet.

nolf 2 looked odd when tried rgb cycle in smartshader options thought i were spicked & high.

projectHUMAN · Oct 8, 2003, 03:19 PM

There are two 2's. :P Which "2" should I click!?

***Zardon*** · Oct 8, 2003, 03:42 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by projectHUMAN
There are two 2's. :P Which "2" should I click!?

well I had a wonderfully witty answer ready to say "well these drivers are so good they dont deserve a 1 !!", but thats lame, I cocked up...... fixed

Vengeance · Oct 8, 2003, 03:47 PM

I will rate later tonight, After I get home from work and play a game or two. But right now they are looking real good

Raider1 · Oct 8, 2003, 04:03 PM

Yeah it sucks being here at work with these cat 3.8 drivers buring a hole in my pocket. Only 2 1/2 hours till i can try them out

**Roadee** · Oct 8, 2003, 04:24 PM

I gave them an 8....because nothing it perfect. The only way I would of given them a 9 is if the over drive function was available for my 9800 Pro......I was hoping for something better then R3DTweak......but oh well. I am sure someone will hack the drivers and figure out a way for the rest of us to use it....where there is a will......there is a way

Warpy · Oct 8, 2003, 06:31 PM

Increased framerate in Ravenshield
Better pixel shading performance in 3dmark03 and Aquamark3
Fixed my American Army Op "Shadow Issue".

[SIZE=xx-large]It's an 8![/size]

I see ATI really working with the community to squeeze that extra inch to performance and public satisfaction

A excellent release, which is why my NVIDIA FX5900 is sitting on my bed in a box!

Dyre Straits · Oct 8, 2003, 06:33 PM

I am giving these a [SIZE=xx-large]BIG 9[/size] for the following reasons:

1. There's no such thing as PERFECT.

2. These have fixed my most annoying problem with the CAT 3.5-3.7s. Namely, I can now reboot my system without having to unplug my Video Out connection! YAY!!! YAY!!! YAY!!!

3. Not only #2, but they also remember my display settings so that I don't have to go back into the Control Panel and reconfigure the monitor and video out resolutions. WONDERFUL!!

4. So far, the only negative I've seen is this: In 3DMark2K1SE the High Poly Test (without the lights) is giving me texture flickering on the shadow/reflections of the tent pavilions in the background. (This is the test with the carousel gargoyles -- or whatever they're called.)

I do still have more testing to do, but, I've put these on both of my RADEONS (8500/128 MB & 64 DDR VIVO) and am tickled pink with them so far.

Rayder · Oct 8, 2003, 07:19 PM

I gave them a 5.

ALL the same problems as the 3.6 and 3.7's, plus a few new ones. The new features are very nice, but if my games don't work correctly, they do me no good.

8500's need to be looked into more closely during driver development, the flickering texture issues got even worse. No amount of options changing made any difference to the games that exibit flickering/missing textures. Back to the 3.5 'hotfix' drivers for me, those are the last set of drivers that have consistenly worked well for me. And YES, as soon as I put the 3.5's back in, all the problems disappeared.

3 PC's, 3 - 8500 variations, 2 different motherboard chipsets, all the same exact problems. DriverCleaner 2.0 made no difference to the results. 8500's must be mongrel cards or something......

I'm pretty bummed-out about it.......I had really high hopes for the 3.8's........

Oh well.....at least they didn't crash, hard-lock or format my systems or anything like that.

sigh....maybe the [SIZE=xx-large]next release[/size] .... [SIZE=x-large]next release[/size] .... [SIZE=x-small]next release[/size] .... (the neverending echo)

qballshalls2002 · Oct 8, 2003, 08:00 PM

I gave them a 9.These drivers are the best Cats I ever used athough not perfect.My only complaints is that they should of implented the Uninstall Utility inside the display box when changing resolutions and such.My next complaint would be the new UI,is nice but it takes alittle while to set up the D3D/OGL properties.I also still get light studders/framerate lags with Vsync and AA enabled.I hope they will fix this.

