AMD acknowledges driver stuttering issues

[next-Jin]

http://techreport.com/blog/24133/as-the-second-turns-the-web-digests-our-game-testing-methods

There it is folks, expect 13 series to address the issue at some point this year.

 

[Stoly]

So cards will be slower now.

Speed is not everything

Go figure.

 

[wabbitseason]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue:

1. Outside techreport.

2. In a game other than Skyrim.

Your thread title is unbelievably misleading and should be changed by a mod immediately.

 

[lavaheadache]

So cards will be slower now.

Speed is not everything

Go figure.

How do you come to the conclusion that the cards will be slower now? Why does a fix HAVE to come at the expense of framerates?

 

[LigTasm]

I read this post that was linked in there, and it was much more interesting and informative.

 

[PRIME1]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue:

1. Outside techreport.

2. In a game other than Skyrim.

Your thread title is unbelievably misleading and should be changed by a mod immediately.

AMD has admitted there is a problem. I guess some people are so deep in denial that nothing can convince them.

 

[MasonD]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue

Oh you haven't seen it, I haven't seen Africa, maybe we're on to something here.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

So cards will be slower now.

Speed is not everything

Go figure.

How do you figure that? Cards might be faster due to the improvements in memory management which is being rewritten for the 7XXX cards. Here's the correct link with AMD's response:

Additionally, when we switched from the old VLIW architecture to the GCN core there was a significant updates to all parts of the driver was needed – although not really spoken about the entire memory management on GCN is different to prior GPU's and the initial software management for that was primarily driven by schedule and in the meantime we've been rewriting it again and we have discovered that the new version has also improved frame latency in a number of cases so we are accelerating the QA and implementation of that.

http://techreport.com/news/24136/dr...e-radeon-frame-latencies-in-series-of-updates

One of the games that had largest performance improvements in Catalyst 12.11 Beta was Battlefield 3 and 7970 GE has marginally (meaning with no real world difference) better frametimes then GTX 680 according to Nordichardware and better framerate also (includes video comparison):

http://www.nordichardware.se/Grafik...rostuttering-och-ojamn-prestanda.html#content

Kudos to Techreport for this though! Smooth frametimes are more important to me then high framerates

 

[next-Jin]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue:

1. Outside techreport.

2. In a game other than Skyrim.

Your thread title is unbelievably misleading and should be changed by a mod immediately.

How is it misleading when an AMD employee who works with these issues openly admits a problem with GCN architecture memory handling via the driver?

Try playing some games because I have horrid stuttering with my setup in Borderlands 2, Far Cry 3 and Skyrim among others.

I am no expert by any stretch but the reason frame limiters remove micro stutter is probably because it's preventing the memory from being taxed.

 

[FrgMstr]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue:

1. Outside techreport.

2. In a game other than Skyrim.

Your thread title is unbelievably misleading and should be changed by a mod immediately.

Do you read ANY of our GPU reviews? We have noted this for years.

 

[PinchedNerve]

I had 7850's in xfire & the stuttering issue which I complained about many times on Rage3d & also submitted a few bug reports to AMD was infuriating at best. Now I have a single 7970GHz & would consider getting another "IF" they can fix the xfire stuttering....

To the guy assuming a fix means less frames. The way I read it, if you reduce the latency a frame rate increase is more likely, if not at least a smoother feel which always feels like an increase when you've lived with the xfire stutter (lag like) hell.

 

[lavaheadache]

How is it misleading when an AMD employee who works with these issues openly admits a problem with GCN architecture memory handling via the driver?

Try playing some games because I have horrid stuttering with my setup in Borderlands 2, Far Cry 3 and Skyrim among others.

I am no expert by any stretch but the reason frame limiters remove micro stutter is probably because it's preventing the memory from being taxed.

The Far cry 3 stuttering is the game. I have the exact same stuttering using a 480 as a i do a 7970. The stuttering only occurs if your frame rate drops below 60. I encourage you to see for yourself.

 

[Blacklash]

If you're experiencing chop when running around outdoors in Skyrim with something like an HD 7950 my advice is to limit your FPS to one below your refresh rate with Afterburner. It helps a good deal. Also Cat 12.6 seems to run Skyrim better than Cat 12.11 Beta 11. Cat 12.11 Beta 11 actually dropped my FPS in cities when using the ultra preset and made the game a little more choppy outdoors.

 

[Stoly]

How do you come to the conclusion that the cards will be slower now? Why does a fix HAVE to come at the expense of framerates?

Because it will

at least for now the fix is to limit FPS so the card performance is is effectively reduced.

