Catalyst drivers and UT2004, Doom3, Q4?

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SkaarjMaster

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I was sure I had started a thread on this a few to several months ago, but I can't find it. I was just wondering what would be the best catalyst drivers for these 3 games (obviously, mostly concerned about UT2004)? Presently I'm running the 5.8 catalyst drivers with CP and NOT CCC and they seem to be running fine. I'm even open to trying some Omega drivers (6.7 seem to be latest available). Anyone have any comments or stories of their experiences to help me out? Thank you. Here are my abbreviated specs from my sig below:

WinXP SP2
P4 3.2GHz CPU
Asus P4P800-Deluxe MB
2GB Corsair XMS PC3200 RAM
Sapphire ATI Radeon 9800Pro 256MB w/ VGA silencer
SB Audigy2 OEM sound card hooked up for 5.1 surround sound
Enermax 550W PSU

I'm looking at some of the reviews of the Catalyst drivers at Tweaktown and ATI driver release notes and without looking at the release notes in huge detail, it looks like the best Catalyst drivers for me right now are going to be the 6.5s or 6.6s as these provide the best performance gains in UT2004 over previous drivers. For Doom3/Q4, it's the same story and these also have performance hits with the 6.7s and 6.8s.

I've also checked around for the Catalyst/ZeroPoint/NGO/Omega comparisons and all I could find was something in 2005 (nbsgaming) suggesting NGO was the best overall, Zeropoint or NGO was the best for DX games and Omega the best for OpenGL games. I have no idea how this applies now though. It's looking like the best candidate for me now though might be the NGO Ultra 6.5 or 6.6 drivers. Yes, I'll be playing UT2004 most of time, but still will be playing some OpenGL games like Doom3/Q4/UT. After looking at the Tweaktown results again, maybe I do want some version of the 6.8 drivers? Anyone have any comments on this?
 
OK, so it's looking like the 6.8s. I know some aren't out yet, but which one would you recommend the Zeropoint, NGO or Omega and why? Thank you.
 
I'm using the 6.6's right now with my 1900xt and the 6.8's with my 9800xt. The xt is on my server but seems to work great on desktop. I use a modified set that uses the old atitool instead of the ati CC or CCC. I suggest you head on over to Guru3d and read the forums there re: ati drivers. UT2k4...will there ever be another game that has kept me interested for so long? <{CTC}>SalChicha is what I go by...look for some cool folks on the HOG VCTF server, as well at (ftf) and Fat Jimmy's. Frag on bro! I can't remember the name of the set I'm using, sorry!
 
From what I've read it looks like ATI Tray Tools are wrapped up in the Omega drivers, so that's probably what you're using. I know what the differences are between the ZeroPoint, Omega and NGO drivers a year ago. I'm just trying to find out if that still applies today and what the best would be for me. The ZP 6.8 CCC drivers are out now, so I think I may wait for the ZP 6.8 CP, Omega 6.8s and NGO 6.8s and see how it all shakes down. As you can tell I'm in no hurry to upgrade and may leave whatever I install on with this video card for the duration. :D
 
Well, I still haven't upgraded from the 5.8 cats. I'm definitely leaning towards the NGO 6.6s or NGO 6.12s though. What do you guys think for my system (sig) and games in the thread title? Thank you.
 
All right, based on this thread, other threads in this forum and similar threads in other forums, I've finally decided to upgrade from my 5.8s to either NGO or ZeroPoint 6.6s. There was a thread somewhere in the Guru3d forums that said the ZeroPoint might be best with my video card, so I'm throwing the ZeroPoint back into the mix again. For my card and games, do you guys think NGO or ZeroPoint?:)
 
Bro, Guru3D has the best info on these matters. And if you don't like the new drivers, then uninstall them and try a dif set. It really isn't as big a deal as you make it sound.
Go for it!
 
Yes, it is a big deal because the last time I installed new video drivers my pagefile got fragmented and PageDefrag could not even fix it. I would prefer this to not happen again. Also, I'm only installing one more video driver set with this video card. In other words, whatever I install will be the last driver this video card will ever see. I would also prefer not to reinstall Windows XP at this point either. I will probably have to reinstall at least one more time, but don't want to right now. Thank you.

Um, just saw that no ZeroPoint 6.6s exist, so that makes the decision easy........NGO 6.6s it is!
 
OK, it's been almost 6 months since my last post in this thread and I finally upgraded to the NGO Ultra 6.6 drivers today! Here are the results:

ATI Catalyst 5.8 (driver only with ATI control panel):

UMark (DM-Forbidden, 1280x1024, 12 bots, current settings incl. 2xAA,4xAF)
min >> 4.255326
avg >> 40.037739
max >> 123.191775
score >> 40.088936

3DMark2001SE (1280x960,2xAA,4xAF) >> 11,719
3DMark2003 >> 4,190
AquaMark3 >> 42,702 score (42.70 avg. FPS)

NGO Ultra 6.6 drivers (WDM with ATI control panel):

UMark (as above)
min >> 4.460111
avg >> 41.928104
max >> 125.690750
score >> 41.981968

3DMark2001SE (as above) >> 11,706
3DMark2003 >> 4,208
AquaMark3 >> 42,669 score (42.67 avg. FPS)

Not much of a change and the important benchmark for me is the UMark (for UT2004 of course) and it's slightly higher, so that's good. I don't pay for benchmark programs, so those are the only ones I ran. I probably should have run a Doom3 and Quake4 one also, but I forgot and it's too late. Knowing that those tweaks are there and should make both those games faster is fine with me. I'll stick with these for the life of the card. See Ya!
 
until ATI fixes AA/AF not being retained with official 7.4+ im sticking with teh 7.4 beta that came out briefly at the 2900 launch.
 
Exactly what does that mean? I wasn't too worried about it since my next card was supposed to be Nvidia, but it looks like an X2 for me this time so now I'm concerned.
 
Wow, old thread....

I don't have any problems with my X2 not retaining my CCC settings (Catalyst 8.1).
 
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