Catalyst 7.5

Didn't think there was going to be a release this month http://ati.amd.com/support/drivers/xp/radeonx-xp.html

7.5 looks like it has nothing at all to offer... at least for me and WinXP. I don't have any use for 7.5.

:no_sad:

then again, I am not sure anything is broken that I use..

What do you mean it has nothing to offer??

Actually I hated the Catalyst 7.4 because no matter what I did AA / AF and Vsync did not work when I set them in CCC. Last night I figured out a way to do this in registry via regedit.

Best of all, I figured out when I enable AF it sets it automatically to High Quality with Trilinear.. and this stupid Triliear filtering is what's giving me stutters. I managed to set it to Quality via regedit and LockOn is seriously much much smoother.

Last night I also installed this Multi Core patch fix for WindowsXP and I swear to god the game runs faster.

I'll download these Catalyst 7.5 tomorrow but for sure will tweak with registry again to get Trilinear filtering off.

I just can't understand why can't ATI guys give this option in CCC? This ATI Tray tool is also very good as it gives many other options no Catalyst driver or CCC ever had... like optimise Pixel shader code... and lots of other stuff.

From now on what I do is install full package Catalyst driver, then use ATI Tray tools to add more registry keys. Then go into registry and edit the values myself to my liking.

I just go by the release notes. If enough people 'hype' the release I may change my mind. I saw nothing noted for anything I see I need.

:doh:

Actually I hated the Catalyst 7.4 because no matter what I did AA / AF and Vsync did not work when I set them in CCC. Last night I figured out a way to do this in registry via regedit.

 

Best of all, I figured out when I enable AF it sets it automatically to High Quality with Trilinear.. and this stupid Triliear filtering is what's giving me stutters. I managed to set it to Quality via regedit and LockOn is seriously much much smoother.

Wait, I thought trilinear filtering is only used if you click on the 'High Quality AF' option under anistropic filtering settings. When you leave the box unchecked, doesn't it use the regular bilinear filtering?

Wait, I thought trilinear filtering is only used if you click on the 'High Quality AF' option under anistropic filtering settings. When you leave the box unchecked, doesn't it use the regular bilinear filtering?

I thought so too, apparently it doesn't. Even if I leave the HQ AF unchecked, ATI Tray tools shows Trilinear filtering as enabled. In the game I can tell the difference too (when I disable it in ATI Tray tools).

People who make these Catalyst drivers and CCC are full of shit :music_whistling:

Well, after reinstallig windows again yesterday, I decided to try and install latest Catalyst 7.5 but this time driver only (and that WDM driver also) but not CCC. Instead I will try and use ATI Tray Tools. So far seems to be more convinient. There are less processes running and also you don't get that display restart (you get black screen for a sec while CCC is loading). You get lot more control over driver settings, not to mention you can set exactly what type of AF you want (Trilinear filtering enabled or not) unlike in this stupid CCC... I never really liked the CCC anyway :music_whistling:

That's what I am using, just the basic 7.5 driver + ATIT tools. I don't think CCC is particularly a bad program; it's just that ATIT does everything that CCC does using less system resource. (~7mb vs ~3.5mb, respectively) And it's also quicker to use.

Now I think CCC is in fack a bad program... sure it looks nice but has very limited options, and what I've recently found that even if don't enable High Quality AF in CCC, ATI Tray Tools shows AF set as AF with Trilinear, meaning HQ AF is enabled... and this is bullocks from ATI driver team as I can't believe they couldn't sort this out.

Last night I saw installing Catalyst 7.5 driver and WDM driver only (and not CCC) then using ATI Tray Tools actually almost halfed the 3DMark06 score for me (it was well bellow 4000 points which is very low for overclocked E6600 and X1950XTX)?! It made me realise if you don't install the full Catalyst package you actually don't enable all the hardware capabilities of the GPU. Reinstalling a fully package of Catalyst 7.5 and my 3DMark06 score went back up to normal figures.

Just thought you should be aware of this. I didn't know installing driver only would make something like this (enable only basic functionality) but then again DuH! on me as after reading ATI driver release notes and instructions it actually says installing driver only enabled only basic functionality on the card.

Mind you, this only means techology introduced in 3DMark06 actually require some features that can be installed/enabled only with full driver package installation.

EDIT: There was a difference in 3DMark05 score too. From 10345 with Catalyst 7.5 driver install only to 13370 with full Catalyst 7.5 package install

Update, not really lockon related, but ATI released a hotfix version of 7.5, fixes "handle leaks" in Armed Assault http://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&questionID=27293

edit: i now have this driver installed and running on my PC and it's fine.