As I did in the last couple of months, benchmarking current and former versions of AMD Catalyst, here is the newest one: AMD Catalyst 11.7 vs 11.8.
Before we get started let’s take a look at 11.8′s newest features and performance improvements:
New Features
- AMD Overdrive has been enhanced to include both CPU and GPU over-clocking controls within the AMD Vision Control Center
- CPU over-clocking is only supported on AMD Black edition CPUs
Performance Highlights
- Improves performance up to 10% in Crysis 2 DirectX 11 version for both non-Anti-Aliasing, and application enabled Anti-Aliasing cases on the AMD Radeon™ HD 6000 and AMD Radeon™ HD 5000 Series
- Improves performance up to 8% in Fear 3 DirectX 11 version with application enabled Anti-Aliasing on the
AMD Radeon™ HD 6000 and AMD Radeon™ HD 5000 Series - Improves performance up to 30% when AMD’s Morphological Anti-Aliasing (MLAA) is enabled through the
Catalyst™ Control Center on the AMD Radeon™ HD 6000 and AMD Radeon™ HD 5000 Series - Improves performance up to 20% in Call of Duty Black Operations for single GPU and Multi-GPU configurations on the AMD Radeon™ HD 6000 and AMD Radeon™ HD 5000 Series
Read the complete AMD Catalyst 11.8 Release Notes.
Thew new AMD Catalyst let’s you overclock your Black Edition AMD CPU right from the AMD Overdrive section. Also improves performance in games like: Crysis 2, Black Ops and FEAR 3.
So here is the complete list and the settings used for each game and mode included in this benchmark:
- Aliens vs Predator: Very High Settings @ 1680×1050 – 16xAF – 4xAA – DirectX 11
- Bad Company 2: Highest Settings @ 1680×1050 – 16xAA – 1xAA for DirectX 9 and 8xMSAA for Direct X11
- Call of Juarez: High Details @ 1680×1050 – DirectX 10
- Crysis 2: Ultra Settings @ 1680 x 1050 for both Direct X9 and DirectX 11
- DiRT 3: Highest Settings @ 1680×1050 – 8xMSAA for both Direct X9 and DirectX 11
- Formula 1 2010: Settings Maxed Out @ 1680×1050 – 8xMSAA for both Direct X9 and Direct X11
- H.A.W.X. 2: High Settings @ 1680×1050 – 8xAA for both Direct X9 and DirectX 11
- Metro 2033: Very High Settings @ 1680×1050 – 16xAF – No AA for DirectX9 and 4xMSAA for DirectX 10 and DirectX 11
| Test Hardware | AMD Catalyst 11.7 vs 11.8 | |
|---|---|
| Processor |
Intel Core i5-2500K (Sandy Bridge) 3.3 GHz, 6 MB L3 Cache, power-saving settings disabled, Turbo Boost disabled. |
| Motherboard | MSI P67-C43-B3, Intel P67 Chipset |
| Memory | 2 x 2 GB DDR3 1600MHZ |
| Hard Drive | WD 500 GB SATA III |
| Graphics Card | Sapphire HD6950 1 GB |
| Power Supply | Corsair TX 650 W |
| System Software And Drivers | |
| Operating System | Windows 7 SP1 x64 |
| DirectX | DirectX9 | DirectX 10 | DirectX 11 |
| Graphics Driver | AMD Catalyst 11.7 WHQL | AMD Catalyst 11.8 WHQL |
Here is the graph comparing AMD Catalyst 11.7 to AMD Catalyst 11.8:
To better understand the performance differences between the two driver versions here is a detailed list of the performance gained or lost by AMD Catalyst 11.8 against AMD Catalyst 11.7 in percentages:
|
GAME |
Performance Gained or Lost by AMD Catalyst 11.8 from AMD Catalyst 11.7 |
|---|---|
|
Aliens vs Predator DirectX 11 |
0 % |
|
Bad Company 2 DirectX 9 |
0 % |
|
Bad Company 2 DirectX 11 |
- 1.2 % |
|
Call of Juarez DirectX 10 |
- 3.5 % |
|
Crysis 2 DirectX 9 |
- 2 % |
|
Crysis 2 DirectX 11 |
0 % |
|
DiRT 3 DirectX 9 |
+ 1 % |
|
DiRT 3 DirectX 11 |
0 % |
|
Formula 1 2010 DirectX 9 |
+ 2.8 % |
|
Formula 1 2010 DirectX 11 |
+ 1.3 % |
|
H.A.W.X. 2 DirectX 9 |
+ 1.4 % |
|
H.A.W.X. 2 DirectX 11 |
0 % |
|
Metro 2033 DirectX 9 |
0 % |
|
Metro 2033 DirectX 10 |
0 % |
|
Metro 2033 DirectX 11 |
+ 2.7 % |
Despite the fact that former Catalyst version (11.7) brought an additional 5% in performance from 11.6, AMD Catalyst 11.8 doesn’t bring a lot of performance from AMD Catalyst 11.7, it actually losses performance in games like: Call of Juarez, Battlefield Bad Company 2 and Crysis 2.
AMD Catalyst 11.8 only improves performance by 0.2% over Catalyst 11.7. This is a bit disappointing but I guess it’s a step forward for AMD, a small one.
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