Catalyst 3.8 Review

[TKS]

<A HREF="http://www.beyond3d.com/reviews/ati/cat3.8/" target="_new">http://www.beyond3d.com/reviews/ati/cat3.8/</A>

They look and feel to be a winner...More stable than I've ever experienced. Good Job ATI.

Includes a feature called VPU recover and explains it all. Nice review. Nice layout. Not a horrible read. Enjoy!

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<b>I'm not normally a religious man, but if you're up there, save me, Superman! </b> <i>Homer Simpson</i>

 

[Guest]

Captain Obvious is itching to try out the whacky smartshader effects!

The Captain gives this review and the 3.8's, a big thumbs up!

<b><font color=red>Captain Obvious To The Rescue!!!</font color=red></b>

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

Yeah like I said in Cleev's thread, I like that VPU recovery Idea. I'm gonna try and crash my system again with that Mozilla 1.5b BETA, and see what happens. I'll let y'all know when I do.

Those Smartshader effects look kinda neat. Like they say mainly to muck-around with games you've gotten bored of. I may try them on 3Dmk01 like they did just to check them out. Stencil would be more confusing for me in FPS(s) I think. Not enough info at long distances.

No major performance increases, but that's what we expected.

Wait for 3.9 or 4.0 to add the viagra to your card.

I'm happy for now.


- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp <i>(or internet account)</i> ! <A HREF="http://www.redgreen.com" target="_new"><font color=green>RED</font color=green> <font color=red>GREEN</font color=red></A> GA to SK

 

[eden]

Amazing how much they are dedicated. Truly amazing. Not to sound fanboyish, but this is the best kind of PR they are doing, by checking what the community desires, and that is to trust ATi. VPU Recover is gonna be the next wave, for sure.

I found it weird 3.8s didn't increase performance. Was someone misquoted so that it became the hype about its performance?

--
<A HREF="http://www.lochel.com/THGC/album.html" target="_new"><font color=blue><b>This just in, over 56 no-lifers have their pics up on THGC's Photo Album! </b></font color=blue></A> :lol:

 

[TKS]

In all the forums I checked they stated it would be whiz bang improvments and not major driver performance gains...the 3.8's give some improvment on select games and that's about it. They feel stable though...I can tell you that. I've been looping 3dmark for over 2 hours now.

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<b>I'm not normally a religious man, but if you're up there, save me, Superman! </b> <i>Homer Simpson</i>

 

[speeduk]

I wonder about that vpu recovery? If I take my card over the edge again, say to 390/360, and it crashes, will this thing recover and put me back to the desktop? If so that would be pretty neat for extreme benching sessions and not worrying about a restart, (*shudders* scandisk so many nightmares).

<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=7000747" target="_new"> 3D-2001 </A>
<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k3=1284380" target="_new"> 3D-03 </A>
<font color=red> 120% overclocker </font color=red> (cheapskate)

 

[markgun]

I'm quite disappointed with these drivers, and this is the first time I've ever had a problem with ATi's drivers. I've tested 3 games and 1 benchmark on two different R8500 systems (And yes, I did a proper uninstall and driver cleaning prior to the 3.8 drivers).

Morrowind - White flashing/missing textures
C&C Generals - White flashing/missing textures
U2K3 - Fine
3DMark01 - Fine

Oh well, the Omega 3.7 drivers still work great. Checking the Rage3d forums, this problem seems to be mostly isolated with R8500 cards.

Now it's time to fill out that driver feedback form on ATi's website.

<b>Qui habet aures audiendi audiat</b>

 

[Willamette_sucks]

HOLY CRAP THE REAL TIME EFFECTS ARE AWESOME!!!

Well, they look awesome. Havn't tried em yet. Will when I get home today! w00t!


Stop asking people "whats up" or "hows it goin", you know you don't give a sh*t. And noone cares how you're doing either.

"We are far less than we knew." - Bright Eyes

 

[DrJeckyl]

I usually don't post anything even remotely "fanboyish" here, but I must say I am very impressed with the dedication ATI has put into it's drivers. Not only are they responding to consumer requests and needs promptly, they share with outside persons for ideas on driver improvement. To me, someone that is truly comitted to doing a good job, opens themselves up to outside ideas and allows for these ideas to be incorporated into their own.
More specifically, I am speaking of the Omega drivers. Did you all see the release date of the Omega drivers? (10/8)
I will have to assume that ATI allowed them to have the drivers ahead of time to work on, and get out for distribution. ATI wants their cards to run the best they can, even if an outside person can make it run better.
...tips his hat to ATI.

--the Doc

 

[TKS]

Crap...I found a bug too. They crash Unreal Tournament Game of the Year Edition every single time I load up. Doesn't matter if it's openGL or D3D. Boom..Poof..Crash. I reverted back to the 3.7's. 3dmark successfully looped for about 6 hours though

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<b>I'm not normally a religious man, but if you're up there, save me, Superman! </b> <i>Homer Simpson</i>

 

[lhgpoobaa]

Drviers seem stable and fast with the games I play... and ive had fun messing with the smartshader effects last night.

Oddly they only currently work with openGL, not DirectX.

and that stencil effect REALLY drags down the framerate!
Matrix effect is truly absolutley awesome though!

<b>I am not a AMD fanboy.
I am not a Via fanboy.
I am not a ATI fanboy.
I AM a performance fanboy.
And a low price fanboy.
Regards,
Mr no integrity coward.</b>