 

[lavaheadache]

Because it will

at least for now the fix is to limit FPS so the card performance is is effectively reduced.

Your argument is a little weak. Limiting frame rates using a frame limiter does smooth things out but that isn't the same as the fixes they are talking about. Hope your hungry because I feel that you will be eating your words.

 

[next-Jin]

The Far cry 3 stuttering is the game. I have the exact same stuttering using a 480 as a i do a 7970. The stuttering only occurs if your frame rate drops below 60. I encourage you to see for yourself.

I only get stuttering once it goes past 60 anything below are normal frame rate dips which I notice but there is a significant difference between the two.

With Far Cry especially when strafing there are hitches when loading textures for some off the wall reason where you see the graphical anomalies with the dithering effect. (ie immediately after leaving the safe house in the first town look left while under the overhang towards the pole holding it up then strafe right)

Neither are what I am referring to with the stuttering.

 

[Yakk]

A frame limiter does help in stabilizing the framerate and smooth out ms lag spikes which could be created between frames. But it is more a bandaid solution instead of fixing the execution pipeline directly as they talked about.

An example of a cap that works (for me) in crossfire is capping the fps in Shogun 2 creates a silky smooth glasslike gaming experience. It's just awesome to play in.

A place where it does not work (again, for me) is in Sleeping Dogs which just seems to always have crazy microstutter, even in single card setup, no matter what I do.

 

[GotNoRice]

They released betas that increased the performance of GCN hardware at the expense of smoothness and did so conveniently right before the holiday shopping season where they sell more cards than any other time of year by far; knowing that people make purchases based on benchmarks.

No WHQL drivers since October... pretty clear that the betas would NOT pass WHQL certification, and it's pretty clear why.

Now it's January. The Holiday shopping season is over. Like clockwork they now "acknowledge" the problem.

The final test will be to see if they can actually come out with a set of WHQL drivers that somehow retain the performance increase of the betas while also eliminating the frame latency issue. I personally don't believe this is something we will ever see.

 

[lavaheadache]

This thread is turning into a thread that I need to put my tin foil hat on before returning

 

[Anytime]

I still haven't seen a single example of this issue:

1. Outside techreport.

2. In a game other than Skyrim.

Your thread title is unbelievably misleading and should be changed by a mod immediately.

After trying to play Far Cry 3 with a 6990 I consider Skyrim to be silky smooth . After I stopped playing my head was all weird, it was like real life was stuttering too

 

[shansoft]

They released betas that increased the performance of GCN hardware at the expense of smoothness and did so conveniently right before the holiday shopping season where they sell more cards than any other time of year by far; knowing that people make purchases based on benchmarks.

No WHQL drivers since October... pretty clear that the betas would NOT pass WHQL certification, and it's pretty clear why.

Now it's January. The Holiday shopping season is over. Like clockwork they now "acknowledge" the problem.

The final test will be to see if they can actually come out with a set of WHQL drivers that somehow retain the performance increase of the betas while also eliminating the frame latency issue. I personally don't believe this is something we will ever see.

Do you even know what you are talking about here?

Because I honestly can't tell if it's a sarcasm or being serious....

 

[dcds1]

What really confuses me about all this is the bashing AMD is taking over this. Now I am confused because when you look at the graphs both in this forum topic and at Techreports website, Nvidia's 680 has the highest swing from max fps to min fps in the closest amount of time. Now to me, that is when I am going to notice a stutter, not when it changes 5 to 10 fps in a short period of time. I know on my HD 5850, I really notice it when I have a big fps change not a little one. Could it be pockets being lined, I guess only the poitical machine knows the truth.

 

[GotNoRice]

Do you even know what you are talking about here?

Do you?

Tech Report did not just start using frame latency graphs in their reviews. They have been doing so for quite some time. The frame latency issue, as measured by tech report, only seemed to show up as of the recent beta drivers that also served to significantly increase GCN performance. Their older reviews with older WHQL drivers did not experience this issue - but of course didn't contain any of the performance increases either.

Maybe you can explain to us why there have been no WHQL drivers since October? What is wrong with the betas that make them ineligible for WHQL? hmmm... Simply put, drivers with glaring flaws don't get certified.

You have to admit that even if the timing was a complete coincidence, it was still nothing short of extremely convenient for AMD having all their cards show up with a 10%+ performance increase in all of the benchmarks people based their holiday shopping on, even if that performance increase was the result of major frame latency spikes that aren't represented in the FPS figures.

If you are still confused, maybe you can ask AMD, since they've now acknowledged the issue themselves. Amazing how people can still be in denial after that.

