2012 AMD and NVIDIA Driver Performance Summary Review @ [H]

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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2012 AMD and NVIDIA Driver Performance Summary Review - We have evaluated AMD and NVIDIA's 2012 video card driver performances separately. Today we will be combining these two evaluations to show each companies full body of work in 2012. We will also be looking at some unique graphs that show how each video cards driver improved or worsened performance in each game throughout the year.
 
In before the crying about OC performance.

I found the review very interesting. Nvidia had very consistent performance all year and AMD really had to work on their drivers to get the most out of the 79XX by the end of the year.
 
it definitely took AMD awhile to get their stuff together.

Since the 12.11's, things have been going well though.

Although this is a 2012 year in review, it would have been nice to have the the 13.1/13.2 betas just to see, although it seems like 13.1/13.2 didn't add that much performance but they certainly fixed a ton of issues (crossfire latency for example)
 
Nicely done.:D

The cumulative graph very nicely reflects the year we had with AMD drivers.
I hope your conclusions don't fall on deaf ears.

Given the AMD doesn't seem to be planning any new hardware, I wonder what they can do on the software side to squeeze the 7970 some more?
 
Would really like to see AMD Support for HD3xxx/4xxx cards on Xorg 1.13.....

This is AMD's major flaw right now for those of us who use both Win+Linux.
 
Excellent series of articles. This was was very interesting as well and a great way to cap off the series. I'd love to see something like this to include multi card next year for the 2013 year end.
 
Nice to see real numbers like this without constant bickering about whose drivers are better. :p
 
No mention of stuttering... odd...

Its probably irrelevant now with the latest AMD drivers. but big boost on amd came with big stuttering. Fortunately it seems to be solved.

IMO its something to keep an eye on when newer drivers are released.
 
I think this article would have benefited from game dev insights about your results. While the article achieved it's goal, I find the conclusion lackluster. Unappreciated timing of performance boosts were mentioned, but only hands wrung over it. It feels like amd and Nvidia are releasing hardware that only pays lips service to gamer enthusiasts. Has discreet card support within these companies' lineups given way to the mobile sector? I'd like a broader perspective on this. I'm left with more questions than answers.
 
Wow, shocking how long it took for them to get it together. I was considering an AMD 7970 -- I've swapped back and forth between the two companies since getting back into PC gaming. So glad I went with the GTX680s. Any self-doubt was erased and I no longer have "grass is greener on the other side" symptoms. Maybe next time, AMD.
 
nice graphs, though they may say more if dates are somehow aligned as well (perhaps in a different graph)

This way you can compare how was the competition through time.
 
Nice review. I think this is really useful information for seeing the 2 brands' driver history.

joseardzm said:
nice graphs, though they may say more if dates are somehow aligned as well (perhaps in a different graph)

This way you can compare how was the competition through time.
Click to expand...

This might be a good idea. Line up the driver release dates on the graph with a linear jan 1 - dec 31 graph. Granted it might look a bit spread out, but it makes for a glance at when in relation to the games release date, that improvements were or were not made. In the same linear date graph, place a vertical line with the games' release date. Then we can easily see when the vendor was prepared for the game.

Nice job!
 
GoodBoy said:
Nice review. I think this is really useful information for seeing the 2 brands' driver history.



This might be a good idea. Line up the driver release dates on the graph with a linear jan 1 - dec 31 graph. Granted it might look a bit spread out, but it makes for a glance at when in relation to the games release date, that improvements were or were not made. In the same linear date graph, place a vertical line with the games' release date. Then we can easily see when the vendor was prepared for the game.

Nice job!
Click to expand...

The combination of both of your suggestions sounds awesome and would be a welcome addition to the article or... maybe for next years? ;)
 
Thanks for the feedback, I definitely want to make this a continued series each year. I think it's important to look back and see what happened, helps people make decisions for the next year.
 
Drivers are why I finally went back to team green and plan on staying there for a while. While AMD's cards were an incredible value for several years, I was willing to endure a certain amount of inconvenience. Not the case anymore.
 
This is a really nicely thought out and executed review, thanks guys! AMD looks like it got it together late, my concern is them keeping it up.
 
I really like looking at the consistency of Nvidia's driver performance. I also like the idea of tracking the driver performance over time. Good job guys!
 