I hope in the 3.9's they add crazy optimisations to there drivers to seriously boost performance big time!!!

FiatluX · Oct 8, 2003, 08:02 PM

Slowed my machine to near stop and hardlocked on me ! Its a 4 from me

Cleaned out and reinstalled 3.7´s ! Everything up and running perfectly again

Warpy · Oct 8, 2003, 08:07 PM

Quote:

I gave them a 5.

ALL the same problems as the 3.6 and 3.7's, plus a few new ones. The new features are very nice, but if my games don't work correctly, they do me no good.

8500's need to be looked into more closely during driver development, the flickering texture issues got even worse. No amount of options changing made any difference to the games that exibit flickering/missing textures. Back to the 3.5 'hotfix' drivers for me, those are the last set of drivers that have consistenly worked well for me. And YES, as soon as I put the 3.5's back in, all the problems disappeared.

3 PC's, 3 - 8500 variations, 2 different motherboard chipsets, all the same exact problems. DriverCleaner 2.0 made no difference to the results. 8500's must be mongrel cards or something......

I'm pretty bummed-out about it.......I had really high hopes for the 3.8's........

Oh well.....at least they didn't crash, hard-lock or format my systems or anything like that.

sigh....maybe the next release .... next release .... next release .... (the neverending echo)

Perhaps its time to upgrade that video card son?

ZzzombieBunny · Oct 8, 2003, 08:10 PM

Im getting stuttering with AA enabled when playing UFO: Aftermath.... performance was awesome with the 3.7 , I could play with 16 Anistropic and 6x AA... now i get stuttering with 2x AA on? Really weird...

mkk · Oct 8, 2003, 10:23 PM

I had hoped for a lot more on the so called "game profile" feature, but I'll just have to kick in RadLinker again until ATI really does something worthwile there. Other than that I'm more than okay with the driver. VPU recover should be a nice thing to have in the long run. It's the feature in 3.8 to me. A little too much hooplah was created about the rest in my mind.

Rayder · Oct 8, 2003, 10:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Funky Monkey
Perhaps its time to upgrade that video card son?

Perhaps it is, boy, but unless I misread the Release Notes, the 3.8's are for 8500's too ya know. An 8500 is what I have and an 8500 is what I must deal with until 'real-life' allows me to afford a new top-of-the-line-super-duper-really-good-this-time-turbo-hyper-mega-lightning-speed Radeon. OK?

Anyway, back to what I originally came here to post. Here are some pics of the problems I mentioned with the 3.8's on an 8500.

The Hulk (this has been going on since the 3.6's)

Supercar Street Challenge (this is a new problem with the 3.8's)

There are some others, but I'm out of webspace. Re-installng the 3.5 'hotfix' drivers eliminates these problems, which is what I've been forced to do.

Warpy · Oct 8, 2003, 10:57 PM

Hey dude,

I think your askn for too much....... Way to much!!

kuja · Oct 8, 2003, 11:20 PM

I can safely say that this will be the worst release in the entire 3.x series.

a)The per-game profiles are useless in that they are not automatically applied when a game is launched, as they are in 3rd party applications which have been around for long before now, rendering the official support redundant. They save you maybe 2/3 mouse clicks. Big deal.

b)VPU protection is similarly useless. Unless the drivers are not working (in which case, priority should be given to that rather than such superfluous features), the fault lies with the hardware. If the fault lies with the hardware, you're overclocking WAY too far, or the card is fubar. If the card is fubar, VPU protection doesn't mean a damn. Again, unnecessary.

c)The new smartshader features are a fucking idiotic inclusion, at best. With the number of outstanding bugs in the Catalysts, I cannot believe that they expended a month of time working on such a frivolous, novelty of a feature, that noone in their right minds will use after a week or two.

d)The release fubared many, many popular games, including BF1942, Morrowind, DAOC, IL2FB, LOMAC, Homeworld 2, UT2003 (when using their stupid PS effects), NASCAR 2003 etc etc.