AMD is free to prove me wrong at any time by releasing WHQL drivers that fix the frame latency issue while still containing the performance increases from the betas. I've been saying that since the betas were released months ago and haven't been proven wrong yet

 

[Deleted whining member 223597]

And you would know of this firsthand since you use a 7 series card..oh wait..

 

[suiken_2mieu]

What really confuses me about all this is the bashing AMD is taking over this. Now I am confused because when you look at the graphs both in this forum topic and at Techreports website, Nvidia's 680 has the highest swing from max fps to min fps in the closest amount of time. Now to me, that is when I am going to notice a stutter, not when it changes 5 to 10 fps in a short period of time. I know on my HD 5850, I really notice it when I have a big fps change not a little one. Could it be pockets being lined, I guess only the poitical machine knows the truth.

I can agree with that. If I'm into a game, Ill only notice things if a giant change if fps happens.

 

[GotNoRice]

And you would know of this firsthand since you use a 7 series card..oh wait..

What did you do, read my signature and assume that represents the grand total of hardware I have experience with? I build new systems for customers constantly, and having the opportunity to compare both cards directly, yes, I went with GTX680s for my personal rig.

If I'm into a game, Ill only notice things if a giant change if fps happens.

Did you watch the TechReport followup video? Because the stuttering isn't exactly subtle.

http://techreport.com/review/24051/geforce-versus-radeon-captured-on-high-speed-video

If you can't "notice" that... get your eyes checked.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

They released betas that increased the performance of GCN hardware at the expense of smoothness and did so conveniently right before the holiday shopping season where they sell more cards than any other time of year by far; knowing that people make purchases based on benchmarks.

No WHQL drivers since October... pretty clear that the betas would NOT pass WHQL certification, and it's pretty clear why.

Now it's January. The Holiday shopping season is over. Like clockwork they now "acknowledge" the problem.

The final test will be to see if they can actually come out with a set of WHQL drivers that somehow retain the performance increase of the betas while also eliminating the frame latency issue. I personally don't believe this is something we will ever see.

You've claimed this conspiracy theory in several times now, and you haven't provided any evidence that the performance was at the cost of frametimes.

AMD (Dave Baumann) was asked this very thing in the commentary field @ TR and replied that we might in fact see performance improvements after AMD implements the memory management rewrite for GCN:

I wonder if smoothing the frame times will reduce the average FPS. That would be an interesting outcome, and it would mean that the vast majority of sites will see it as a negative driver change, and by sheer weight there will probably be a lot of complaining and posts on forums saying 'don't update to the new drivers!' That's all just speculation based on assuming that frame times were sacrificed in favor of average FPS, even if unintentionally, but it would put AMD in tough spot.

This is not due to solely chasing average FPS. One of the software engineers looking into this contacted me to point out that for at least two of the titles where we've made improvements the average FPS should be improved, maybe by a reasonably large degree in some cases.

http://techreport.com/news/24136/dr...e-radeon-frame-latencies-in-series-of-updates

 

[Dark12]

Does this latency issue exist with the 6 series cards?
If so, is it something that can be fixed with a driver, or is it only fixable on the newer 7 series architecture?

 

[ICDP]

This is not a hardware issue, it is a driver/CAP problem for a few individual games and can be fixed. From my own testing on single GPU (HD 7970 and GTX 680) serious stutters only showed in three games out of the following. This is at 2560x1600 resolution and the games with latency issues were fixable. Tested on both a GTX 680 and HD 7970.

Red = AMD stutter
Orange = AMD and Nvidia stutter

Skyrim - Stutters on AMD GPUs but can be eliminated by capping FPS at 60 and seting flip queue size to 1 using RadeonPro.
Witcher 2 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be fixed by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Far Cry 3 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be reduced by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Crysis 2
Sleeping Dogs
Rise of Flight
Hitman Absolution
Project CARS
rFactor 2
Dishonored

 

[Brackle]

This is not a hardware issue, it is a driver/CAP problem for a few individual games and can be fixed. From my own testing on single GPU (HD 7970 and GTX 680) serious stutters only showed in three games out of the following. This is at 2560x1600 resolution and the games with latency issues were fixable. Tested on both a GTX 680 and HD 7970.

Red = AMD stutter
Orange = AMD and Nvidia stutter

Skyrim - Stutters on AMD GPUs but can be eliminated by capping FPS at 60 and seting flip queue size to 1 using RadeonPro.
Witcher 2 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be fixed by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Far Cry 3 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be reduced by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Crysis 2
Sleeping Dogs
Arma II
Rise of Flight
Hitman Absolution
Project CARS
rFactor 2
Skyrim
Mass Effect 3
Dishonored

Either way you shouldnt have to use a 3rd party program just to get a game smooth.

