ATI Mobility Radeon Graphics Cards

How often does ATI update their cards with performance?

Also I went to the ATI site and found my 2600HD but I didn't notice any driver updates like 1.667 or what ever I see most people talking about.

 

ATI dont do mobile drivers any more, you will need to get the latest drivers from the gateway site or, check the drivers sticky here on NBR and get the latest ATI drivers from their, might require driver modding, which is actually quite easy. Even I managed it...lol

 

Yeah. Just get the latest Desktop driver from ATi and use Mobility Modder to mod it for your notebook. Its an almost fully automated procces and is realy easy to do.

 

Mobility Modder?

 

Yeah, a program to mod the ATI drivers. Very simple to use.

http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php

 

Even tho there is a newer driver available at ATI's website, I wouldnt bother. Just get it off Gateway's website or let Microsoft Windows update do it. It is more safe, and you wont see any dramatic changes in performance by going from 8.45 -> 8.7 manually

 

Actualy this is debatable. New games tend to give certain drivers graphical glitches. Even if you dont see them they may reduce performance.
For example ET: Quake Wars had some issues with old ATi drivers. The first update removed the glitches. The second upped the performance quite a bit.
Also, they tend to improve performance even in older games. Staying up to date = good, even if you only check the "patch"notes to see if anything is relevant to you. Especialy if you play the new games.

The following performance gains are noticed with this release of Catalyst™.

* 3DMark Vantage: Performance increases of up to 20% is noticed in the Performance Preset on single card configured systems when using ATI Radeon™ HD 36xx or ATI Radeon™ HD 34xx products
* Company of Heroes DX10: Performance increases of 3% to 12% is noticed in specific maps on single card configured systems when using either an ATI Radeon™ HD 48xx, ATI Radeon ™ HD 38xx, or an ATI Radeon™ HD 36xx product
* Lost Planet DX10: Performance increases of 4% to 15% is noticed in specific maps on single card configured systems when using either an ATI Radeon™ HD 48xx, ATI Radeon™ HD 38xx, or an ATI Radeon™ HD 36xx product
* Call Of Duty 4 DX9: Performance increases of up to 4% in specific maps is noticed on single card configured systems when using an ATI Radeon™ HD 48xx product
* Lost Planet DX9: CrossFire™ scaling improves up to 1.7x and performance increases up to 80% across all Radeon™ products when AA and AF is enabled

Now this one doesnt affect us alot. Unless you play DX10 but i doubt that But as you can see they even improved old games.
Also note 38xx, 36xx and 34xx improvements also tend to be for the 2xxx series since they are basicly identical.


ATi 8.7 Drivers:
http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx

ATi Mobility Modder:
http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php
Follow instructions on this page.

EDIT:
Forgot the fixes of the latest drivers. Now some of these fixes are acutaly usefull, especialy the Assasins creed one for you if you play the game

Resolved Issues for the Windows Vista Operating System

This section provides information on resolved issues in this release of the ATI Catalyst™ Software Suite for Windows Vista. These include:

* Assassin's Creed: Attempting to launch the game on a system containing an ATI Radeon™ HD 2600 series of product and running the Windows Vista operating system (32 bit version) no longer results in the game exiting to the desktop. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35804
* Crysis: Edge detect is now working when playing the DX9 version of the game with UBM enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35765
* Frontlines Fuel of War: Setting the in-game option to 1152x864 and AA to N/A no longer results in corruption being noticed when playing the game on a system containing an ATI Radeon™ HD 38x0 series of product. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35861
* Hellgate London: Setting the display resolution to 2560x1600 no longer results in the game failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35886
* Mahjongg Artifacts: Launching the game on a system running Windows Vista no longer results in the operating system failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35873
* Rainbow Six Vegas 2: Flickering is no longer noticed when switching between the game and the Windows desktop. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35818
* Rainbow Six Vegas 2: Setting AA to 8x no longer results in AA failing to be applied. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35823
* World In Conflict: Setting the video quality to high no longer results in corruption being noticed. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35884
* World of Warcraft: The game's log-in background is no longer blank when using OpenGL mode. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35767
* ZT: Attempting to play the Asian game in a windowed mode or at a display resolution of 1280x1024 no longer results in the game failing to respond. Further details can be found in topic number 737-34152
* Running various games on a system containing an ATI Radeon™ X18x0 series of product no longer results in Time-out Detection and Recovery (TDR) when having Catalyst AI set to Advanced. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35828
* A black window is no longer displayed when attempting to play a DVD title using WinDVD 7 when Overlay Theater Mode and clone mode is enabled. Further details can be found in topic number 737-34133
* Connecting an HDMI display device to the DVI port using an HDMI to DVI dongle no longer results in the display mode of 720x480 failing to be in the display mode list after hot-unplugging the HDMI display device and hot-plugging a DVI display device. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35105
* Clicking on the Scaling Options for the HDMI display device no longer results in the Panel Information and Image Scaling failing to be restored the graphics adapter. This issue is also resolved for the Windows XP operating system as well. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35874
* Attempting to change to clone or single mode no longer fails when display number 2 is set a the primary display device. This issue is also resolved for the Windows XP operating system as well. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35768
* Connecting a secondary display device no longer results in the secondary display failing to be seen in the Catalyst Control Center when using a system containing an ATI Radeon™ HD 2400 series of product. This issue is also resolved for the Windows XP operating system as well. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35802
* Adjusting either the gamma, brightness or contrast setting in the Catalyst Control Center no longer results in certain graphics hardware information failing to be displayed in the Information Center. This issue is also resolved for the Windows XP operating system as well. Further details can be found in topic number 737-358633
* Enabling and disabling GPU Scaling no longer results in some of the supported display resolutions no longer being available. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35047
* The OverDrive™ clocks are no longer set back to default setting when exiting the fullscreen samples if the Enable ATI OverDrive™ clocks for 3D applications only option is set to Off. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35755
* Using a smart dongle no longer results in the mode of 1080i failing to appear in the display manager of the Catalyst Control Center. Further details can be found in topic number 737-358477

