AMD Catalyst 14.1 delayed due to a last minute bug

[WYP]

One of the most highly anticipated pieces of gaming tech to come this year is the Mantle API, AMD's ambitious 3D graphics API to rival Direct3D and OpenGL, which promises to give huge performance gains in CPU limited gaming tasks and more optimum GPU utilization which opens up titles to more performance and visual yum yum that gamers want.

This was all to come with AMD Catalyst 14.1, which sadly has been delayed today due to an installation issue found during AMD's internal testing.

AMD's Driver should have been in sync with the release of DICE's last update for Battlefield 4, but is now left in a position where there are two titles which support, being DICE's Battlefield 4 and Oxide Games Star Swarm benchmark tool. Sadly the only guys not supporting Mantle today are AMD themselves.

AMD now say that their driver team have been working overnight to fix the driver, and should have their next update up by mid-afternoon EST (New York time), later today.

That doesn't necessarily mean a driver release at that for public use however, given that AMD has given an exclusive 24 hour period for the press to evaluate the driver before its eventual release to the public, so we likely will not see mantle until sometime tomorrow.

At this rate AMD might even have to call their driver 14.2 to keep up with their current naming scheme (Currently named - Year.Month).

It is a shame 14.1 is not released yet but at least we all can play Battlefield 4 and test Star Swarm today to get some good before Mantle looks at these titles.

Hopefully we will be adequately impressed by the changes in performance we will see tomorrow, or AMD will have trouble marketing Mantle to other Developers.

Source - techpowerup

 

[SeekaX]

wait, what?
wasn't mantle supposed to be ready since late november and all that was keeping it back was DICE being a bunch of incompetent retards?

 

[WYP]

wait, what?
wasn't mantle supposed to be ready since late november and all that was keeping it back was DICE being a bunch of incompetent retards?

It's a big driver in more ways that one, with phase 2 frame pacing, HSA and mantle, there are so many possibilities for problems there.

Also it is an installation problem AMD says they are facing ATM.

 

[Excalabur50]

Cant wait for these drivers gonna be good

 

[Jaytec359]

Indeed, this is definitely going to put pressure on Nvidia in the Graphics market.

 

[Josh Weston]

At this rate AMD might even have to call their driver 14.2 to keep up with their current naming scheme (Currently named - Year.Month).

Holy crap. How did I never work this out? Mind = blown.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Don't really see this as a big deal tbh.

If they released it with a bugged version they would have gotten far more crap from everyone on the internet. Now they still get some crap for delaying it but its still far better than releasing a driver that does not work.

Its only a big deal thats it delayed because its an important driver. If it wasn't important we wouldn't even know about it.

So good job to AMD driver team saving their asses at the last moment!

 

[Josh Weston]

Don't really see this as a big deal tbh.

If they released it with a bugged version they would have gotten far more crap from everyone on the internet. Now they still get some crap for delaying it but its still far better than releasing a driver that does not work.

Its only a big deal thats it delayed because its an important driver. If it wasn't important we wouldn't even know about it.

So good job to AMD driver team saving their asses at the last moment!

I think it's funny that the same people yelling at AMD for delaying their release are those who yell at Dice/EA for releasing the game too soon.

 

[NeverBackDown]

I think it's funny that the same people yelling at AMD for delaying their release are those who yell at Dice/EA for releasing the game too soon.

Well it makes sense. In the case of AMD; if they released it too soon they would have gotten tons of crap, but they probably learned from EA/Dice and waited it out to fix things.

BF4 was just rushed and not delayed... result is what AMD avoided.. a nightmare.

But i do see your point

 

[Dicehunter]

Well it makes sense. In the case of AMD; if they released it too soon they would have gotten tons of crap, but they probably learned from EA/Dice and waited it out to fix things.

BF4 was just rushed and not delayed... result is what AMD avoided.. a nightmare.

