{"id":39095,"date":"2013-10-25T04:22:06","date_gmt":"2013-10-25T03:22:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/?p=39095"},"modified":"2013-11-03T18:48:07","modified_gmt":"2013-11-03T18:48:07","slug":"catalyst-13-11-beta-performance-analysis-versus-geforce-331-58","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/catalyst-13-11-beta-performance-analysis-versus-geforce-331-58\/","title":{"rendered":"Catalyst 13.11 Beta Performance Analysis versus GeForce 331.58"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\">As part of a regular feature for AlienBabelTech and since we are benching for an upcoming VisionTek R9 280X evaluation, we are charting the performance of 30 games with AMD&#8217;s latest <a href=\"http:\/\/support.amd.com\/en-us\/kb-articles\/Pages\/latest-catalyst-windows-beta.aspx\" onclick=\"_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http:\/\/support.amd.com\/en-us\/kb-articles\/Pages\/latest-catalyst-windows-beta.aspx', 'Beta 13.11']);\" >Beta 13.11<\/a> Catalyst driver using a single HD 7970. We will compare HD 7970 single-GPU performance versus the previous Catalyst 13.9 WHQL driver and also versus the latest <a href=\"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/geforce-whql-331-58-performance-analysis\/\">GeForce 331.58<\/a> WHQL drivers using GTX 770\/780.<\/p>\n<p>This driver performance evaluation will give a natural comparison between the driver performance improvements for the GTX 770 and GTX 780 versus the HD 7970, and also versus the HD 7970 at GHz Edition speeds. Both sets of drivers were released quite recently.\u00a0 This is an important time for Nvidia and AMD to showcase their best driver improvements as AMD has just released their new flagship, the R9 290X.<a href=\"http:\/\/i1.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-39097\" alt=\"MaxPayne3\" src=\"http:\/\/i1.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3.jpg?resize=300%2C168\" srcset=\"http:\/\/i1.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3.jpg?resize=300%2C168 300w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3-150x84.jpg 150w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3-1024x576.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/MaxPayne3.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We are going to test Catalyst 13.9 WHQL and 13.11 Beta versus GeForce 331.58 WHQL using our current benchmark suite of 30 games plus 4 synthetic benchmarks &#8211; FireStrike<em>, Heaven 4.0<\/em>, 3DMark 11, and Valley. Our testing platform is Windows 7 64-bit, using Intel Core i7-3770K at 4.50GHz, EVGA Z77FTW motherboard and 16GB Kingston &#8220;Beast&#8221; DD3 at 2133MHz, and the settings and hardware are identical except for the video cards.<\/p>\n<p>The HD 7970 and the GTX 770\/780 are tested at higher settings and resolutions generally than we test the midrange cards as noted on the chart. All of our games are tested at two resolutions: 2560&#215;1600 and 1920&#215;1080, and we use DX11\/10\/10.1 whenever possible with an emphasis on DX11 games.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s get right to the test configuration, the driver release notes and the tests.<\/p>\n<p><!--pagetitle: Introduction--><!--nextpage--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><span style=\"font-size: large;\"><strong>Test Configuration &amp; Driver Release Notes<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><span style=\"color: #ffff00;\"><strong><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Test Configuration &#8211; Hardware<\/span> <\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Intel Core i7 3770K (overclocked to 4.5GHz); Turbo is on.\u00a0 Supplied by Intel.<\/li>\n<li>EVGA Z77 FTW motherboard (Intel Z77 chipset, latest beta 03-12-13 BIOS, PCIe 3.0 specification; CrossFire\/SLI 16x+16x using Plex chip.) Supplied by EVGA.<\/li>\n<li>16GB Kingston Beast HyperX DDR3 Kingston RAM (8x2GB, dual-channel at 2133MHz; supplied by Kingston)<\/li>\n<li>Noctua NH-DH14 CPU cooler, supplied by Noctua plus 7 case fans.<\/li>\n<li>EVGA GeForce 780, 3GB, reference design and clocks, on loan from EVGA.<\/li>\n<li>Nvidia GTX 770 (2GB, reference design and clocks), supplied by Nvidia<\/li>\n<li>PowerColor HD 7970 3GB at stock clocks (925\/1375MHz) and at GHz Edition Boost speeds (1050\/1500MHz)<\/li>\n<li>Onboard Realtek Audio<\/li>\n<li>Genius SP-D150 notebook speakers, supplied by Genius<\/li>\n<li>Two identical 500GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 hard drives configured and set up identically from drive image; one drive for Nvidia GeForce drivers and one for ATI Catalyst drivers<\/li>\n<li>Two 240GB Kingston HyperX SSDs; supplied by Kingston. Both SSDs configured and set up identically from drive image; one drive for Nvidia GeForce drivers and one for ATI Catalyst drivers..<\/li>\n<li>Cooler Master Platinum Pro 1000W PSU, supplied by Cooler Master<\/li>\n<li>Thermaltake Overseer RX-I full tower case, supplied by Thermaltake<\/li>\n<li>Philips DVD SATA writer<\/li>\n<li>HP LP3065 2560&#215;1600 thirty inch LCD<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-size: medium; color: #000000;\"><strong>Test Configuration &#8211; Software<\/strong> <\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nvidia GeForce WHQL 331.58 an WHQL 327.23 High Quality; Single-display Performance mode; Prefer Maximum Performance<\/li>\n<li>AMD Catalyst 13.9 WHQL and 13.11 beta drivers. All optimizations off (Use application settings); High Quality<\/li>\n<li>Windows 7 64-bit; very latest updates<\/li>\n<li>Latest DirectX<\/li>\n<li>All games are patched to their latest versions.<\/li>\n<li>Vsync is forced off in the control panels.<\/li>\n<li>Varying AA enabled as noted in games; all in-game settings are specified with 16xAF always applied; 16xAF forced in control panel for <em>Crysis<\/em>.<\/li>\n<li>All results show average frame rates<\/li>\n<li>Highest quality sound (stereo) used in all games.