amd

AMD Catalyst 13.2 beta 3 driver up to 300% performance ?

by

After several posts into their forums, it is now the time for AMD to launch their most awaited driver (bug-fixes concerning to Steam Linux client) that comes in their 3rd instalment of Catalyst 13.2 beta.  So, if you had problem with Serious Sam 3 or Team Fortress 2, now you can actually feel the ultimate gaming experience. Yet, there are many things remaining to be fixed, but this driver it was most awaited by many… many… people out there. Especially for us, Ubuntu users.

Check the log…

[toggle title=”Driver bug-fixes”]

Feature Highlights of the AMD Catalyst™ 13.2 Beta Driver for Linux

  • [370476 ]: Resolves a Team Fortress 2 performance issue with Ubuntu 12.04/12.10 and AMD Radeon™ HD 7000, 6000 Series GPU. Up to 300% performance improvement
  • [369298 ]: Resolves a Serious Sam 3 launching and corruption issue with Ubuntu 12.04/12.10 and AMD Radeon™ HD 7000, 6000 Series GPU

[/toggle]

[toggle title=”Supported GPUs”]

AMD Desktop Product Family Compatibility

AMD Radeon™ HD 8900 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6800 Series

AMD Radeon HD 8800 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6700 Series

AMD Radeon HD 8700 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6600 Series

AMD Radeon HD 8400 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6500 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7900 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6400 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7800 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6300 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7700 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6200 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7600 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5900 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7500 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7570 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5700 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7500 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5600 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7400 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5500 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7300 Series

ATI Radeon HD 5400 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7000 series

ATI Radeon HD 5000 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series

AMD Radeon™ HD 7600A Series

AMD Radeon HD 6600A Series

AMD Radeon HD 7400A Series

AMD Radeon HD 6350A Series

AMD Radeon™ E6760

AMD Radeon E6460

AMD Radeon™ HD 7600G Series

AMD Radeon HD 7600D Series

AMD Radeon HD 7500G Series

AMD Radeon HD 7500D Series

AMD Radeon HD 7400G Series

AMD Radeon HD 7400D Series

AMD Radeon HD 7300G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6500D Series

AMD Radeon HD 6700G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6400D Series

AMD Radeon HD 6600G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6300D Series

AMD Radeon HD 6500G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6400G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6300G Series

AMD Radeon HD 6200G Series

AMD Radeon™ HD 7900M Series

AMD Radeon HD 6500M Series

AMD Radeon HD 7800M Series

AMD Radeon HD 6400M Series

AMD Radeon HD 7700M Series

AMD Radeon HD 6300M Series

AMD Radeon HD 7600M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5800 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7500M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5700 Series

AMD Radeon HD 7000M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5600 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6900M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5500 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6800M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5400 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6700M Series

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5000 Series

AMD Radeon HD 6600M Series

[/toggle]

According to AMD, there is a potential performance boost up to 300% improvement ONLY for Radeon HD 7000, 6000 series.  However, I tested the game with my Radeon 6950 and I didn’t notice a 300% boost. The overall experience is updated, indeed, but I can’t see this 300% boost the AMD claims in their website. I will make some test with Radeon HD7000 as soon as possible and then come back. Good news don’t stop here because there is another thing about this driver release. For the first time (if my memory serves me right) AMD offers you support for their upcoming GPUs: AMD Radeon 8000 series GPU also known as Oland family. According to TechPowerUp “the Radeon HD 8870,  could offer performance comparable to today’s high-end GPUs. The HD 8870 is clocked at 1050 MHz with 1100 MHz PowerTune Boost frequency; while the HD 8850 is clocked at 925 MHz with 975 MHz boost frequency. The memory of both SKUs is clocked at 6.00 GHz, yielding 192 GB/s memory bandwidth. The chips hence have 256-bit wide memory interfaces”.