Resolved Issues for the Windows XP Operating System

This section provides information on resolved issues in this release of the ATI Catalyst™ Software Suite for Windows XP. These include:

* City of Heroes: Character stretching and double character reflection is no longer noticed when the in-game resolution is set to 2560x1600. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35757
* Enemy Territories Quake Wars: Flickering is no longer noticed when playing the game with CrossFire™ enabled on systems containing an ATI Radeon™ HD 38x0 series of product. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35788
* Lost Planet: Corruption is no longer noticed when switching between the game and the Windows XP desktop. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35782
* Google SketchUp: The Push/Pull tool no longer fails to select some faces. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35800
* World of Warcraft: Enabling AA in the Catalyst Control Center no longer results in the user failing to log on to the game. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35816
* Installing the display driver from an installation CD no longer results in a warning message indicating that the Catalyst Control Center is not supported by the driver version installed. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35120
* Playing a standard definition DVD using the Windows Media Player (hardware acceleration enabled) no longer results in the operating system failing to respond when attempting to rotate the display. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35875
* Intermittent flashing is no longer noticed in the right portion of the display when playing a 720p or 1080i media file when using the Windows Media Player v10. Further details can be found in topic number 737-32666
* Playing a DVD title and selecting the option to use basic color setting to default in the Catalyst Control Center now results in the option being applied. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35803
* Playing an MPEG2 video clip on a display that is rotated no longer results in corruption being noticed when rotating the display back to landscape mode. Further details can be found in topic number 737-35805

 

Are you going to buy him a new notebook if his GPU goes bad?

While I am not saying that will happen, the modder looks like it knows what it is doing, it is still a chance. I know updating will not help me much, if at all, so I am going to wait.

 

I dont understand why i would have to buy a new notebook for him if it magicly blows up. Nor did i say i would vouche for the guys work or modding. Ofcourse a driver install could go bad. Things happen, but you also have this with diffrent software.

Do you aslo say this when people mod the Inf file in the Nvidia drivers? Only thing the tool does is basicly the same. Due to the fact that the files that have to be corrected are "locked away" this tool comes in handy but doenst do anything more than modding the competability list.

These days VGPU, Temperaturedownclocking and clocks itself are done by the gpu bios so there is no way his GPU could "blow up" if the driver fails.

P.S.

Ive used to tool several times on multiple notebooks and i persnaly never had any problems.

 

If you have 32 bit Windows XP, just check this link when they release new drivers for the desktop.

http://ati.amd.com/online/mobilecatalyst/

ATi officially announced that they will leave the driver updates to the manufacturers, but ironically that link will give you the latest Mobility Catalyst drivers for 32 bit XP.

 

All I am saying is that this is the guy's first notebook.

While the whole desktop drivers -> notebook drivers modder seems dependable, if anything happens to his notebook, hes gunna come back here and asking questions of why he was suggested to do this.

So...ya.

 

Yeah true. Your way is probably the safest but i tought he was realy into getting the most out of it.

 

How on Earth is it going to get physicaly damaged by a video driver? It's impossible.
Worst case scenario he will have to installer older version of driver than the one that has(IF) problems.