[H] has been bitching about smoothness for years when it comes to AMD. And let me tell ya, that skyrim stuttering sucks royal ass unless you use the FPS limiter.

Good on AMD for acknowledging the issue, and fixing it.

 

[Raudulfr]

This is not a hardware issue, it is a driver/CAP problem for a few individual games and can be fixed. From my own testing on single GPU (HD 7970 and GTX 680) serious stutters only showed in three games out of the following. This is at 2560x1600 resolution and the games with latency issues were fixable. Tested on both a GTX 680 and HD 7970.

Red = AMD stutter
Orange = AMD and Nvidia stutter

Skyrim - Stutters on AMD GPUs but can be eliminated by capping FPS at 60 and seting flip queue size to 1 using RadeonPro.
Witcher 2 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be fixed by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Far Cry 3 - Stutters on both AMD and Nvidia but can be reduced by setting an FPS cap slightly below the cards average FPS.
Crysis 2
Sleeping Dogs
Rise of Flight
Hitman Absolution
Project CARS
rFactor 2
Dishonored

But but but... AMD sucks!! (?)

(and nothing anyone says will ever change that because "because").

 

[ICDP]

Either way you shouldnt have to use a 3rd party program just to get a game smooth.

Agreed but unfortunately the nature of PC games/hardware means AMD or Nvidia cannot guarantee every game will work perfectly. That is why both AMD and Nivida issue new driver releases regularly. It is also the reason why it is possible to create your own game profiles using the built in GPU control panel or 3rd party software such as RadeonPro or Nvidiainspector. Practically every one of us use 3rd party tools to overclock our cards and think nothing of it. I gaurantee there is not a single Nvidia GPU owner out there who has never had to create a custom profile to get the best out of some game or another. I know I have to make custom game profiles to get the best out of a lot of my games for my GTX 680. Witcher 2 is unplayable without an FPS cap for example.

[H] has been bitching about smoothness for years when it comes to AMD. And let me tell ya, that skyrim stuttering sucks royal ass unless you use the FPS limiter.

[H] has been bitching for years about multi GPU Crossfire stuttering, not single GPU. For the vast majority this latency issue has never been an issue. My own testing in Skyrim showed a simple tweak to the flip queue size cured all stuttering.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2289641&highlight=

Hitman Absolution Frame Times

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=34376473&postcount=550

Good on AMD for acknowledging the issue, and fixing it.

Agreed.

 

[Brackle]

Agreed but unfortunately the nature of PC games/hardware means AMD or Nvidia cannot guarantee every game will work perfectly. That is why both AMD and Nivida issue new driver releases regularly. It is also the reason why it is possible to create your own game profiles using the built in GPU control panel or 3rd party software such as RadeonPro or Nvidiainspector. Practically every one of us use 3rd party tools to overclock our cards and think nothing of it. I gaurantee there is not a single Nvidia GPU owner out there who has never had to create a custom profile to get the best out of some game or another. I know I have to make custom game profiles to get the best out of a lot of my games for my GTX 680. Witcher 2 is unplayable without an FPS cap for example.



[H] has been bitching for years about multi GPU Crossfire stuttering, not single GPU. For the vast majority this latency issue has never been an issue. My own testing in Skyrim showed a simple tweak to the flip queue size cured all stuttering.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2289641&highlight=



Agreed.

Totally agree with everything you said. I mean shit still to this day I still get horrible stuttering in GW2 on my media pc with the 480. Been waiting for this to be fixed now for months.

But yea. Looking foward to future driver updates indeed.

 

[Blacklash]

Like I said, limiting my FPS to one below my refresh rate with AB helps with Skyrim outdoors.

It's fine for a temporary fix. It's certainly better than not using it.

I did notice my 7950 is only showing 39% use in Markarth and 55-66% outdoors. The low usage in Markarth causes lower FPS than some nVidia cards that do 61% in that city instead of 39%. I'd be getting on the order of +6-9FPS if my 7950 was doing at least 60% in Markarth. It's certainly not unplayable and it's a tad disappointing.

 

[KENNYB]

You've claimed this conspiracy theory in several times now, and you haven't provided any evidence that the performance was at the cost of frametimes.

AMD (Dave Baumann) was asked this very thing in the commentary field @ TR and replied that we might in fact see performance improvements after AMD implements the memory management rewrite for GCN:



http://techreport.com/news/24136/dr...e-radeon-frame-latencies-in-series-of-updates

*adjusting_ma_tin_foil_hat_and_googles*
I remember an OpenGL on Linux performance review on Linux from a couple of years ago that tracked AMD "performance" increases/decreases. Performance increases went hand-in-hand with bugs. Fixing bugs again decreased performance. Hopefully this won't occur again.