<\/li>\n<li>Windows 7 64, all DX9 titles were run under DX9 render paths, DX10 titles were run under DX10 render paths and DX11 titles under DX11 render paths.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><strong>The Benchmarks<\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Synthetic<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>FireStrike (and FireStrike Extreme)<\/li>\n<li>3DMark 11<em><\/em><\/li>\n<li>Heaven 4.0<\/li>\n<li>Valley 1.0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><strong>DX9 <\/strong><\/div>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Serious Sam 3 BFE<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Alan Wake: Ameican Nightmare<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>The Witcher 2<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Borderlands 2<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Aliens: Colonial Marines<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><strong>DX10<\/strong><\/div>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Crysis<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><strong>DX11<\/strong><\/div>\n<ul>\n<li><em>BattleForge<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Alien vs. Predator<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>STALKER, Call of Pripyat<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Metro 2033<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em><\/em><em>Lost Planet 2<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Civilization V<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Total War: Shogun II<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em><\/em><em>Crysis 2<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>DiRT 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em><\/em><em>DiRT: ShowDown<br \/>\n<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em><\/em><em>Batman: Arkham City<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Battlefield 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Max Payne 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>the Secret World<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Sleeping Dogs<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Sniper Elite V2<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Hitman: Absolution<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Far Cry 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Tomb Raider: 2013<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Assassin&#8217;s Creed 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Crysis 3<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>BioShock: Infinite<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Metro: Last Light<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>GRID 2<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Lets look at the release notes from AMD regarding the Catalyst 13.11 beta before we head to performance testing.\u00a0 Driver release notes and the performance analysis of GeForce 331.58 WHQL drivers can be found <a href=\"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/geforce-whql-331-58-performance-analysis\/\">here<\/a>.\u00a0 However, first up, the <a href=\"http:\/\/support.amd.com\/en-us\/kb-articles\/Pages\/latest-catalyst-windows-beta.aspx\" onclick=\"_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http:\/\/support.amd.com\/en-us\/kb-articles\/Pages\/latest-catalyst-windows-beta.aspx', 'release notes']);\" >release notes<\/a> from AMD regarding Catalyst 13.11 Beta drivers.<\/p>\n<p>Always start <a href=\"http:\/\/support.amd.com\/us\/gpudownload\/Pages\/index.aspx\" onclick=\"_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http:\/\/support.amd.com\/us\/gpudownload\/Pages\/index.aspx', 'here']);\" >here<\/a> to download AMD graphics drivers.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Feature Highlights of The AMD Catalyst 13.11 Beta Driver for Windows<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Includes support for the new products:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>AMD Radeon\u2122 R9 280X<\/li>\n<li>AMD Radeon R9 270X<\/li>\n<li>AMD Radeon R7 260X<\/li>\n<li>AMD Radeon R7 250<\/li>\n<li>AMD Radeon R7 240<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Performance improvements for the AMD Radeon HD 7000 Series\u00a0in the following games:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Total War\u2122: Rome 2 &#8211; improves performance up to 10%<\/li>\n<li>Splinter Cell\u00ae Blacklist\u2122 &#8211; improves performance up to 7% on single GPU and AMD CrossFire\u2122 configurations<\/li>\n<li>The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim\u00ae &#8211; improves performance up to 9%<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Compatible Operating Systems<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The AMD Catalyst 13.11 Beta Driver for Windows is designed to support the following Microsoft Windows platforms:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Windows 8.1 (32 &amp; 64-bit version)<\/li>\n<li>Windows 8 (32 &amp; 64-bit version)<\/li>\n<li>Windows 7 (32 &amp; 64-bit version with SP1 or higher)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Installing The AMD Catalyst Software Driver<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>For additional information and general help on the software driver installation, game issues and more visit, <a href=\"http:\/\/support.amd.com\/us\/Pages\/AMDSupportHub.aspx\" onclick=\"_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http:\/\/support.amd.com\/us\/Pages\/AMDSupportHub.aspx', 'AMD Support']);\" target=\"_blank\">AMD Support<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s head to the charts and see the performance comparison in 30 games and in 4 synthetics since we recently tested the GTX 770 versus the VisionTek HD <a href=\"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/visionteks-hd-7970-brings-solid-value-gaming\/\">reference HD 7970<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><!