AMD Frame Pacing Explored: Catalyst 13.8 Brings Consistency to Crossfire
by Ryan Smith on August 1, 2013 2:00 PM ESTBattlefield 3
Our multiplayer action game of our benchmark suite is Battlefield 3, DICE’s 2011 multiplayer military shooter. Its ability to pose a significant challenge to GPUs has been dulled some by time and drivers, but it’s still a challenge if you want to hit the highest settings at the highest resolutions at the highest anti-aliasing levels. Furthermore while we can crack 60fps in single player mode, our rule of thumb here is that multiplayer framerates will dip to half our single player framerates, so hitting high framerates here may not be high enough.
BF3 typically favors NVIDIA cards, so it comes as no great shock that performance has once again flipped in advantage of the GTX 690.
Looking at our delta percentages this is another game where AMD has made massive gains; previously they’d be so unbalanced that every other frame for a long stretch of the benchmark would be a runt frame. 12.6% is the single best showing for the 7990 and much closer to where we would like AMD to be. They still have more than twice the variability of the GTX 690, but if every game were like this AMD would in a better position than where they’re going to be with this first phase of frame pacing.
The graphical representation of our FCAT data neatly matches our numeric analysis, once again showcasing AMD’s improved frame pacing, while showing how much farther they have to go to catch NVIDIA.
Finally this is another case where improving on the frame pacing situation by so much has greatly improved on 95th percentile times. Though 7990 still trails GTX 690, as you’d expect given the latter’s general performance lead.
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Feellia - Friday, August 2, 2013 - link
Not aimed at anyone, but flat out in any competitive game play the kind that has tourneys and pays out cash, Mostly fps such as quake..etc everyone has vsync off it flat out adds input lag...all the pros turn it off no matter what monitor is used, but no one is running a SLI/CrossfFire set up during these events.The pros typically lower settings quite damn low so they can push a steady 125fps and screen tearing is absolutely no concern. And if i have vsync on my aim % takes a nearly 25% dip
Anyway this is review is about duel+ cards, and kudos to AMD even though they still need a bit of work before going on a official non beta release = )
piwo - Friday, August 2, 2013 - link
can you check a10- 5750m with hd6670?dew111 - Friday, August 2, 2013 - link
I just got a second HD 7950, and this driver makes a HUGE difference! They should have done this earlier, but their timing was great for my first CrossFire setup :PJamesWoods - Sunday, August 4, 2013 - link
It's a crying shame they won't jump back to HD 4000 series or even HD 3000 series and fix these problems. I'm sure there is still quite a large loyal fanbase using these cards. I happen to own several systems with HD 4850's in them, and they can still set pace on a lot of modern games. Crossfire is another story. They never really felt optimized running in X fire.medi02 - Tuesday, August 6, 2013 - link
Is it me, or does nVidia have much lower min fps on a number of charts? =)transphasic - Tuesday, August 6, 2013 - link
Well done, AMD! You didn't bother to do anything about creating fixes for the single GPU setup, and basically ignored those w/o CF setups.You had 2 1/2 months without any new driver fixes, and THIS is the BEST you can do?
Major fail once again.
Thanks for nothing....
medi02 - Wednesday, August 7, 2013 - link
Exactly which single GPU setup is giving you micro stuttering problem?usrevenge - Wednesday, August 7, 2013 - link
Basically, AMD did a lot to fix the problems, but still leaves a lot of work to be done. I call these drivers a success.Nearox - Monday, August 26, 2013 - link
Does this technology also apply to the HD6000 series (and in particular the HD6950)? Could anyone say if this will also work for Skyrim? Thinking about getting a 2nd hand hd6950 to go xfire with this, seeing the good results from this AnandTech test.lopper - Wednesday, August 28, 2013 - link
A question: Does this driver fix stuttering on dual graphics configurations like A10 +6670?