It took just a tad bit more than 3 months for AMD’s next non-beta version of the Catalyst GPU drivers to be released, but they’re finally here. Its major improvements include optimizations and performance improvements for several games (listed below), better support for OpenGL 4.3 as well as a number of resolved issues. You’ll find the full release notes below. You’ll find the download here.
Release Notes
This article provides information on the latest posting of AMD’s Catalyst™ Software Suite, AMD Catalyst™ 13.4. This particular software suite updates the AMD Catalyst Display Driver and the AMD Catalyst Control Center / AMD Vision Engine Control Center. This unified driver has been updated, and is designed to provide enhanced performance and reliability.
Package Contents
The AMD Catalyst™ Software Suite, AMD Catalyst™ 13.4 contains the following:
- AMD Catalyst™ Display Driver version 12.104
- HydraVision™ for Windows Vista® and Windows® 7
- Southbridge/IXP Driver
- AMD Catalyst™ Control Center / AMD Vision Engine Control Center
CAUTION!
- The AMD Catalyst Control Center / AMD Vision Engine Control Center requires that the Microsoft® .NET Framework SP1 be installed for Windows Vista. Without .NET SP1 installed, the AMD Catalyst Control Center / AMD Vision Engine Control Center will not launch properly and the user will see an error message
NOTES!
- When installing the AMD Catalyst Driver for Windows operating system, the user must be logged on as Administrator, or have Administrator rights to complete the installation of the AMD Catalyst Driver
- The AMD Catalyst 13.4 requires Windows 7 Service Pack 1 to be installed
- These release notes provide information on the AMD Catalyst Display Driver only. For information on the AMD Multimedia Center™, HydraVision, HydraVision Basic Edition, Remote Wonder™, or the Southbridge/IXP driver, please refer to their respective release notes found at: http://support.amd.com/
- AMD Eyefinity technology is designed to give gamers access to high display resolutions. As pixel count grows, the graphics “horsepower” required to drive the displays at a reasonable frame rate can increase dramatically. Depending on the game and system configuration, users may notice texture corruption and reduced frame rates when running games in multi-monitor Eyefinity modes
- Windows Driver Model (WDM) drivers are no longer bundled in the AMD Catalyst software suite. The WDM drivers install bundle can be downloaded independently through the AMD website
AMD Product Compatibility
AMD Catalyst™ 13.4 is compatible with the following AMD products.
AMD Desktop Product Family Compatibility
AMD Radeon™ HD 7900 Series (incl. HD7990) AMD Radeon HD 6500 Series AMD Radeon HD 7800 Series AMD Radeon HD 6410D Series AMD Radeon HD 7700 Series (incl. HD7790) AMD Radeon HD 6370D Series AMD Radeon HD 7660D Series AMD Radeon HD 6310D Series AMD Radeon HD 7560D Series AMD Radeon HD 6300 Series AMD Radeon HD 7300 Series AMD Radeon HD 6200 Series AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series ATI Radeon HD 5900 Series AMD Radeon HD 6800 Series ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series AMD Radeon HD 6700 Series ATI Radeon HD 5700 Series AMD Radeon HD 6600 Series ATI Radeon HD 5600 Series AMD Radeon HD 6550D Series ATI Radeon HD 5500 Series AMD Radeon HD 6530D Series ATI Radeon HD 5400 Series
AMD Mobility Radeon™ Family Compatibility
AMD Catalyst Mobility is a notebook reference graphics driver with limited support for system vendor specific features. When used with Windows Vista or Windows 7, the user experience may be limited or compromised.
The Installation Verification Software is designed to prevent driver download on certain notebook products. This is to help protect against the installing of drivers that may disable features or functionality provided by the system manufacturer. When used with Windows Vista or Windows 7, the user experience may be limited or compromised. In such a situation, it is recommended to revert back to the driver provided by your system vendor for your specific platform. Please contact your system vendor for the most recent drivers for your notebook.
