AMD Posts Catalyst 13.12 WHQL Graphics Driver

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AMD has posted its Catalyst 13.12 WHQL-certified graphics driver.

AMD has been on a long streak of releasing its 13.11 Beta drivers, and now, after tweaking and tuning the driver, it has released the Catalyst 13.12 WHQL certified driver. The driver brings support for all graphics cards ranging from the R7 240 up to the R9 290 to a WHQL-certified driver, but also brings a number of performance improvements as well as big fixes.

Below you'll find the feature highlights of this driver release, as published by AMD:

Feature Highlights
​Support for the following new products:

  • AMD Radeon R9 290, 280, and 270 Series
  • AMD Radeon R7 260, 250, and 240 Series

​Improved AMD CrossFire​ scaling for the following game titles:

  • Call of Duty: Ghosts (multiplayer component)
  • Splinter Cell Blacklist
  • Saints Row 4
  • Metro Last Light

​New AMD Enduro Technology profiles for the following game titles:

  • XCOM: Enemy Unknown
  • Need for Speed Rivals
  • Total War​: Rome 2
  • Battlefield 4
  • Saints Row 4
  • Splinter Cell Blacklist
  • FIFA 14

​Support For AMD CrossFire frame pacing

  • Frame pacing ensures that frames rendered across multiple GPUs in an AMD CrossFire configuration will be displayed at an even and regular pace
  • Frame pacing is enabled through the AMD Catalyst Control Center, or on a per application basis
  • Frame pacing is supported on DirectX 10 and DirectX 11 applications using resolutions up to (and including) 2560 x 1600 on a single display

Resolved Issues

  • May resolve intermittent black screens or display loss observed on some AMD Radeon R9 290X and AMD Radeon R9 290 graphics cards
  • Resolves intermittent crashes seen in legacy DirectX 9 applications
  • AMD Radeon R9 290 Series -- Power Tune update to reduce variance of fan speed / RPM
  • PCI-E bus speed is no longer set to x1 on the secondary GPU when running in an AMD CrossFire configuration
  • Resolves incorrect HDMI Audio Driver information being listed in the AMD Catalyst Control Center
  • Resolves AMD Steady Video option being grayed out in the AMD Catalyst Control Center
  • Resolves intermittent flickering seen on some AMD Radeon R9 270X graphics cards
  • Resolves graphics corruption issues found in Starcraft
  • Resolves image corruption seen in Autodesk Investor 2014
  • Resolves flickering water corruption found in World of Warcraft
  • Resolves intermittent black screen when resuming from an S3/S4 sleep-state if the display is unplugged during the sleep-state on systems supporting AMD Enduro Technology
  • Resolves intermittent crashes experienced with Battlefield 4 on Windows 8-based systems
  • Resolves the display turning green when using Windows Media Player to view HD .avi format video in an extended desktop configuration
  • Resolves Metro applications experiencing frame drops during playback of interlaced video content
  • Resolves video playback corruption of .wmv format files in Windows Media Player

The driver is available for download here from AMD.

Niels Broekhuijsen
Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.

19 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Mousemonkey
    Why are these being posted two days later than other sites?

    http://www.guru3d.com/files_details/amd_catalyst_13_12_whql_download.html 12/18/2013
    Reply
  • MagicPants
    Crossfire is still broken for the 290x. With it turned on, it garbles the audio in games. Only happens with vsync enabled so I assume they haven't figured out frame pacing yet. Been up on the AMD support forums and it's not just me. I haven't yet seen a release driver that works with the 290x in crossfire (they released the card using a beta driver.) Anyway it's time to start testing/benchmarking Radeons with the sound turned on, so they can't cheat. (The problem happens with onboard audio and external cards, I'm not sure about audio over hdmi)
    Reply
  • Darkerson
    Why are moderators for this very site asking redundant questions?
    Reply
  • Mousemonkey
    12224268 said:
    Why are moderators for this very site asking redundant questions?

    Because such questions need to be asked?
    Reply
  • alikum
    Out of curiosity, is it safe to update drivers directly by running the executable now? In the past, it'd cause issues, and was recommended to do a complete install (clean up old drivers then run new ones).
    Reply
  • johnnyevil
    really....is the 7970 card SOOOOOO old that there's nothing left to update on it? I guess AMD has got that thing mastered....
    Reply
  • brandonjclark
    @MagicPants - The release notes don't claim crossfired 290x's are fixed.
    Reply
  • jimmysmitty
    MM, I would assume its due to them getting the info, submitting it to the editor then waiting publication.

    I agree though, THG should be faster. It's considered one of the largest tech sites out there. The reviews come fast enough but the news lags too much.

    Still I love THG. Just want it to be the best there is.
    Reply
  • Mousemonkey
    12225171 said:
    MM, I would assume its due to them getting the info, submitting it to the editor then waiting publication.

    I agree though, THG should be faster. It's considered one of the largest tech sites out there. The reviews come fast enough but the news lags too much.

    Still I love THG. Just want it to be the best there is.

    I feel the same as you mate which is why I think it's time these questions are asked, I'm not holding my breath for a response though.
    Reply
  • silverblue
    Let's be fair though; neither Anandtech nor Fudzilla had an article on them until the same date.
    Reply