[button color=”red” link=”http://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/amd-driver-installer-catalyst-13.2-beta3-linux-x86.x86_64.zip”]Download Catalyst[/button]

Read more

Steam for Linux client current status

by

Steam for Linux client is currently under a closed-beta phase, while interal beta-testers are providing the necessary feedback for Valve. The client targets Ubuntu 12.04 LTS and is fully featured with access to the Steam Store, your Linux game Library, your Friends list and Community content. In addition to the client, a varied selection of … Read more

How to fix Steam for Linux video problems

by

As you can probably imagine, Steam in Linux issues are related to video drivers. Thus, Valve wants to be ensured that only with the latest binary blob you’ll be able to play Steam games into Ubuntu. So, if you want to become Steam compatible you have to install proprietary nVIDIA or AMD drivers into your … Read more

How to fix your AMD Graphics in Ubuntu 12.10 (updated)

by

The last week or so has been one of transition for AMD’s Catalyst driver, especially for those you have a quite old Radeon GPU. Alongside the launch of Ubuntu 12.10 – that comes with new xorg 1.13 and breaks the fglrx (aka Catalyst 12.9) – AMD has also drop the support for Radeon HD 4000, HD 3000 or HD 2000 graphics cards, forcing a broken upgrade up to Quantal 12.10. On the development side of things, this problem is not 100% percent related to Ubuntu 12.10, but it comes with the new version of xorg 1.13 that is included in Quantal, meaning that you need to downgrade xorg down to 1.12.  So for the time being there is no AMD Legacy support with X-Server 1.13, and you need to downgrade. Capping this off, the solution comes from inside the root of the problem, thus AMD’s driver team has launched a new driver for these outdated GPU models, called Catalyst Legacy.

Read more

Why AMD Hondo Z-60 Windows 8 Tablets will epic fail

by

Today, AMD officially announced that the first Windows 8 RT tablets using their latest processor Z-60 will be available during this year in stores. Both Microsoft and AMD play a dirty game providing hardware support only to Windows operating system, leaving out Linux distros. In that way, Microsoft believe they would out-space Android tablets and … Read more

GPU Accelerated Java by AMD and Oracle

by

During the JavaOne™ 2012 Strategy Keynote,AMD announced its participation in OpenJDK™ Project “Sumatra” in collaboration with Oracle and other members of the OpenJDK community to help bring heterogeneous computing capabilities to Java™ for server and cloud environments. The OpenJDK Project “Sumatra” will explore how the Java Virtual Machine (JVM), as well as the Java language and APIs, might be enhanced … Read more

AMD Catalyst 12.9 released – Install Guide (updated)

by

The latest AMD Catalyst 12.9 was released yesterday (13/9/12) . The most significant change here is that Catalyst 9 improves your embedded Radeon graphics. For example if you’re using a netbook with an AMD CPU, then you have better support for its embedded IGPU, like E6760, E6460 etc.

Last but not least, the AMD hasn’t updated their website, thus this link is located under embedded graphics, not PC Desktop. Hopefully they will update their website during the next 24 hours.

[toggle title=”Changelog from Phoronix”]

Fix startx failure on PowerXpress A+A platforms
– Fix performance downgrade with 3DMarkVantage
– Fix startx failure on some specific ASICs
– Fix PowerPlay settings not persistent after reboot
– Fix problem that the hardware information is shown twice in AMD CCC:LE for Power Saving mode of PowerXpress A+A
– Fix severe corruption when switch between multiple X servers
– Fix cursor disappear when open AMD CCC:LE with specific steps
– Fix suspend/resume hang on PowerXpress A+A in Power-Saving mode
– Fix system hang after panning
– Fix system font change after enable Xinerama
– Fix X crash when run 32bit AMD CCC:LE on 64bit system
– Fix the issue that monitor goes into sleep for some ASICs after kill X

[/toggle]

Click to download the drivers for 64/32 bit (the package contains both the 32-bit and 64-bit driver.).

[button color=”orange” link=”http://www2.ati.com/drivers/embedded/9.00-120815a-146426C-EDG_Direct.zip”]Download 32/64bit[/button]

Currently you can’t install this driver using Xorg-Edgers PPA because the repository has not been updated yet. You have to built it by you own following the hard(manual) way.

Read more

AMD Catalyst 12.8 Released – Install Guide

by

Actually the Catalyst driver was released yesterday (15/8/12) but the official link was broken, although many users find out the mispelling and download the driver without problem — currently the link is fixed. Click to download the drivers for 64/32 bit (the package contains both the 32-bit and 64-bit driver.). [button color=”orange” link=”http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/amd-driver-installer-12-8-x86.x86_64.zip”]Download 32/64bit[/button] The … Read more