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AMD Posts Catalyst 14.9 WHQL Display Drivers

By - Source: Tom's Hardware US | B 15 comments

AMD has posted its Catalyst 14.9 WHQL graphics driver suite.

AMD has launched its Catalyst 14.9 graphics software suite, which is the first WHQL (Windows Hardware Quality Labs)-certified driver we've seen from the company since the release of the Catalyst 14.4 suite. Of course, AMD has posted other drivers in the meantime, but this is the first fully tested and stable driver in five months, and it comes with all of the improvements we've seen since the Catalyst 14.4 driver.

Due to the lengthy time between the releases, the list of changes is dauntingly long. Note that improvements below are relative to the Catalyst 14.4 WHQL driver release – not of newer Beta or Release Candidate drivers that never got WHQL certification.

The driver adds new Eyefinity enhancements, including support for mixed resolutions, new user controls for video color and display settings, and enhancements to the AMD Mantle API with performance improvements on mobile hardware, along with improved JPEG decoding on the budget-oriented AM1 platform. The driver also brings support for the new AMD Radeon R9 285 graphics card. Performance improvements are listed below:

3DMark Sky Diver improvements
  • AMD A4 6300 – improves up to 4%
  • Enables AMD Dual Graphics / AMD CrossFire support
3DMark Fire Strike
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series - improves up to 5% in Performance Preset
3DMark11
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series / R9 270 Series - improves up to 4% in Entry and Performance Preset
BioShock Infinite
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series – 1920 x 1080 - improves up to 5%
Company of Heroes 2
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series - improves up to 8%
Crysis 3
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series / R9 270 Series – improves up to 10%
Grid Auto Sport
  • AMD CrossFire profile
Murdered Soul Suspect
  • AMD Radeon R9 290X (2560 x 1440, 4x MSAA, 16x AF) – improves up to 50%
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series / R9 270 Series – improves up to 6%
  • CrossFire configurations improve scaling up to 75%
Plants vs. Zombies (Direct3D performance improvements)
  • AMD Radeon R9 290X - 1920 x 1080 Ultra – improves up to 11%
  • AMD Radeon R9290X - 2560 x 1600 Ultra – improves up to  15%
  • AMD Radeon R9290X CrossFire configuration (3840 x 2160 Ultra) - 92% scaling
Batman Arkham Origins:
  • AMD Radeon R9 290X (4x MSAA) – improves up to 20%
  • CrossFire configurations see up to a 70% gain in scaling
Wildstar
  • Power Xpress profile
  • Performance improvements to improve smoothness of application
  • Performance improves up to 30% on the AMD Radeon R9 and R7 Series of products for both single GPU and Multi-GPU configurations
Tomb Raider
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series – improves up to 5%
Watch Dogs
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series / R9 270 Series – improves up to 9%
  • AMD CrossFire – Frame pacing improvement
  • Improved CrossFire performance – up to 20%
Assassin's Creed IV
  • Improves CrossFire scaling (3840 x 2160 High Settings) up to 93%  (CrossFire scaling improvement of 25% compared to AMD Catalyst 14.4)
Lichdom
  • Improves performance for single GPU and Multi-GPU configurations
Star Craft II
  • AMD Radeon R9 290X (2560 x 1440, AA, 16x AF) – improves up to 20%

So there you have it, all the highlights of the graphics driver updates since the Catalyst 14.4 suite. The links below will take you straight to the driver downloads.

Catalyst 14.9 WHQL 64-bit.

Catalyst 14.9 WHQL 32-bit.

Release Notes.

Follow Niels Broekhuijsen @NBroekhuijsen. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

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  • 3 Hide
    2112Starman , September 30, 2014 11:58 AM
    Ik hope AMD has resolved the black-screen-after-install bug....
  • 0 Hide
    salgado18 , September 30, 2014 12:07 PM
    The release notes mention some known issues, and some of them bother me. Can anyone tell if it is a source of concern?

    Quote:
    Known Issues
    [404829]: Horizontal flashing lines on second screen in a clone mode with V-Sync on using AMD Mobility Graphics with Switchable Intel Graphics
    [404508]: Display takes a long time to redraw the screen after an S4 cycle
    [405432]: Mantle driver will TDR when running Star Swarm on the loading screen
    [404660]: GPU gets stuck in a low power state after it was previously stressed to max power
    [403032]: Severe flickering observed on default launch of SimCity 4
    [403449]: Playing any media sample in full screen in the 2x1/1x2 Fill SLS configuration leads to TDR
    [400573]: Intermittent application hang observed while launching Aliens vs. Predator
    [400693]: While running performance test, crash is observed with fault module atidxx32.dll
    [401386]: Severe corruption and flashing light observed with specific game settings in Grid 2
    [401289]: Flashing lights in Batman Arkham Origins game main menu
  • 0 Hide
    thor220 , September 30, 2014 7:40 PM
    Quote:
    The release notes mention some known issues, and some of them bother me. Can anyone tell if it is a source of concern?

