AMD Catalyst 12.1 WHQL and 12.2 Preview Benchmark

Yesterday was a busy day for AMD’s Software/Driver Team, they released this month’s WHQL driver, 12.1 that is. 12.1 WHQL is actually the 8.93 driver released on the 5th of December, it took almost two months from the moment of the leak and the official release. AMD also released 12.2 Preview and recommended it for “gamers”.

Instead of making two articles for each driver, I will mash both drivers together and compare them both to 11.12 WHQL and 8.95 17 Jan (best performing driver to date).

Prior to installing a driver, a sweep was done in safe-mode using Phyxion Driver Sweeper.

All 3 drivers are tested in 3 synthetic benchmarks and 6 games.

• 1. 3DMark06 1.02 Professional Edition - 1680×1050 – 2xAA – Anti Aliasing Quality = 0 – 4xAF – Shader Model 2.0 = Return to Proxycon + Firefly Forest – HDR/Shader Model 3.0 = Canyon Flight + Deep Freeze – 2 Runs.
• 2. Unigine – Heaven Benchmark 2.5 – 1680×1050 – High Shaders – Normal Tessellation(DirectX 11) – 2xAA – 4xAF – 2 Runs.
• 3. Cinebench 11.5 – 3 Runs.
• 4. Crysis 2 1.9 using Adrenaline Benchmark Tool – Extreme Preset – 1680×1050 – 4xAA – Hi-Res Textures – Central Park – 3 Runs.
• 5. Metro 2033 using Update 1.2 Benchmark Tool – Very High Settings – 1680×1050 – 16xAF – No AA for DirectX 9 and 4xMSAA for DirectX 10 and DirectX 11 – 3 Runs.
• 6. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. – Call of Pripyat – 1680×1050 – Extreme Preset (DirectX 9) – Ultra Preset (DirectX 10 & 11)
• 7. DiRT 3 – Ultra Preset – 1680×1050 – 8xMSAA – 3 Runs
• 8. Battlefield 3 – Ultra Preset – 1680×1050 – 4xMSAA – 16xAF – Multiplayer @ Strike at Karkand (32p map, Large Conquest), main street: US Deployment -> B Flag – 3 Runs x 60s.
• 9. Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim v1.3.10 – Ultra Preset – 1680×1050 – 8xAA – 16xAF – Tested in the area East of Rorikstead – 3 Runs x 60s.

All synthetic benchmarks were ran 2 times except Cinebench (3 runs), all games were ran 3 times.

Table of Contents:

Page 1 – Introduction
Page 2 – 3DMark06, Unigine and Cinebench
Page 3 – Crysis 2, Metro 2033 and Call of Pripyat
Page 4 – Battlefield 3, DiRT 3 and Skyrim
Page 5 – Image Quality
Page 6 – Conclusion

Page 2 – 3DMark06, Unigine and Cinebench