AMD Catalyst 12.8 (8.982.0 July 27) AMD Official WHQL is out

Finally, 12.8 WHQL is out
Here is link Guru3d-Catalyst12.8_WHQL

I'm downloading now

 

yea from the reply people say these are bad also.. ill give them a go tho and see.

 

I've tested now and all problem is on going still. rollback 12.5b

 

It's not "official" if it is from Guru3D. I don't see it available on the AMD web site for 7970M or desktop video cards.

 

Goodie... lets see. I wont hold my breathe..
Ohh the time one wastes swapping around AMD drivers.


I don't know what I can expect now anyway...*expectations set low*

Lets see

 

the DL for 12.8 WHQL is from official server http://www2.ati.com/DriverS/12-8_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc.exe win7 64bits driver here

Not really interested in this driver since Win8 was the focus of this version I would not expect much, these are reported (from guru3d forums) as being mostly the same as the Catalyst 12.x (9.00 June 12) driver and do not even included the recent 12.7 CAPs.

Also it seems that the firefox hardware acceleration bug is still there, just like in Catalyst 12.x (9.00 June 12) !!
They could not even fix that ...

Still I might give these a try if I get bored and have time to kill.

 

I tried the mobility and the desktop versions. My 3DMark11 score dropped below 8K and I had several BSOD. First one was with the mobility driver before I did anything to load the GPU. The other two were with the desktop driver under load. The sensor for my second GPU keeps dropping out with both drivers. Did not have nearly so many issues with the Catalyst 12.7b hotfix. I tried this installing over the top of the previous Catalyst package first. I did a "clean driver installation" and that was also a fail.

You're right, xmadror. Appears the links on Guru3D are the actual AMD driver since they lead directly to an AMD web site. I thought they were another of asder00's hacks, but apparently not. I was hoping AMD's official driver would be better, but if this is it, I think it may be their worst effort yet. I cannot say more because doing so would violate forum rules, so I'll end my commentary right there.

Spoiler

I am going to try this one more time using very drastic cleanup measures that exceed the typical "clean installation" for AMD drivers. It is possible that cruft from the old driver might be lurking and causing a conflict. I'm going to do this just to be sure I give them a fair shake and not accuse them of going backward instead of forward. I am going to use an another app that usually makes it difficult for my system to load the Windows desktop after running it. The last time I used it could only get a black screen at boot I had to boot with SG mode to use the IGFX, but that allowed the 7970M cards to be visible and I was able to install the drivers for the 7970M cards while running on the IGFX. That improved my experience overall. Will report back if that improves the situation with these lovely drivers.

 

Firefox HW is not fixed.... damn it... but rest is fine

 

Hello

Thx New Drivers

First test M18X R2 Xfire 7970M

Spoiler

 

Looks good Riri-Fifi. Your GPUs seem to be a lot better than almost everyone else's. Even though the voltage reading is off on one of them, I would try to hang on to both of those video cards. You are very lucky to have them. It's too bad so many of the 7970M GPUs do not work as well as they should.

Doing this helped immensely. It appears a lot of old AMD crud was left behind in the registry after DriverSweeper and CCleaner were run, but I am still seeing a small decrease in 3DMark11 performance and otherwise nothing I can identify as an improvement. Will try some games after work and see if there is any reason to be glad they released it.

Here's what I use as the nuclear AMD pooper-scooper Atiman Uninstaller v.6.3.1. It's very effective and I did not have to switch to SG mode this time.

 

Official AMD link:
AMD Catalyst

Benchmark3D Link:
AMD Catalyst 12.8 WHQL – BenchmarK3D

 

So far, Catalyst 12.8 seems to be... meh. About the same as 12.7b hotfix with a slightly lower benchmark result.

I merged the two threads that were running on the same topic.

 

Test Drivers 12.8 +Wndows 8 Pro 64

Spoiler

]

 

Hi guys. I am thinking of doing a clean install today. So would you guys say it I should just put on 12.8 or stick with 12.7b hotfix? Also with that said. Do you guys have CAPs installed? I think 12.7 CAP 3 is latest one. Is there any drawbacks from installing this, or does everyone install it anyways? I am on 7970m Crossfire btw. I will create a sig soon enough

 

Another question on my mind, do you guys just leave Crossfire on all the/most the time? or do you have it disabled to benefit from lower temps and less electric wastage?

I have had my Crossfire disabled, as I am playing Skyrim and Dota 2 only now and do not require it. The other day I turned it on to show my brother metro 2033 and for the first time I got a blue screen of death and a restart. Then Dell driver stopped working so I had to install them over again. This fixed the issue and not had any problems since. Well I just turned crossfire on just now for a metro 2033 benchmark, when it came on I got some screen tear/ artifacting thing for like 3-4 seconds after the switchover. I did a restart just in case. No problems now.

 

Alienboy12 - Catalyst 12.7b hotfix and 12.8 seem basically the same on my system. I get slightly lower benchmark scores with 12.8, but otherwise I see no difference between them. I'm running CAP3. I always install AMD CAP files, especially with CrossFire systems. CrossFire is becoming famous for not working correctly, and for having issues like what you described with Metro 2033. Catalyst 12.7b and 12.8 have improvements with that compared to the 12.5 and 12.6. The CAP usually helps with things like the aritfacts and screen tearing. The screen tearing was especially horrible with Batman Arkham City and Arkham Asylum using Catalyst 12.5.

There is no reason or need to disable CrossFire, except for when AMD's drivers lack proper support and problems arise (which can, unfortunately, be more often than it should be and a whole lot more often than it used to be). There is nothing to be gained in terms of power utilization or improving idle temperatures as it is only implemented when the conditions are appropriate for it to function (which is exclusively full-screen 3D video demand). In 2D mode (such as web browsing) or windowed gaming modes it does not function at all and the card basically just goes into a sleep type state.

 

Meh, I'm not crazy about the release notes, 2 things to point out.

1) 7970m not on comp list (even though using it in drop down selections got me here)

2) States driver is not for "Switchable Graphics enabled notebooks."

I don't recall seeing either of those points on the 12.6WHQL notes. Even the 12.7beta said it was for 7000m series.

EDIT: NVM, 12.6 notes says the same stuff. Someone at AMD should update their release note page template