AMD Addresses Witcher 3 And Project Cars (Catalyst 15.5 Driver Fix)

[Trik'Stari]

This forum was flooded when GTA V came out and you didn't get annoyed then?

Fair enough.

[bogus]

Because gameworks may not be the issue.  As I said, their could be lots of reasons.  Given that AMD are announcing they are releasing driver updates to optimize the game from their end, it sounds just as likely to be a driver issue as it is anything else.

 

We shall see then, after the release of the drivers.

[Altecice]

What I don't get is who in their right mind sees fit to use NVIDIA Hairworks in Witcher 3 on an AMD card and then complain that it doesn't perform very well? It's an NVIDIA optimized feature, of course it isn't going to work well on an AMD card (just like what happened with TressFX on Tomb Raider.)

 

TresFX was open source and this allowed Nvidia to quickly optimize it to run as well on Nvidia cards as AMD cards, it took them a few weeks. NVIDIA Hairworks is closed source so AMD cannot use the source code to optimize it. This means there is almost 0 hope to get it running 'well' on AMD hardware. I wouldn't be surprised if the driver fix was just x8 maximum tess on a W3 profile.

[mr moose]

TresFX was open source and this allowed Nvidia to quickly optimize it to run as well on Nvidia cards as AMD cards, it took them a few weeks. NVIDIA Hairworks is closed source so AMD cannot use the source code to optimize it. This means there is almost 0 hope to get it running 'well' on AMD hardware. I wouldn't be surprised if the driver fix was just x8 maximum tess on a W3 profile.

 

If the issue is lack of tessellation performance on AMD cards then the issue is not access to hairworks code, as access to that code is not going to increase the tessellation performance of said cards.   An AMD driver fix that merely limits tessellation would indicate this rather than hairworks optimization issues.

[BonSie]

If the issue is lack of tessellation performance on AMD cards then the issue is not access to hairworks code, as access to that code is not going to increase the tessellation performance of said cards.   An AMD driver fix that merely limits tessellation would indicate this rather than hairworks optimization issues.

Depends on how look at it.

If it was NVidia who decided to put it on x64 for no reason, then it would be the fault of nvidia.

Meaning that they did screw over AMD and 700 series owners.

 

If it was CDPR, than they where pretty much stupid.

 

On second note, does this also help P CARS?

I reckon it uses a lot of tessellation.

[mr moose]

Depends on how look at it.

If it was NVidia who decided to put it on x64 for no reason, then it would be the fault of nvidia.

Meaning that they did screw over AMD and 700 series owners.

 

If it was CDPR, than they where pretty much stupid.

 

On second note, does this also help P CARS?

I reckon it uses a lot of tessellation.

 

My point is that it has to be done in one way or another, the way they seem to have done it leverages only the latest GPU's.  because this hampers their older cards it is not logical to assume they did it on purpose to cripple AMD.  And given you can turn hairworks off (the only part of the whole game that seems to cause an issue) it is fair to assume they just considered anyone with a sub par GPU (700 series or below) will just ditch hairworks and get on with playing the game.

[Master Disaster]

Hairworks is based on TressFX, Nvidia ripped off AMDs technology, rewrote it around Maxwell then closed sourced it and released it as their own.

Makes sense if you think about it, why else would they totally block devs from releasing any code to AMD?

[BonSie]

My point is that it has to be done in one way or another, the way they seem to have done it leverages only the latest GPU's.  because this hampers their older cards it is not logical to assume they did it on purpose to cripple AMD.  And given you can turn hairworks off (the only part of the whole game that seems to cause an issue) it is fair to assume they just considered anyone with a sub par GPU (700 series or below) will just ditch hairworks and get on with playing the game.

Problem is that even without hairworks on, 780s and titan still get beating by 960s and 280.

Nvidia is doing something bad.

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/The-Witcher-3-PC-237266/Specials/Grafikkarten-Benchmarks-1159196/

 

Hairworks is based on TressFX, Nvidia ripped off AMDs technology, rewrote it around Maxwell then closed sourced it and released it as their own.

Makes sense if you think about it, why else would they totally block devs from releasing any code to AMD?

I might be mistaken but wasn't Tomb Raider the first game with Tressfx and that one came after COD:Ghost?

[Master Disaster]

Problem is that even without hairworks on, 780s and titan still get beating by 960s and 280.

Nvidia is doing something bad.

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/The-Witcher-3-PC-237266/Specials/Grafikkarten-Benchmarks-1159196/

 

I might be mistaken but wasn't Tomb Raider the first game with Tressfx and that one came after COD:Ghost?

Just to clarify, I wasn't being 100% serious in that post.

Not sure why thats relevant? Ghosts had no HW or TFX did it?

[mr moose]

Problem is that even without hairworks on, 780s and titan still get beating by 960s and 280.

Nvidia is doing something bad.

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/The-Witcher-3-PC-237266/Specials/Grafikkarten-Benchmarks-1159196/

 

I might be mistaken but wasn't Tomb Raider the first game with Tressfx and that one came after COD:Ghost?

 

I don't know what graphs you are reading but without hairworks most reviews show the performance to scale with GPU as most would expect.

Even the one you linked shows the 290x, 285, 970 and titan x all beating the 960.

[BonSie]

Just to clarify, I wasn't being 100% serious in that post.

Not sure why thats relevant? Ghosts had no HW or TFX did it?

Took it as both joke and part serious.

Ghost had HW according to physxinfo

 

I don't know what graphs you are reading but without hairworks most reviews show the performance to scale with GPU as most would expect.

Even the one you linked shows the 290x, 285, 970 and titan x all beating the 960.

I'm implying to the second one, after the frametime chart one.

Here a 780 gets beaten by a 960 and a 285 with both cleaving to a standard titan. 

Both 1080p and 1440p, that shouldn't happen.

[ACatWithThumbs]

Depends on how look at it.

If it was NVidia who decided to put it on x64 for no reason, then it would be the fault of nvidia.

Meaning that they did screw over AMD and 700 series owners.

 

If it was CDPR, than they where pretty much stupid.

 

On second note, does this also help P CARS?

I reckon it uses a lot of tessellation.

I don't think either Nvidia nor CDPR can control the tessellation amount set up in the driver by AMD.

 

I also don't see the problem Hairworks isn't supposed to run on AMD in the first place.

Next I'm going to complain that Mantle isn't running on my GTX670?

 

[mr moose]

Took it as both joke and part serious.

Ghost had HW according to physxinfo

 

I'm implying to the second one, after the frametime chart one.

Here a 780 gets beaten by a 960 and a 285 with both cleaving to a standard titan. 

Both 1080p and 1440p, that shouldn't happen.

even in the second graph there is only one 780 that is doing worse than the 960 and even the 285 is doing better than the 780, so whats your point?  That one 780 being a poor performer = nvidia intentionally crippling cards?

 

EDIT: in fact looking at that second graph the only card that is out of place is the Zotac 960, which depending on settings is within margin because it trades blows with the 780 and given it is supposed to be a 770 rebrand is that really unexpected?

http://www.gamersnexus.net/game-bench/1947-witcher-3-pc-graphics-card-fps-benchmark

[BonSie]

even in the second graph there is only one 780 that is doing worse than the 960 and even the 285 is doing better than the 780, so whats your point?  That one 780 being a poor performer = nvidia intentionally crippling cards?

You find it okay that a 700 dollar card gets beaten 200 dollar card?

 

I don't think either Nvidia nor CDPR can control the tessellation amount set up in the driver by AMD.

 

I also don't see the problem Hairworks isn't supposed to run on AMD in the first place.

Next I'm going to complain that Mantle isn't running on my GTX670?

 

Wasn't it possible to set the amount in an ini file in the game?

 

It would be stupid from a developers point of few to prevent a large userbase from using a feature.

[mr moose]

 

You find it okay that a 700 dollar card gets beaten 200 dollar card?

 

Wasn't it possible to set the amount in an ini file in the game?

 

It would be stupid from a developers point of few to prevent a large userbase from using a feature.

 

 

You find it ok to exaggerate?  Even in Australia the 780 is $400 while the 960 can be upto $370.  Tech moves on, cards get better, prices don't always reflect that. 

[BonSie]

You find it ok to exaggerate?  Even in Australia the 780 is $400 while the 960 can be upto $370.  Tech moves on, cards get better, prices don't always reflect that. 

Not for those who bought em for 700 bucks.

It should not happen on this level.

[Megahurt]

 

 

EDIT: in fact looking at that second graph the only card that is out of place is the Zotac 960, which depending on settings is within margin because it trades blows with the 780 and given it is supposed to be a 770 rebrand is that really unexpected?

http://www.gamersnexus.net/game-bench/1947-witcher-3-pc-graphics-card-fps-benchmark

A 780 isn't a 770 rebadge, it usually performs close to a 970, the 770 is usually faster than a 960. Perfomance seems to be really bad on older than maxwell and amd video cards, which could be your best argument for it being a tessellation performance issue rather than a gameworks/hairworks issue. Still a dick move to cripple anything that isn't maxwell, so the majority of people who will get the game.

[BonSie]

A 780 isn't a 770 rebadge, it usually performs close to a 970, the 770 is usually faster than a 960. Perfomance seems to be really bad on older than maxwell and amd video cards, which could be your best argument for it being a tessellation performance issue rather than a gameworks/hairworks issue. Still a dick move to cripple anything that isn't maxwell, so the majority of people who will get the game.

Tessellation isn't the issue for 700 series as described here, it's also how Hairworks is rendered.

[Memphaestus]

What I find really funny is that I have had zero issue with the game and with Nvidia hairworks. Uber settings and Hairworks enabled on crossfired AMD GPUs; no problems whatsoever. My only complaint is that the combat system is absolutely abysmal, but that's personal preference. Are the people complaining about poor performance trying to run the game on an APU or something or am I just really lucky?

So what driver are you using, because myself and everyone else is getting the exact same performance with Xfire on or off, meaning that it isn't enabled for the game yet.  You should probably double check your fps with something like FRAPS to see what you are really getting, because with Hairworks off, I get mid to high 50's with my 290.  You must have the new AMD Zeus card to be getting better than that with Hairworks on (or using this workaround).

[Me1z]

So what driver are you using, because myself and everyone else is getting the exact same performance with Xfire on or off, meaning that it isn't enabled for the game yet.  You should probably double check your fps with something like FRAPS to see what you are really getting, because with Hairworks off, I get mid to high 50's with my 290.  You must have the new AMD Zeus card to be getting better than that with Hairworks on (or using this workaround).

 

Something I found interesting, Witcher 3 would immediately close if I tried to open it with FRAPS open. I needed to launch the game and then tab out to start it. Hmm. In any case, I'm running catalyst version 15.4 Beta and you're right about Xfire not being implemented yet, I have to wonder what these guys are thinking. With Hairworks off I get an even 60 FPS and with it on it drops to about 50-55 FPS depending on where I am. That explains the bit of stutter I was blaming on Xfire. You'll have to forgive me for thinking it was more logical for Xfire to be acting up than for it to be non-functional all together. In the mean time, I definitely recommend dropping foliage visibility range, grass density, and shadows to high. Those 3 settings alone save about 5 FPS.

[mr moose]

A 780 isn't a 770 rebadge, it usually performs close to a 970, the 770 is usually faster than a 960. Perfomance seems to be really bad on older than maxwell and amd video cards, which could be your best argument for it being a tessellation performance issue rather than a gameworks/hairworks issue. Still a dick move to cripple anything that isn't maxwell, so the majority of people who will get the game.

 

I never said it was.

 

Not for those who bought em for 700 bucks.

It should not happen on this level.

 

That's flawed logic.  You can't expect something to stay in the top performing brackets just because it was the top performer when released.

[BonSie]

I never said it was.

 

 

That's flawed logic.  You can't expect something to stay in the top performing brackets just because it was the top performer when released.

Don't people buy high end cards so they don't have to buy a new card the next generation?

The cards get beaten by a card that's nearly 1 year older and a much smaller size.

[Psykomantis00]

That's flawed logic.  You can't expect something to stay in the top performing brackets just because it was the top performer when released.

You can't expect them to stay on top but it shouldn't fall below the entry level card that just came out when you bought the highest tier you can go without being a titan. There is seirously something wrong if a 750+ gpu that is a year old loses to a 200 dollar card that just came out, from the same company. It's a bit ridiculous. 

[Humbug]

I also don't see the problem Hairworks isn't supposed to run on AMD in the first place.

Hairworks runs on direct compute and is supposed to be for all DX11 GPUs.

[mr moose]

Don't people buy high end cards so they don't have to buy a new card the next generation?

The cards get beaten by a card that's nearly 1 year older and a much smaller size.

 

2 points to clarify first:

 

1. People with 780 don't need to buy new cards. 

2. the only 960 that seams to have been reviewed is the Zotac in this one website (everyone else is linking straight to it). It could just be an awesome card seeing as everything else seems to be within cooee of expected.