    Quote:
    Known Issues
    [404829]: Horizontal flashing lines on second screen in a clone mode with V-Sync on using AMD Mobility Graphics with Switchable Intel Graphics
    [404508]: Display takes a long time to redraw the screen after an S4 cycle
    [405432]: Mantle driver will TDR when running Star Swarm on the loading screen
    [404660]: GPU gets stuck in a low power state after it was previously stressed to max power
    [403032]: Severe flickering observed on default launch of SimCity 4
    [403449]: Playing any media sample in full screen in the 2x1/1x2 Fill SLS configuration leads to TDR
    [400573]: Intermittent application hang observed while launching Aliens vs. Predator
    [400693]: While running performance test, crash is observed with fault module atidxx32.dll
    [401386]: Severe corruption and flashing light observed with specific game settings in Grid 2
    [401289]: Flashing lights in Batman Arkham Origins game main menu


    This is actually a really small list of issues. These noted issues include all video cards in amd's lineup. This means that you can expect that only a small portion of amd cards will actually have these issues. Most of these are probably from the old cards nearing end of life.
  • Add your comment Display all 15 comments.
  • 0 Hide
    JOHNN93 , October 1, 2014 12:01 AM
    it's good to add that it is also available for linux.
  • 0 Hide
    Mike Coberly , October 1, 2014 2:11 AM
    Quote:
    Ik hope AMD has resolved the black-screen-after-install bug....


    They didn't. Experiencing this right now on my personal machine (currently on the wife's). Re-installing Windows is agony. :'( 
  • 0 Hide
    funkdat , October 1, 2014 5:20 AM
    Updated the driver and now I get a BSOD when waking from sleep. Event log and DX file both point to AMD. I never have this kind of trouble with my Nvidia cards. I really need to sell my 290X and get a 980. It's worth it just for the more stable drivers alone.
  • 0 Hide
    ShawnT007 , October 1, 2014 6:00 AM
    running 290x in crossfire, on 4k. Installed this driver, now my computer freezes whenever i launch a game in crossfire mode. Tried to uninstall, computer locks up during uninstall. I am just about done with AMD.
  • 0 Hide
    wekilledkenny , October 1, 2014 6:39 AM
    "it's good to add that it is also available for linux."
    Yeah, but is the linux driver WHQL-certified? /jk.
    SteamOS is still not supported with AMD's drivers.
    Installed the driver yesterday on both the laptop (with dual graphics 7660+7670) and the desktop (single 7850), had only one minor issue with DFP scaling resetting to -8% from 0 on the laptop when outputting to a monitor over HDMI, quickly fixed it though. I am running 64-bit Windowses 7.
  • -1 Hide
    crabbypatties , October 1, 2014 1:35 PM
    This is the first time a full catalyst install package has worked for me and remained stable. Previous attempts have all results in a black screen lockup requiring hard reboot. Stability previously only possible with 14.4 driver only. This package has a big +1 from me personally.
  • 1 Hide
    ZeusGamer , October 2, 2014 1:26 AM
    I really wish they'd add crossfire support on Windowed gaming.

    I really don't like turning V-sync on and I hate screen tearing too.

    Borderless windowed gaming should be added to all games to make it easier.
  • 0 Hide
    The_Icon , October 6, 2014 12:45 AM
    Damn, still get the display standby issue with my R9 290. Basically the display sometimes does not wake up if it goes standby.
  • 0 Hide
    ZeusGamer , October 6, 2014 12:50 AM
    Quote:
    Damn, still get the display standby issue with my R9 290. Basically the display sometimes does not wake up if it goes standby.


    Yeah I was getting this a lot often after the 14.9 driver updates as well. I just turned off the turning off monitor after a certain amount of time feature. It was bugging the hell out of me that I had to restart every time the screen goes blank.
  • 0 Hide
    The_Icon , October 6, 2014 6:55 AM
    Quote:
    Quote:
    Damn, still get the display standby issue with my R9 290. Basically the display sometimes does not wake up if it goes standby.


    Yeah I was getting this a lot often after the 14.9 driver updates as well. I just turned off the turning off monitor after a certain amount of time feature. It was bugging the hell out of me that I had to restart every time the screen goes blank.


    All previous drivers had this, but with 14.4 it only happened very rarely. According to the Known Issue as of now with Catalyst Drivers:

    "[404660]: GPU gets stuck in a low power state after it was previously stressed to max power"

    I think this is the issue we are facing.

  • 0 Hide
    Kashif Malim , October 17, 2014 12:03 PM
    I had the same problem with my HIS HD 5750. Right now, I'm using my IGP just so I can look for a replacement for my poor card. The card was working fine till I installed 14.9. Be careful if you're using the 14.9 drivers. My GPU seems to have developed hardware issues after this update.

    I formatted my PC and reinstalled Windows 8.1 on it, with 14.4. I kept getting blank gray screens during media playback, with a looping sound in the background. Had to restart my PC every time. Then earlier today, I was browsing AMD's website when my monitor gave me a "No Signal" error and I had to reset my PC to get it working again.

    I wasn't having any issues with the 14.4 (and earlier) drivers and I play games like Planetside 2, SWTOR, MWO, a lot.
  • 0 Hide
    Kashif Malim , October 17, 2014 12:20 PM
    It started with TDRs first on Win 7 64-bit, then on Win 8 64-bit. Now, I'm not sure if I should consider the R9 270 to replace my GPU or not.
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