Just letting everyone know that new ATI drivers have been rolled out across the board. I will be giving them ago this evening and will post about my experience. I am currently running tray tools, but will revert to catalyst for this install, if no gains, will go back to tray tools...etc...danon -

>Just letting everyone know that new ATI drivers have been>rolled out across the board. I will be giving them ago this>evening and will post about my experience. I am currently>running tray tools, but will revert to catalyst for this>install, if no gains, will go back to tray tools...etc...>>danon -Thanks for the heads up! I just tried them on my X1950 Crossfires! The CCC is completely new, it is suppose to take less resources, but it is also very unstable! It crashes on a whim. The drivers themselves seem to be fairly stable. (Atleast so far) The only issue I had is a problem that all the previous drivers also had in FSX. That is the Catalst AI in xfire mode would cause frames to drop to single digits on load of FSX and in some cases cause corruption of graphics. This isn't a problem with it off. All previous drivers have been unstable in FSX, causing stop errors which if VPU is on will sometimes correct itself, but I usually keep it of, as it seems to cause more problems then it solves. In which case when an error does occur system will reboot. with a Stuck in driver error. I had this issue on the last system that had an ATI card (a X800XT), so I don't think the issue is hardware. ATI drivers have always been unstable, especially is FS (both FS9 and FSX). Nvidia drivers never gave me any trouble. I don't know why I went with ATI again, but I can't complain about the speed of these cards!! So far these drivers haven't caused any stop errors, so knock on wood, maybe they fixed the problem, as they seemed to have substantially made significant changes to the suite!!

Well, no perfomance gains at least on my system. I ran CCC and reverted once again to Tray Tools after noticing some stuttering. Oh well, guess I will just wait for the patch.danon -

Well I gave up on the CCC, and went back to Tray Tools. The thing I need the CCC for is to set xfire mode so I can use the greater AA settings. Tray Tools don't support Xfire. The driver seems to be more stable than previous drivers, so I guess I'll just live without Xfire for a while, until they fix the CCC. Not a big deal!

Well that didn't work! Word of warning! If you intend to use the 7.2 drivers with Tray Tools! They don't appear to be compatible. Settings don't hold though a reboot. They revert back to factory default. So I'm back to 7.1 for now!!

Ver 7.1 did not do anything good for my sys either (His 9800 pro iceq). I went back to 6.12, installed an old controlpanel, with no fancy and no eating recources. Then to my surprice, winupdate reports a hardware update from ati/amd called 6.14 for 9800 pro.That made a different, i can tell you.....

I have had zero problem with any Ati driver since they started releasing and refining the Catalyst series. I have used the drivers on the following cards in the last few years, all with FS9 and the X1900 in FSX. 9800 Pro, X800XL and now an X1900GT. No problems and certainly no crashes due to video card drivers.To say Ati drivers are unstable may have been true back in 2001 or so, but I think you will find many Ati users here that are happy with either a combination of the driver and tray tools or the driver and the CCC.I think you will find nvidia's recent drivers leave a lot to be desired also.........Glenn

"or the driver and the CCC."I know i'm quoting you short Glenn, but you are so right with this.The combination of driver and controlpanels today from ati/amd, is asking you to DL it all. You dont have to.Get the display driver down. Remove the old one, and install the new, and then keep your old CP.

>I have had zero problem with any Ati driver since they>started releasing and refining the Catalyst series. I have>used the drivers on the following cards in the last few years,>all with FS9 and the X1900 in FSX. 9800 Pro, X800XL and now an>X1900GT. No problems and certainly no crashes due to video>card drivers.>>To say Ati drivers are unstable may have been true back in>2001 or so, but I think you will find many Ati users here that>are happy with either a combination of the driver and tray>tools or the driver and the CCC.>>I think you will find nvidia's recent drivers leave a lot to>be desired also.........>>Glenn>>Well according to the release notes, the 7.2 drivers are not compatible with the X1950XT cards in Vista. Reading the posts in Guru3D.com they don't seem to work in XP either, so that is probably my problem (My card s are X1950 crossfire and a X1950 XTX card. (Gateway FX530XG system!). I've also read about other stability issues with these cards. May have something to do with these cards using DDR4 memory, As I think that's the only difference between them and a standard x1950 series card like the pro that still uses DDR3 memory. 7.1 seems to run fairly good if I stay out of xfire mode. Not a problem in FS since except for the higher level of AA there isn't much benefit for it anyway.