e)The changes to the control panel are also trivial ahd dispensable. The condensing of D3D and OGL panels into one is just a hassle, and requires more of the clicking that ATi tried to hard to remove with their ineffectual application profiles.

f)The overdrive feature is wholly useless for 99% of those using ATi cards. As it only works on XT boards, it provides absolutely no utility for the vast majority of their customers, and represents a waste of time, when there are far more important problems with their shitty drivers. Edit: Not to mention the fact that the increases in core are limited to 20mhz. I am currently running my 9800Pro at close to 100mhz over the default speed, and that's the best they can deliver. 20mhz should/will make jack-shit real-world difference.

My thoughts? Terry/the Catalyst coders should be fired and it's a damn shame nVidia's hardware isn't up to scratch, because ATi's supporting drivers are sure as hell not.

ErrorS · Oct 8, 2003, 11:24 PM

i voted 9 (shoulda voted 8). I think they're great drivers and would've been perfect if it werent for a few SMALL bugs (just annoyances) and the fact that the profile thing completely sucks ass.

i love them..

Raider1 · Oct 8, 2003, 11:43 PM

No real big change here i gave them a 7

Anemotion · Oct 9, 2003, 07:32 AM

I give these a 7 few things i have noticed since my upgrade from omega 3.5s

+
1. In some games everything feels slightly smoother! (halo etc)
2. Great image quality as usual!
3. Desktop feels more responsive.
4. Nice pixel shader effect's! a fun novelty

-
1. The different control panel is nice thou i'd prefer they kept it as it was so i have to click less to change stuff
2. The game profiles thing need's to be expanded upon so we don't have to goto the control panel to change them.
3. Althou the pixel shader effects are a fun novelty there appeal wears off after a while

Warpy · Oct 9, 2003, 09:19 AM

Quote:

kuja wROTE:

I can safely say that this will be the worst release in the entire 3.x series.

a)The per-game profiles are useless in that they are not automatically applied when a game is launched, as they are in 3rd party applications which have been around for long before now, rendering the official support redundant. They save you maybe 2/3 mouse clicks. Big deal.

b)VPU protection is similarly useless. Unless the drivers are not working (in which case, priority should be given to that rather than such superfluous features), the fault lies with the hardware. If the fault lies with the hardware, you're overclocking WAY too far, or the card is fubar. If the card is fubar, VPU protection doesn't mean a damn. Again, unnecessary.

c)The new smartshader features are a fucking idiotic inclusion, at best. With the number of outstanding bugs in the Catalysts, I cannot believe that they expended a month of time working on such a frivolous, novelty of a feature, that noone in their right minds will use after a week or two.

d)The release fubared many, many popular games, including BF1942, Morrowind, DAOC, IL2FB, LOMAC, Homeworld 2, UT2003 (when using their stupid PS effects), NASCAR 2003 etc etc.

e)The changes to the control panel are also trivial ahd dispensable. The condensing of D3D and OGL panels into one is just a hassle, and requires more of the clicking that ATi tried to hard to remove with their ineffectual application profiles.

f)The overdrive feature is wholly useless for 99% of those using ATi cards. As it only works on XT boards, it provides absolutely no utility for the vast majority of their customers, and represents a waste of time, when there are far more important problems with their shitty drivers. Edit: Not to mention the fact that the increases in core are limited to 20mhz. I am currently running my 9800Pro at close to 100mhz over the default speed, and that's the best they can deliver. 20mhz should/will make jack-shit real-world difference.

My thoughts? Terry/the Catalyst coders should be fired and it's a damn shame nVidia's hardware isn't up to scratch, because ATi's supporting drivers are sure as hell not.

Couldnt help but laugh and share symphany with ya bud!
For me drivers have worked well, I am also using a 9800 PRO - I tend to agree with ya about the O/C feature and VPU Protection

I have a FX5900 for sale if you want it?!!