AMD Mobility Product Families
AMD Mobility Radeon™ HD 7000M Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5400 Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 6900M Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5100 Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 6800M Series AMD Radeon HD 6620G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 6300M Series AMD Radeon HD 6520G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 6300 Series AMD Radeon HD 6480G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 6200 Series AMD Radeon HD 6380G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5800 Series AMD Radeon HD 6310G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5700 Series AMD Radeon HD 6250G Series AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5600 Series AMD PowerXpress™ enabled notebooks using AMD chipsets
The Following Notebooks Are Not Compatible With This Release:
- Any notebook launched after this driver release
- Toshiba notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)
- Sony VAIO notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)
- Panasonic notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)
Compatible Operating Systems
The latest version of AMD’s Catalyst™ Software Suite, AMD Catalyst™ 13.4 is designed to support the following Microsoft Windows platforms:
- Windows 8 32-bit version
- Windows 8 64-bit version
- Windows 7 32-bit version SP1 or higher
- Windows 7 64-bit version SP1 or higher
- Windows Vista 32-bit version SP2 or higher
- Windows Vista 64-bit version SP2 or higher
Feature Highlights of AMD Catalyst™ 13.4
- Support added for AMD Radeon HD7790 and AMD Radeon HD 7990
- Catalyst Driver optimizations to improve performance in Far Cry 3, Crysis 3, and 3DMark
- Significantly improves latency performance in Skyrim, Boderlands 2, Guild Wars 2, Tomb Raider and Hitman Absolution
- Performance gains seen with the entire AMD Radeon HD 7000 Series for the following:
- Batman Arkham City (1920×1200): Performance improvements up to 5%
- Borderlands 2 (2560×1600): Performance improvements up to 10%
- Quake Wars (1920×1200): Performance improvements up to 13%
- Hitman Absolution (2560×1600): Performance improvements up to 11%
- Wolfenstein MP (1920×1080): Performance improvements up to 11%
- Civilization V (2560×1600): Performance improvements up to 5%
- Delivers support for the following OpenGL 4.3 features:
- GL_ARB_compute_shader
- GL_ARB_multi_draw_indirect
- GL_ARB_shader_storage_buffer_object
- GL_ARB_arrays_of_arrays
- GL_ARB_clear_buffer_object
- GL_ARB_ES3_compatibility
- GL_ARB_explicit_uniform_location
- GL_ARB_fragment_layer_viewport
- GL_ARB_invalidate_subdata
- GL_ARB_program_interface_query
- GL_ARB_shader_image_size
- GL_ARB_stencil_texturing
- GL_ARB_texture_buffer_range
- GL_ARB_texture_query_levels
- GL_ARB_texture_storage_multisample
Resolved Issues
This section provides information on resolved known issues in this release of the AMD’s Catalyst™ Software Suite, AMD Catalyst™ 13.4
- With the Radeon HD7790 graphics card, corruption may be seen in the game Tomb Raider with TressFX enabled
- Texture flickering may be observed in DirectX 9.0c enabled applications
- Corruption observed in Tomb Raider with TressFX enabled for AMD Crossfire and single GPU system configurations
- Corruption observed on objects and textures in the game, Call of Duty – Black Ops 2
- Corruption observed in the game, Alan Wake (DirectX 9 Mode) when attempting to change in-game settings with Stereoscopic 3D using Tridef
- Corruption observed on textures in the game, Battle Field: Bad Company 2 with forced anti-aliasing enabled
- Adobe Photoshop CS6 experiences screen flicker under Windows 8 based system
- Horizontal line corruption may be observed with forced anti-aliasing enabled in the game, Dishonored
- System hang may occur when scrolling through the game selection menu in the game, DiRT 3
- F1 2012 may crash to desktop on systems supporting AMD PowerXpress (Enduro) Technology
Known Issues
The section provides a summary of open issues that may be experienced with the AMD’s Catalyst™ Software Suite, AMD Catalyst™ 13.4
- Jumping artifacts, and unsmooth playback of interlaced clips may be experienced using Cyberlink’s Metro UI players
- A black screen may be observed when resuming from a S3/S4 sleep state if the display is unplugged during the sleep state on systems supported AMD PowerXpress (Enduro) Technology
Installing the AMD Catalyst Software Driver
For additional information, and general help on software driver installation, game issues and more visit, AMD Customer Care.
Installation information can be found within the article, KB 20870: Installation Guide for AMD Graphics Card and Driver.
Feel free to follow Brian and Gadget Unit on Twitter.
Source: AMD