I think you will find many Ati users here that are happy with either a combination of the driver and tray tools...yep, 7.1 Cats and ATT (Ray Adams) 1.2.6.964 here and solid as a rock :)I did have problems with the Omega variants this time around, but after a thorough cleanout I decided instead to try the WHQL release from ATI and have not regretted the change.I'm not saying anything was wrong with the Omegas but, for some reason, I could not get the GART to work after driver installation and this was despite repeated reinstallations of the AGP chipset drivers. In the end I ditched my AGP card in favour of a PCI-E upgrade. I did not try the AGP X800XL with the Omegas - it just seemed like a good excuse to upgrade..LOL!I think I'll pass on the 7.2s as I doubt whether they will offer more than I'm getting at present.MikeASRock 939Dual-SATA2, AMD Athlon 64X2 4800+ (2400MHz)(Toledo), 2GB Crucial PC3200 DDR400 Ram 3-3-3-8 (2T)(Dual Channel), (PCI-E)Sapphire ATI Radeon X1950 Pro 512MB (Catalyst 7.1 WHQL), Hyundai ImageQuest Q17 17" TFT LCD 20ms Digital Monitor (1280x1024x32), SB Audigy2 ZS Platinum (Drivers version 5.12.0001.1196 WHQL), WD Caviar SE16 250GB (WD2500KS) SATAII + Hitachi Deskstar T7K500 ATA133 UDMA-6 (320 GB), ASUS DRW-1608P2S Optical Drive, Antec P150 case with NeoHE 430W PSU, CH Products USB Yoke, Pedals and Fighterstick, Plantronics Headset and Mike combo, TrackIR Pro ver. 4.1 (build 29), Logitech MX1000 Laser Mouse, Windows XP Home Edition (SP2), DirectX 9.0c

Silly question regarding updating ATI Drivers. I was reading the install instructions on their website and it recommends uninstalling the old software (all ATI entries and DAO) and then installing the catalyst suite. Why can't you download the newer suite and just install over the existing one?I have version 7.1, but upgraded that from 6.12 without the "recommended" method from ATI. Just wondering if that is causing any damage that I'm unaware of. I've also downloaded Tray Tools but haven't installed yet. From an earlier post it's doesn't sound like it will work with 7.2. What advantages does Tray Tools give that CCC doesn't?Thanks,ChrisATI Radeon X1300 Pro

>>I have had zero problem with any Ati driver since they>>started releasing and refining the Catalyst series. I have>>used the drivers on the following cards in the last few>years,>>all with FS9 and the X1900 in FSX. 9800 Pro, X800XL and now>an>>X1900GT. No problems and certainly no crashes due to video>>card drivers.>>>>To say Ati drivers are unstable may have been true back in>>2001 or so, but I think you will find many Ati users here>that>>are happy with either a combination of the driver and tray>>tools or the driver and the CCC.>>>>I think you will find nvidia's recent drivers leave a lot to>>be desired also.........>>>>Glenn>>>>>>Well according to the release notes, the 7.2 drivers are not>compatible with the X1950XT cards in Vista. Reading the posts>in Guru3D.com they don't seem to work in XP either, so that is>probably my problem (My card s are X1950 crossfire and a X1950>XTX card. (Gateway FX530XG system!). I've also read about>other stability issues with these cards. May have something to>do with these cards using DDR4 memory, As I think that's the>only difference between them and a standard x1950 series card>like the pro that still uses DDR3 memory. 7.1 seems to run>fairly good if I stay out of xfire mode. Not a problem in FS>since except for the higher level of AA there isn't much>benefit for it anyway. >Aha! Yes, you are right. I remember reading that in the install notes now.Hopefully they will address your problem with an update. I have to say though that if I had to choose a multi GPU solution it would be SLi. Crossfire doesn't seem to have quite got there yet. Maybe I'm being unfair?Glenn

>>Aha! Yes, you are right. I remember reading that in the>install notes now.>>Hopefully they will address your problem with an update. I>have to say though that if I had to choose a multi GPU>solution it would be SLi. Crossfire doesn't seem to have quite>got there yet. Maybe I'm being unfair?>>Glenn>Well I don't have any apps that take advantage of either! FS is it. Quite frankly I didn't order xfire when I bought my system. My original system was a Gateway FX510XL which was a E6600 2GB a single X1900XTX. That system had to be returned cause of a HW issue causing the CPU to clock at 1/2 speed (1.2 Ghz). It took a month, but I finally got their tech support to agree the problem was H/W. For some reason, I guess it was a matter of good will, they upgraded me to a FX530XG with a E6700, 2GB and Dual ATI X1950 Xfires. Just lucky I guess!!

Wow, Very lucky!!!!Let's hope ATi get the crossfire teething troubles ironed out.Glenn

Hi Chris,In general it's regarded as being good practice to uninstall previous driver sets before updating. Having said that, Omega has always said that its not really necessary if you are updating, say, within the 7.x series driver sets (this probably applies to ATI's official WHQL drivers as well). However, you are changing from a 6.x series to a 7.x series where there have probably been significant changes made to the drivers. If the previous set has not been completely removed then problems may arise manifesting as apparent system instabilities. I know, I've been there :(As indicated in my original post, I experienced problems with the 7.1 Omegas. In addition to the GART problem I was experiencing random blue screens with STOP errors and failing to complete benchmarking programs like 3DMark05,06 and AquaMark 3 without crashes. My previous stable driver set were the Omega 3.8.273_based on the 6.7 Cats. I believe my mistake was to update over the top of these drivers without first cleaning out the old. I was just being lazy on this occasion.... and paid the price in more ways than one!You may well have got away with it. I suggest you try them for a week or so and see how you go.The choice between CCC and ATT is a no brainer for me. CCC is a ridiculous resource hog whereas all the important functionality I need is provided by the much leaner ATT. It's also very easy to use and everything is accessible from the system tray icon.If you decide to follow the ATT route be sure to first uninstall the CCC or you will have problems.After you remove everything via 'Add or Remove Programs' I recommend that you boot into SAFE MODE and perform a final cleanup of all things ATI with 'Driver Cleaner'.Mike