--pagetitle: Test Configuration--><!--nextpage--><\/p>\n<p><!--pagetitle: Summary Chart &amp; Conclusion--><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Benchmarks and Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Here are the results of thirty-four benchmarks &#8211; thirty games and four synthetics &#8211; compared between Catalyst 13.11 beta versus the previous 13.9 WHQL, and also against the latest GeForce WHQL 331.58 drivers.\u00a0 The HD 7970 at GHz Edition speeds results are only shown with Catalyst 13.11 Beta; the last time we tested was with Catalyst 13.8 Beta 2 in the VisionTek HD <a href=\"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/visionteks-hd-7970-brings-solid-value-gaming\/\">7970 evaluation<\/a>.\u00a0 Catalyst 13.8 Beta 2 is a newer release than the 13.9 WHQLs and appears to have most of the performance improvements of the latest 13.11 Beta.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">&#8220;Wins&#8221; between the two Catalyst driver sets are in <strong>bold<\/strong>; if there is a tie, both results will be in bold type. The GeForce results are not bolded.\u00a0 Column one is the HD 7970 tested with the older Catalyst 13.9 WHQL versus Column Two with the Catalyst 13.11 Beta drivers.\u00a0 Column 3 shows the HD 7970 at GHz Edition speeds for reference with the latest Catalyst 13.11 betas, but it was not benched with the last 13.9 WHQL drivers.\u00a0 Columns 4 and 5 show the reference GTX 770 results of the last WHQL drivers while Columns 6 and 7 show the reference GTX 780 performance.<a href=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Main-Chart-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter  wp-image-39098\" alt=\"Main-Chart-1\" src=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Main-Chart-1.jpg?resize=720%2C1264\" srcset=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Main-Chart-1.jpg?resize=720%2C1264 844w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Main-Chart-1-85x150.jpg 85w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Main-Chart-1-583x1024.jpg 583w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 760px) 100vw, 760px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We note performance improvements with Catalyst 13.11 beta in more than a few games although we did not see quite the 7% improvement in <em>Splinter Cell: Blacklist<\/em> that AMD noted. We also note steady increases overall in the past few driver releases from both AMD and Nvidia. We also find that the newest GeForce driver also brought good performance gains and recommend that you download and upgrade to the very latest drivers no matter which video card you may have!<a href=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/tSW.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-39102\" alt=\"tSW\" src=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/tSW.jpg?resize=300%2C187\" srcset=\"http:\/\/i2.wp.com\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/tSW.jpg?resize=300%2C187 300w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/tSW-150x93.jpg 150w, http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/tSW-1024x640.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The only caveat would be if you regularly play <em>Battleforge<\/em> with a HD 7970 It has been unplayable for several sets of drivers and although it has improved, there are still issues.\u00a0 At any rate, the Battleforge server is being closed down by EA and we will discontinue benching it.\u00a0 <em>Hitman: Absolution<\/em> had issues with running the benchmark at any speed with a HD 7970, and sometimes no results were generated.<\/p>\n<p>Also, do not forget to download and install the Catalyst Application Profiles (CAP) if applicable to your PC.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>To sum it up, we would recommend upgrading to either of these latest drivers because there are real advantages, and the pluses that we found outweigh the rare few negatives. AMD&#8217;s driver team has made some decent improvements for single-GPU performance with their now former AMD flagship HD 7970 just as Nvidia has for the GTX 780 and GTX 770.<\/p>\n<p>We also give our recommendation to the latest GeForce 331.58 WHQL drivers. In most cases they provide performance increases with no real negatives that we have encountered. We&#8217;ll be back to expand this testing to multi-GPU and as newer drivers are released.<\/p>\n<p>In the meantime, check <a href=\"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/abt\/index.php\">ABT&#8217;s forum<\/a> for the best tech discussions anywhere. You can expect an evaluation of Genius KB-G265 &#8211; a $40<em> gaming<\/em> keyboard! &#8211; by tomorrow night. Immediately afterward, we will begin evaluating the new VisionTek R9 280X and will have a reference EVGA GTX 780 evaluation for you next week which will also cover GTX 780 SLI scaling.\u00a0 And we are still building our Haswell box and will be able to shortly showcase Core i7-4770K versus i7-3770K in gaming.<\/p>\n<p>Happy gaming!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As part of a regular feature for AlienBabelTech and since we are benching for an upcoming VisionTek R9 280X evaluation, we are charting the performance of 30 games with AMD&#8217;s latest Beta 13.11 Catalyst&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":39097,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7814,4454],"tags":[72,1850,7160,7174,7159,6883,6661,7175,5012,121,3338],"class_list":["post-39095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","category-mini-reviews","tag-amd","tag-benchmarks","tag-catalyst-13-9-whql","tag-catalyt-13-11-beta","tag-geforce-327-23","tag-ghz-edition","tag-gtx-770","tag-gtx-780-geforce-331-58","tag-hd-7970","tag-nvidia","tag-performance-analysis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/alienbabeltech.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}