AMD Catalyst 14.1 delayed due to a last minute bug

[alxcsb]

Tried the new driver, on a stock 7950. Apart from a barely noticeable gain in that Star Swarm thing (can't call it a benchmark since there's no consistency, and it's not a game either) it sort of crashes after the 6 minutes are over in that it doesn't return to desktop and display that result sheet, yet it's not actually crashed since the HDD activity LED still does it's job and I can access files over the network. Tried cleaning the previous driver, no cigar. I'm assuming this is due to the many issues this driver has. Functions ok in DX applications though.

 

[Zoot]

Toooooooooooooooooold you ;D.

You weren't the only one either. ^_^

 

[cooperman]

Unlucky, the 7000 series isn't fully supported yet so that's probably what is causing your crashes.
Seems a few people are getting crashes and memory leaks from reading around different places.

Hopefully they get another driver up soon that will work good for everyone

My HD7950 seams to be working fine ive been playing bf4 for hrs the only time the game crashed is when it tryed to eat all my system ram and thats been happening since day one with bugfield 4 i dont think it has anything to do with the 14.1driver.

 

[SieB]

My HD7950 seams to be working fine ive been playing bf4 for hrs the only time the game crashed is when it tryed to eat all my system ram and thats been happening since day one with bugfield 4 i dont think it has anything to do with the 14.1driver.

You must be one of the lucky ones, the 7000, 270 and 280 series cards aren't optimized fully yet for Mantle. Quite a few people are reporting memory leaks and crashes with 14.1. Not sure if it's just under Mantle or DX11 though, the crashes are mainly with people with crossfire setups and single cards don't seem to be effected as much if at all.

Personally, i've had no probs at all with 14.1 on Mantle or DX11 apart from a massive CPU spike which causes the game to freeze for about a second every now and then in BF4 when running on Mantle.

The driver and Mantle are in Beta though so bugs and stuff are expected.

List of know issues and other stuff can be found here

http://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/latest-catalyst-windows-beta.aspx

 

[cooperman]

I have noticed there is a noticeable difference in shading/lighting efects in mantle vs DX11 with the same setings not shure what i like better but i do like these setings to get stable 60fps vsync'ed in mantle without any deviation in fps (not one fps drop in these setings in mantle but lots of drops to 35-40fps on some maps in DX11 with the same setings)

Comparson --> http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/60846

setings..

 

[NeverBackDown]

Running Mantle drivers and have had no issues with my 7950 in any game thus far.

 

[SieB]

I have noticed there is a noticeable difference in shading/lighting efects in mantle vs DX11 with the same setings.

I've noticed this as well, there is also fog on Siege of Shanghai and Paracel Storm. The fog has been confirmed as a bug though and DICE are working on it.

Sorry to double post but i've found a way to properly get FPS readings in Bf4 under Mantle.

Well, I say me but it wasn't me and it was someone on the OCUK forums. So all credit to Cambofrog from there for this.

Basically you need to run the built in frame file log in bf4 using this command line in the console

perfoverlay.framefilelogenable 1

This will start the log and record frame times.

To stop it you need to type

perfoverlay.framefilelogenable 0

Now this will save a .csv file in

C:\users\"your username"\documents\battlefield4

To open this you will need spreadsheet software like Excel or free alternatives included in open office or LibreOffice. Don't worry because you don't actually need them, you only need them if you want to open the files to see the data for yourself.

In the files are recorded frame times, not a reading of Min, Max and Avg FPS like you would get if you used FRAPS which unfortunately doesn't work for Mantle. However, you can convert the frametimes to give you FPS.

The guy from OCUK came up with a basic app which will do all the converting for you.

You need to download this
http://www.sendspace.com/file/c7qmr3

It is clean but your browser may flag it because it's not an official app.

Next create a folder and call it whatever you want, place this app inside that folder along with the .csv file that you got from BF4 with the data in it.

Next hold down shift on your keyboard and right click the folder and then select "open command window here"

A command prompt window will now open, in it type

bf4parse followed by the filename of the .csv file making sure it has .csv on the end.

So for example you should have something like this typed in the command promt

bf4parse FrameTimeLog001.csv

Once you have done that press enter and the app will do all the math and display your Min, Max and Avg FPS.

Enjoy Mantle benching

And again all credit to Cambofrog from the OCUK forums.

 

[Zoot]

Another good thing about Mantle and the promise it shows now is that it has produced a lot of butthurt Nvidia/Intel fanbois.

Reading some forums since the weekend has been great comedy. ^_^

 

[SieB]

Another good thing about Mantle and the promise it shows now is that it has produced a lot of butthurt Nvidia/Intel fanbois.

Reading some forums since the weekend has been great comedy. ^_^

Yep, some comments from people have been quite funny.
Some people have been saying crap like the Mantle launch is a complete and utter failure and that AMD have messed up again. All because there are a few bugs and some people are getting crashes, mianly people with 7000 cards that aren't even optimized for Mantle fully yet.
It seems they don't understand what "Beta" means.

All this despite the massive gains some people are getting, especially people with low end CPUs and even people with high end ones with crossfire setups where they were bottlenecked by their CPU.