 

[USMCGrunt]

*adjusting_ma_tin_foil_hat_and_googles*

Aw hell, Google has infilitrated another one and started to rewrite his internal dictionary. THE NEW WAVE OF FREE ADVERTISEMENTS IS HERE, RUN!!

 

[GotNoRice]

You've claimed this conspiracy theory in several times now, and you haven't provided any evidence that the performance was at the cost of frametimes.

My evidence is reality. Currently there is no driver available that contains the performance increases that doesn't also cause the frame latency issue. TR demonstrated on many occasions that this issue isn't present with older WHQL drivers - that also do not contain the performance increases.

AMD (Dave Baumann) was asked this very thing in the commentary field @ TR and replied that we might in fact see performance improvements after AMD implements the memory management rewrite for GCN:

http://techreport.com/news/24136/dr...e-radeon-frame-latencies-in-series-of-updates

Talk is cheap. We've been waiting for WHQL drivers since October, and we're still waiting... Of course it's not even clear from that link if he is talking about WHQL drivers or yet more flawed betas. I guess time will tell.

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

*adjusting_ma_tin_foil_hat_and_googles*
I remember an OpenGL on Linux performance review on Linux from a couple of years ago that tracked AMD "performance" increases/decreases. Performance increases went hand-in-hand with bugs. Fixing bugs again decreased performance. Hopefully this won't occur again.

You put your tin_foil_hat on backwards. You should have said "AMD increased performance knowing it was causing bugs in Linux, so they could take over the world!"! Now thats a juicy conspiracy theory!

In Linux however, bugs go hand-in-hand with bugs when it comes to drivers. That goes for Nvidia too. The performance review on Linux you saw years ago isn't something I can comment on as long as you don't link up to the review.

The fix spoken of here in this thread, is about rewriting the memory management to suit the GCM architecture better. AMD/Dave Baumann implied that we will see performance improvements as result of this in games that has been optimized.

As you can see from the Nordichardware microstutter test, Battlefield 3 doesn't show any microstuttering and is infact both marginally better in frametimes AND framerate on 7970 vs. 680. That was one of the games that had the largest increase in framerate in 12.11.

That said, I care less about getting less FPS then getting smoother gameplay. This is one of the reasons I actually READ [H]'s reviews. Their reviews are about highest playable settings and they nudge down settings if they feel gameplay isn't smooth enough, even when framerate should suggest they could use a higher settings.

Except for FPS gaming where higher framerate can help response time, I only need higher framerates to get smoother gameplay.

Thats why kudos to Techreport for making a buzz about this and also kudos to [H] for their reviews which focus on gameplay and not only pure framerates.

Don't put a marketing spin on this with conspiracy theories and all, turning it into an AMD vs. Nvidia war like they have on Anandtech forums. That will only mud the issue.

PCPER is now also going over to a new performance metric that focus on smoothness :
http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/Frame-Rating-New-Graphics-Performance-Metric

 

[Tamlin_WSGF]

My evidence is reality. Currently there is no driver available that contains the performance increases that doesn't also cause the frame latency issue. TR demonstrated on many occasions that this issue isn't present with older WHQL drivers - that also do not contain the performance increases.

Thats the evidence you base a whole conspiracy theory on?

Didn't you catch the post earlier in this thread, showing one of the games that had biggest increase in 12.11 beta, which has both better framerate and frametimes with 7970 vs. the 680 according to Nordichardware's microstutter article?

Talk is cheap. We've been waiting for WHQL drivers since October, and we're still waiting... Of course it's not even clear from that link if he is talking about WHQL drivers or yet more flawed betas. I guess time will tell.

AMD doesn't have monthly WHQL driver schedual anymore.
http://benchmark3d.com/no-more-monthly-amd-catalyst-whql-drivers

 

[GotNoRice]

Didn't you catch the post earlier in this thread, showing one of the games that had biggest increase in 12.11 beta, which has both better framerate and frametimes with 7970 vs. the 680 according to Nordichardware's microstutter article?

Yes I did, very interesting link. Let's explore it a bit.

So this is the example you claimed where AMD has "better" frame-times? Even then it's clear that the Nvidia hardware is not experiencing any sort of issue in terms of frame latency. At that high resolution, in the most VRam intensive game yet released, you would expect a card with an extra GB of VRam to start showing an advantage. Even then the two are basically dead even.

THIS is the frame latency issue: