Ati drivers keep getting better. 3.1 reviews

[creedamd]

http://firingsquad.gamers.com/hardware/catalyst3.1/default.asp


Pretty even until the aa and af in Ut2k3 :eek:

This card keeps on getting better! Good read. I think the only thing negative was dx9 and Commanche 4. Other than that the drivers did well.

[Smokey]

I was blown away by the UT2003 results, with AA+AF, but seems very strange that the rest of the benchmarks are nowhere near the same performance :confused: I would really like to see ATI boost the performance in drivers as much as they did in UT2003, for every game ;)

[digitalwanderer]

I was actually disapointed with the 3.1 set of cats, they changed something in how the monitor refresh rate is set and I can't get it over 75Mhz in 98se to save me nuggers. :(

On the otherhand though, I'm talking with ATI about it and they're really working on fixing it. (WOO-HOO!!! Someone answers me e-mails, WOO-HOO!!! :D ) It ain't the best thing, but I was very pleased with the way that ATI didn't try and blame something on my rig or configuration and acknowledged it and started looking into a fix. :) (The normal registry key change doesn't fix this problem, and neither did Omegadrive's set. :( )

But from XP I've been hearing nothing but good, but who uses XP? :hmm:

I'm hoping for a quicky set of Cat 3.1a (or rev2, or whatever) that resolves the 98se refresh issue, THEN I'll be singing their praises to the heavens again. ;)

[saturnotaku]

The Cat 3.1's didn't break anything for me which is good, but they don't seem to have improved a whole lot either. I'm sure my CPU is the biggest problem here, but I'm not terribly concerned about upgrading it because my vid card is so darn fast.

I may not be able to play UT2003 at 1280 with 6x AA and 16x aniso, but the same resolution with 2x AA and 4x aniso still looks darn pretty. :D

[SlyBoots]

Originally posted by digitalwanderer
I was actually disapointed with the 3.1 set of cats, they changed something in how the monitor refresh rate is set and I can't get it over 75Mhz in 98se to save me nuggers. :(

On the otherhand though, I'm talking with ATI about it and they're really working on fixing it. (WOO-HOO!!! Someone answers me e-mails, WOO-HOO!!! :D ) It ain't the best thing, but I was very pleased with the way that ATI didn't try and blame something on my rig or configuration and acknowledged it and started looking into a fix. :) (The normal registry key change doesn't fix this problem, and neither did Omegadrive's set. :( )

But from XP I've been hearing nothing but good, but who uses XP? :hmm:

I'm hoping for a quicky set of Cat 3.1a (or rev2, or whatever) that resolves the 98se refresh issue, THEN I'll be singing their praises to the heavens again. ;)

I noticed the same when I loaded 3.1's to run 3dmark03...my normal reg hack didn't work, ratz. Glad to hear they're working on it...:)

[MrNasty]

Nvidias is dead in the water !

[-=Gib-McFragger=-]

I used to get approx 40fps with all detail settings maxed, including physics in UT2k3, using no AA and no Aniso in high poly maps like DM-Inferno. Turn on AA and/or aniso, and it would be almost unplayable.


I have been running the 3.1's since they came out. I just read this post and decided to fire up UT2k3 for the first time in I don't know how long.

I am now getting 50-60fps in DM-Infero consistantly, which is cool.

[Megatron]

Originally posted by saturnotaku
I may not be able to play UT2003 at 1280 with 6x AA and 16x aniso, but the same resolution with 2x AA and 4x aniso still looks darn pretty. :D

Im with ya on that. I dont play UT2k3 much...but when I do its enjoyable.
:)

[-=Gib-McFragger=-]

MMMMMMMMM :eek:

Pardon the jaggies. No AA. 1280x1024 with every setting maxed BTW. ;)

Unreal 2 and UT2K3 are the ONLY games that I cannot play using AA and Aniso and still leave all settings on high. Damnit.

http://www3.telus.net/gib_mcfragger/U2.bmp

[LORD-eX-Bu]

that looks sweet Gib. You think you coulda made that bmp file size just a little bigger?:p

EDIT: I play at 1600x1200x32 for U2. Not bad performance at all, stays above 30 fps and goes up to 45 fps;) errr... actually, did notice some dips into 20's, so, not as great:p

[kyleb]

exactly [eNv]-LORD-eX-Bu, not so great at all. even if you back it down to 640x480 butt ugly mode ill bet you hit 20's, everyone else i have talked with much on the subject said the same thing. u2 is a realy cool game in many ways, but preformace is shoddy at best, i got my damn money back for it. i will buy it again when 5ghz cpus and nv50's are at a reasonble price or they fix it with a damn patch. :D

[Hellbinder]

For you guys havoing problems with UT an UT2k3 when playing with AA+AF..

Set AF to Performance. Then you will be able to play both games at a minimum of 2x AA +16x AF. I play UT2003 at 1024x768 everything maxed out, even Detail textures etc. With 4x FSAA+16x PERF AF. It is generally Rock solid in the 50's-60's. Highs into the 80's, lows into the mid 40's.

[kyleb]

something lucky about your system Hellbinder, i wasnt usein af at all, like i said butt ugly mode; still hit 20s. everything else ran great and benchmarked on par though so i just took the game back. if i could have just kept the framerate over 30 i would have been happy.

[gravioli]

I posted this in the games forum, but I think it's worth briefly mentioning here. For Unreal 2 make sure you have CD AutoRun disabled, which can be done by using Tweak UI (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/downloads/powertoys.asp) or a variety of other XP tweaking programs. After disabling this (darn thing was eating up 40-50% of the CPU according to the XP Task Manager), my FPS went from 2-15 on some levels to consistently 40-50.