AMD's New Adrenalin Driver Claims 7 Percent Speed Boost for Anthem

We suspect a lot of the time AMD spends writing patch notes for its new graphics drivers is devoted to writing out the full name. Case in point: the company this week released the AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition 19.1.2 Driver Version 18.50.15.01 (Windows Driver Store Version 25.20.15015.1002). We're just going to call it Adrenalin 19.1.2 for brevity.

Adrenalin 19.1.2 improves AMD graphics card support for Resident Evil 2 Remake (RE2R), Tropico 6 and the upcoming early access release of Anthem from Electronic Arts. AMD didn't break down the performance improvements for RE2R or Tropico 6, but it did claim there's up to 7 percent faster performance in Anthem at 1080p using this driver with an RX 580 graphics card than when using the previous Adrenalin 19.1.1 driver with the same card.

The usual caveats apply: those performance gains were reported by AMD for a game we haven't tested under conditions we can't verify. But the company usually reports fairly modest improvements (it's not uncommon to see a two or three percent gain), and that makes the reported 7 percent bump in Anthem seem pretty significant by comparison. Hopefully, RX 580 owners actually see a similar boost with their own setups once Anthem's out.

Adrenalin 19.1.2 also includes fixes for the following issues:

• Displays showing a black screen on reboot until the display is power cycled.
• An incorrect toast message sporadically popping up, claiming a new driver upgrade is available.
• Rocket League showing flickering or erratic refresh rates when Radeon FreeSync is enabled.
• Custom installations of Radeon Software failing to install Radeon Settings.
• Radeon Settings suffering an application crash when a user refreshes Upgrade Advisor multiple times.
• Some users weren't able to upgrade to an optional driver if the latest recommended driver was installed by AMD Link.

There are some known issues, too, including one where "mouse lag or system slowdown is observed for extended periods of time with two or more displays connected and one display switched off." That won't be too big a deal for most people—folks don't usually buy multiple displays just to leave one off—but anyone looking to, say, cut down on the amount of light being shot at their retinas at night, should keep that in mind.

How to Download AMD's New Adrenalin Driver 

The new driver isn't meant for Macs using Boot Camp. Users of those systems "should contact their system manufacturer for driver support," AMD said.

You can download the Adrenalin 19.1.2 driver via the following links:

• Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition 19.1.2 Driver for Windows 10 64-bit  
• Radeon Softare Adrenalin Edition 19.1.2 Driver for Windows 7 64-bit