Don't know why Intel users are moaning because Mantle benefits all CPUs not just AMD ones.
It is always amazing to see how much people attach themselves to a brand whether it be Nvidia, Intel or AMD and think that their chosen brand is best and others are bad just because they seem to think that choosing a certain brand over the other gives then some kind of superior status (on the internet of all places) or self worth.

It really is amusing to see people like that, especially the ones who get upset and feel threatened by other brands doing better or offering something their chosen ones don't.

 

[SeekaX]

Yep, some comments from people have been quite funny.
Some people have been saying crap like the Mantle launch is a complete and utter failure and that AMD have messed up again. All because there are a few bugs and some people are getting crashes, mianly people with 7000 cards that aren't even optimized for Mantle fully yet.
It seems they don't understand what "Beta" means.

All this despite the massive gains some people are getting, especially people with low end CPUs and even people with high end ones with crossfire setups where they were bottlenecked by their CPU.

Don't know why Intel users are moaning because Mantle benefits all CPUs not just AMD ones.
It is always amazing to see how much people attach themselves to a brand whether it be Nvidia, Intel or AMD and think that their chosen brand is best and others are bad just because they seem to think that choosing a certain brand over the other gives then some kind of superior status (on the internet of all places) or self worth.

It really is amusing to see people like that, especially the ones who get upset and feel threatened by other brands doing better or offering something their chosen ones don't.

aren't those crashes related to DICE employees being incompetent rather than mantle messing up?
i wonder what the future plans are with mantle, they know it won't become a standard but they also spent way too much money and effort on it just to make third parties make a better API.

 

[barnsley]

It is always amazing to see how much people attach themselves to a brand whether it be Nvidia, Intel or AMD and think that their chosen brand is best and others are bad just because they seem to think that choosing a certain brand over the other gives then some kind of superior status (on the internet of all places) or self worth.

It really is amusing to see people like that, especially the ones who get upset and feel threatened by other brands doing better or offering something their chosen ones don't.

^ every discussion about computers on the internet ever has some variation of this . Good way of putting it


I'm waiting for further mantle updates to see if it'd make sense for me to stick with my current cpu and get another 280x. If the benefit isn't enough then I won't bother. I'll probably sell my rig and start again. This may seem a bit daft to some of you, but I've had a big change in circumstance since I built Octobox (I moved house, got a full time job and my internet isn't good enough for streaming ) and the way I use my pc has changed. If mantle means my 8320 will do excellent in gaming, I'll resist changing my rig and put up with slow render times for a year or so.

 

[SieB]

aren't those crashes related to DICE employees being incompetent rather than mantle messing up?
i wonder what the future plans are with mantle, they know it won't become a standard but they also spent way too much money and effort on it just to make third parties make a better API.

The crashes are mainly with people with 7000 cards because they aren't optimized yet. I'm not sure if it's because of DICE or AMD that they are not fully optimized though.
I've not had one single crash on my 290, the only bug I have is a random CPU spike every now and then that causes the game to freeze for about a second, it's not gamebreaking though.

Who knows whether it will become a standard or not? it is to early to tell. Mantle and drivers are still in beta. There are quite a few other games lined up that will be using Mantle. Unlike BF4 those games have been built around Mantle not with it just patched in like with BF4.

It's to early to tell what will become of it, but it has already shown what it can do. If more developers jump on board and start using it then all the better. We will have to wait and see what happens though, it is still very early days.

 

[Zoot]

Some people have been saying crap like the Mantle launch is a complete and utter failure and that AMD have messed up again. All because there are a few bugs and some people are getting crashes, mianly people with 7000 cards that aren't even optimized for Mantle fully yet.
It seems they don't understand what "Beta" means.

[...]

It really is amusing to see people like that, especially the ones who get upset and feel threatened by other brands doing better or offering something their chosen ones don't.

Sometimes I think AMD should give the Intel/Nvidia fanbois what they want and declare bankruptcy. I bet they'd love paying 1000+ for an i5-4670k or GTX 780 then.

I know I went with Nvidia this generation, but there's no way in hell I'd have bought my 780 if they were still the price they were before the R9 290/290X launched. For that, I'm grateful to AMD, even if I didn't keep the 290. ^_^

More On-Topic, these results from TechReport are interesting. You'll notice the 780Ti with DirectX still bests the 290X with Mantle, this is with an i7-4770k. This to me says Nvidia must have put a lot of effort into optimizing their drivers for Battlefield 4 to rain a little on AMD's parade.
http://techreport.com/review/25995/first-look-amd-mantle-cpu-performance-in-battlefield-4 ***

***(Don't take the comments too seriously - lots of butthurt there)

 

[cooperman]

You'll notice the 780Ti with DirectX still bests the 290X with Mantle

Well its not surprising considering the 780TI is the most powerfull gameing card you can buy rigth now.

 

[Zoot]

Well its not surprising considering the 780TI is the most powerfull gameing card you can buy rigth now.

Yup, so much so had I the choice between a 780Ti and 290X now, I'd pick the former for that reason (price not withstanding of course).

I wouldn't see this as much of a big deal for Mantle. This is just one part of one game, other parts could tip the scales in the 290X's favor. Although the performance difference between the two at the top just isn't noticable.

The new Thief game that's coming soon is to support Mantle too, it'll be interesting to see what that brings. ^_^