Great read for lots of us out there. I look forward to seeing this become a routine thing/
 
I'd bet they could get more variability out of the nVidia drivers if they tried. But hey, no one is asking them to do what most nVidia cards do, like run more than one game at a res higher than 1080, or crank the AA to the max.
 
So we can pretty much say good bye to any more performance from the Titan via drivers from what we have seen here i.e. don`t expect much performance after nvidia`s initial drivers bcoz they are already optimized.
 
inglewood78 said:
Yep, looks about right. Beginning of the year was when AMD lost my business.
Click to expand...

Same here.

I had more or less been buying a new video card each year or so. Usually AMD on the tick and NVidia on the tock.

The results in this review pretty much mirror mine. The nvidia drivers are usually closer to cooked out of the gate, and you get regular releases. AMD might get you a new driver eventually, they might not. They might have dropped that new driver for someone's amusement, or it might be there with actual performance gains.

As I get older, I can afford the better cards, but what I can't afford is wasting what little gaming time I have available fighting with crap drivers, and AMD has wasted much more of my time with that. From my experience nividia single card has been pretty painless. Then amd single card. then nvidia sli, and amd xfire was pretty much so broken when I tried it I will never ever go back there. AMD single card and nvidia SLI are close though. SLI is has a higher probability of encountering a serious driver/game compatibility issue, but I'm not sure it actually takes longer for a driver that fixes it to drop.

Note to both companies. If you don't produce good drivers very rapidly, you basically stole $400-500 out of my pocket given the short lifecycle of these products.
 
I just stick with the fastest single card and single monitor that I can afford and leave it at that.

Multi gpu causes issues regardless of which company but SLI is certainly the more reliable of the two.
 
When you get stuck with the idea that only current series matters and your videocard for whatever reason is not tested because of different issues beside the "we test only the latest and the greatest", then you are bound to give the wrong impression about the thing you would like your viewers to know.

So the summery should read that only the cards that have been tested from those series can expect such results, ruling out difference which may occur if you don't have any of the mentioned system components.

It still does not make sense .....
 
and people call me a troll when i say i prefer nvidia cards over amd cards due to better drivers and stability.

just few days ago , i was attacked by a handfull of AMD fanatics when i told them that AMD has stutter issues/erradic frame rates in crossfire but when i posted the link that proved my claim they never replied after that.

they just wont admit that AMD has not done their best this generation.

they keep telling people to get amd over nvidia due to price difference, its wrong on so many levels to people who dont know much about video cards.
 
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I wonder if this new architecture will be the key to ATI providing a more consistent driver. I think from the 12.11s on we have seen some good stuff, but even still earlier cards have issues.. maybe this will be a short lived series because next year the review will say.. both cards did just fine.
 
Would liked to have seen the last 2 AMD driver updates in there. 12.11 was ok, but did nothing but break my 7970 in games. The 13.x drivers have been a good improvement all around for CFX and single card performance. (running 13.1 now, haven't tried 13.2)

Unfortunately some things STILL run like crap (AC3) no matter what you do.

Glad to see this though. It's nice to have as much data out there as possible when discussing one vs. the other vendor and how the way things are made, living with the card, etc. is oft ignored.
 
TroyX said:
and people call me a troll when i say i prefer nvidia cards over amd cards due to better drivers and stability.

just few days ago , i was attacked by a handfull of AMD fanatics when i told them that AMD has stutter issues/erradic frame rates in crossfire but when i posted the link that proved my claim they never replied after that.

they just wont admit that AMD has not done their best this generation.

they keep telling people to get amd over nvidia due to price difference, its wrong on so many levels to people who dont know much about video cards.
Click to expand...

Because you blatantly tell someone they all have problems while even people with Nvidia cards have problems because you don't get them doesn't mean they aren't there this happens with hardware and software.

We have seen it a million times people swapping from Nvidia to AMD and vice versa some say best thing ever happened to me other people still claim to have problems.

On a whole your experience doesn't mean you are lying, but doesn't tell the truth about hardware problems either.

And f this "review" which is another attempt at pigeon holing drivers for only very _small sample_ of the market (high end vs mid end and older versions) tends to skew results.
 
Aren't you forgetting AMD Frame Latency issue that AMD acknowledged lately?:confused:

fyi: i got sapphire 7970 oc Dual-X you praised so much
which im totally dissatisfied with,
fan rattling noise issues on card #5!:mad:
 
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