MooreThread GPU Performance Vastly Improved by New Driver Update

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MooreThread needs to create more of these big driver updates if it ever wants to compete with Intel, AMD and Nvidia

Moore Threads
(Image credit: Moore Threads)

Chinese GPU manufacturer MooreThreads has issued a new driver update for its MTT S80 and S70 graphics cards, significantly improving performance in some games and game engines. The driver update also comes with 20 bug fixes, greatly improving both graphics cards' functionality and stability.

The driver's new performance optimizations include 40% higher frame rates at 1080P in Fearless Contract, 10% better performance in Asseto Corsa at 1080P resolution, 40% better performance in CryEngine titles based on version 5.7 of the engine, and 40% greater performance in Valley when operating in DX11 mode. MooreThreads' patch notes also state that more game and graphics optimizations were implemented on top of the ones already mentioned; however, it did not disclose specific titles.

Bug fixes include a host of solved issues relating to games, video streaming, browsers, hibernation and more. The first ten bugs are dedicated to game-related fixes, including solved problems relating to "incorrect drawings" in Apex Legends, Eternal Tribulation, and texture corruption fixes when running The Crew 2. Some of the other non-gaming-related fixes include hibernation fixes when utilizing Display Stream Compression (DSC), fixes to system crashes, a fix pertaining to blue screens when playing AV1 HDR 8K video, fixes for problems playing videos in Edge and Chrome, and more.

Besides performance optimizations and bug fixes, the patch also includes new feature support for OpenGL 3.3 in Windows 10, as well as stability optimizations for Dark Souls: Remastered, GTFO 3, Galaxy Breaker 4, SketchUp 2023, and 3D One.

MooreThreads Driver Situation Is Substantially Worse Than Intel's

(Image credit: Moore Threads)

It's great to see MooreThreads working hard to optimize its drivers for gaming. When we last saw gaming performance benchmarks on the MTT S80 a few months ago, the GPU was in a horrendous state, featuring the gaming performance of a 6-year-old GTX 1050 Ti, despite the fact it has RTX 3060 Ti levels of compute power. Stability was also a massive problem in the past, with popular games like Dota 2 and Tomb Raider being completely non-functional on the Chinese GPU.

MooreThread's latest GPU driver update won't make them competitive with Nvidia, AMD or Intel's latest GPUs, but it is a good start.

MooreThreads is a new Chinese GPU manufacturer that is the first national company to create GPUs domestically without the help of foreign manufacturers. Its flagship GPU, the MTT S80, features 4096 cores, 128 tensor cores, a 256-bit memory bus, 16 lane PCIe Gen 5 support (yep Gen 5, not Gen 4), and 16GB of memory. On paper, the graphics card can deliver 14.4 FP32 TFLOPS or 15.2 FP32 TFLOPS of performance, which closely aligns with the single precision compute power of an RTX 3060 Ti.

Its graphics drivers are now the most problematic part of the GPUs and need serious work if MooreThreads ever wants to compete with Western GPU manufacturers. Hopefully, the Chinese company will continue to pump out these big performance-enhancing updates to compete in the future.

Aaron Klotz
Aaron Klotz
Contributing Writer

Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.

5 Comments Comment from the forums
  • artk2219
    Yep, as Intel recently discovered, having decent drivers is 95% of having a decent graphics card.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    artk2219 said:
    Yep, as Intel recently discovered, having decent drivers is 95% of having a decent graphics card.
    Sorry, but I really think we can't say that. That trivializes the hardware, which I think is a big mistake.

    Considering a different sort of driver, you could say the fastest race car won't win races without at least a very good driver. It's a similar situation as GPUs, where it's essential that both the driver and the hardware be highly-optimized (and robust).

    Even today, with all the improvements Intel has delivered over the past year, the A770 still delivers significantly worse raster performance than its specs would suggest. That very much hints at bottlenecks in the hardware.
    Reply
  • Francis412
    bit_user said:
    Sorry, but I really think we can't say that. That trivializes the hardware, which I think is a big mistake.

    Considering a different sort of driver, you could say the fastest race car won't win races without at least a very good driver. It's a similar situation as GPUs, where it's essential that both the driver and the hardware be highly-optimized (and robust).

    Even today, with all the improvements Intel has delivered over the past year, the A770 still delivers significantly worse raster performance than its specs would suggest. That very much hints at bottlenecks in the hardware.
    Oh! come come now. Hardware has always chosen to blame software for their own mistakes. The truth hardware Engineering is way beyond Software. That is why Software has continuously improved on older hardware through driver updates and by reprogramming the PROMs on the hardware. Hardware manufactures do not hire Software Engineers. They rent them. Typically just for the design and early implementation of their product. Hardware manufactures expect you to go out and buy new hardware as soon at the shine is off the proverbial apple. Hardware manufactures do not consider you an asset if you hold on to your product after the next product is released.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    Francis412 said:
    Hardware has always chosen to blame software for their own mistakes. The truth hardware Engineering is way beyond Software.
    My experience matches your first sentence more than the second. Hardware is often riddled with bugs and needs them to be papered over by software. This makes the software developers' jobs much harder, when they're simultaneously asked to implement new features and optimize performance.

    I have it on good authority that GPUs are no exception, in this regard. They have bugs aplenty, which probably helps explain why drivers are often lagging and continue to unlock more performance over the months following a new GPU's release.

    Francis412 said:
    That is why Software has continuously improved on older hardware through driver updates and by reprogramming the PROMs on the hardware.
    There's no hard and fast rule about this. Sometimes, you're able to reach near enough the theoretical peak performance of the hardware that no further improvement is possible. Other times, this wasn't achieved. Reasons vary.

    Francis412 said:
    Hardware manufactures do not hire Software Engineers. They rent them.
    That doesn't tally with how Jensen has pitched Nvidia as a software company that produces chips:
    https://www.reddit.com/r/hardware/comments/jj71td/nvidia_a_software_company_that_produces_chips/
    BTW, you're really missing my point: designing a high-end GPU is not trivial. Saying that drivers are 95% of the problem trivializes the hardware, which is a mistake. The hardware design actually matters. I'm not going to assign percentages, but simply say that both the hardware and the software need to be done well, in order to achieve good system performance, at the end.
    Reply
  • artk2219
    bit_user said:
    Sorry, but I really think we can't say that. That trivializes the hardware, which I think is a big mistake.

    Considering a different sort of driver, you could say the fastest race car won't win races without at least a very good driver. It's a similar situation as GPUs, where it's essential that both the driver and the hardware be highly-optimized (and robust).

    Even today, with all the improvements Intel has delivered over the past year, the A770 still delivers significantly worse raster performance than its specs would suggest. That very much hints at bottlenecks in the hardware.
    I didn't mean to trivialize the process of creating viable hardware, its a monumental task in and of itself. What I meant to say is that once you've cleared the first hurdle of hardware production, dont expect the second part of driver creation to be any easier. Having good drivers is 95% or having a good EXPERIENCE with a graphics card, provided the hardware itself isnt half baked.
    Reply