But i do see your point

You just confirmed him confirming and agreeing with you ^_^ *was funny in my head *

 

[NeverBackDown]

You just confirmed him confirming and agreeing with you ^_^

Weird cycle ay? ^_^

 

[Dicehunter]

Weird cycle ay? ^_^

As I said it was funny in my head

 

[WYP]

I think it's funny that the same people yelling at AMD for delaying their release are those who yell at Dice/EA for releasing the game too soon.

Some people can never be pleased, they want stuff now but in a perfect state.

As with all software, release should be when it is ready and never pushed for a quick release, or have a release now fix later approach.

This is one of the main reasons why I don't support any early access games like Rust or DayZ, especially Rust where they said this

We are in very early development. Some things work, some things don't. We haven't totally decided where the game is headed - so things will change. Things will change a lot. We might even make changes that you think are wrong. But we have a plan. It's in our interest to make the game awesome - so please trust us.”

I believe that if you have not decided where you plan on going with your game it is nowhere near a place where the public should be using it, never mind paying for it.

While i do not see early access games as an entirely bad thing i think there needs to be tighter standards for these games. Perhaps the developer needs to outline actual release dates of their titles and give an incentive to finish eventually, right now Rust and DayZ have made a fortune but there are currently no release dates out there, the devs have made their money whats their reason to release?

Sorry for the mini rant there but that's what i think.

'EDIT' Back on topic AMD have now said this on their AMD Gaming Facebook page;

Mantle Update: Our driver team is still working on putting the final touches on the Catalyst 14.1 Beta. We will keep you updated on our progress.

Doesn't give us any new information here, but they are trying hard to release it soon!

 

[SieB]

EA/DICE deserve all they get to be honest, if it was just them messing up on one game and and it only being once in a while, then fair enough. But With DICE it's been a consistent theme since BFBC2 with them constantly messing things up and breaking things. They are getting better with BF4, but back in BF3 and earlier they only patched things every 2-3 months, so all the bugs and things they broke stayed in the game for that amount of time. And every time they did fix things they broke other things, things that weren't even related to what they were fixing in the first place. How they manage to consistently continue to do it I will never understand.

It's not often, if at all AMD delay driver releases though. So i'm not sure why people are moaning at them for doing it now, especially with something as big as the release of Mantle. At least they aren't doing a DICE and throwing out a broken release.

EDIT:

Quote from an AMD rep on the OCUK forums, looks like Monday at the earliest now

Hello everyone,

I just wanted to provide you a quick update:

The driver won't be released today. Our Driver team is putting the final touches on the Catalyst 14.1 Beta driver, but I will make sure to keep you informed on this front as much as possible. I appreciate your patience, means a lot to me

Another interesting bit of info from him though

The Mantle API is a low-level programming language that enables developers to exploit the capabilities of today's GPUs, to improve graphics performance. It's designed to be applicable to a range of GPU architectures. It's an agnostic API. Our intention for Mantle is to eventually become an industry standard applicable to multiple graphics architectures and platforms.

 

[NeverBackDown]

I'm excited for the release. I keep f5'ing the driver page'

 

[SeekaX]

Quote from an AMD rep on the OCUK forums, looks like Monday at the earliest now

Quote:
Hello everyone,

I just wanted to provide you a quick update:

The driver won't be released today.

I'm excited for the release. I keep f5'ing the driver page'

good luck with that mission mate.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Thanks

 

[Zoot]

I'm excited for the release. I keep f5'ing the driver page'

You've a 7950 no?

You might want to give your finger a rest if this is true
http://www.techpowerup.com/197402/amd-mantle-driver-to-only-benefit-four-gpus-initially.html

 

[cooperman]

You've a 7950 no?

You might want to give your finger a rest if this is true
http://www.techpowerup.com/197402/amd-mantle-driver-to-only-benefit-four-gpus-initially.html

As usual 'techpowerup' are a bunch of dumbasses.

 

[SieB]

There "may" still be a chance of the driver coming this weekend.

Just seen an article on Guru3D and AMD have released a not quite finished version of the driver to them.

Here are some early results that they got