Offical note for AMD / ATI: I HATE YOUR DRIVERS.

[JernejL]

THIS is why i hate developing for ati's drivers, consider this code for detecting weither or not their opengl implementation supports dxt compression, and enumerating compressed formats that it supports:


candxt := findbuffer('GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc');
if candxt = False then
candxt := findbuffer('GL_S3_s3tc');

if candxt = True then
begin
debug('EXT: Enumerating texture compression:');
glGetIntegerv(GL_NUM_COMPRESSED_TEXTURE_FORMATS_AR B, @num);

SetLength(valid_arb_compression, num);

glGetIntegerv(GL_COMPRESSED_TEXTURE_FORMATS_ARB, @valid_arb_compression[0]);

for i := 0 to num - 1 do
debug(format('$%x', [valid_arb_compression[i]]));

end;

It worked fine for last 5 years or so, and THIS is how the code looks now after their latest driver "update":


candxt := findbuffer('GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc');
if candxt = False then
candxt := findbuffer('GL_S3_s3tc');

if candxt = True then
begin
debug('EXT: Enumerating texture compression:');
glGetIntegerv(GL_NUM_COMPRESSED_TEXTURE_FORMATS_AR B, @num);

SetLength(valid_arb_compression, num);

if num = 0 then // can use dxt but supports zero compressed formats... ati / amd screwed up their drivers again..
begin
debug('AMD CRAPPY BROKEN DRIVERS.');
end else
glGetIntegerv(GL_COMPRESSED_TEXTURE_FORMATS_ARB, @valid_arb_compression[0]);

for i := 0 to num - 1 do
debug(format('$%x', [valid_arb_compression[i]]));

end;

They keep breaking their opengl implementation and are getting pretty good at it, good job AMD, i'm guaranteeing you my next gpu won't come from your fabrics for a looong time and i will actively tell people not to buy your crappy products.

[arthurprs]

:lol: no comments

[JSoftware]

ATI cards have always had crappy opengl drivers... :(

[Robert Kosek]

I absolutely LOVE AMD processors and motherboards, they've been the most rock-solid out of any that I've owned. On the otherhand, I could do without ATI's horrible OpenGL support and their drivers.

[LP]

...or you could just stay away from OpenGL. ;)

[JernejL]

...or you could just stay away from OpenGL. ;)

It's not as if their directx drivers are any much better!

Here's instruction from some outside expert on ati graphics drivers how to crash them:


make a PE that has a PAGE_NOACCESS section from 00020000 to 0002FFFF and use direct3d

Yeah.. apparently it tries to read those sections to figure out app's name, path and environment values from the memory structs and assumes they are always at that address (!!) so don't you dare making a directx app which has base address other than $00400000, or relocated near that "memory range of doom".. i can't believe how can their drivers ever be logo certified with such a hack!

Robert Kosek: i absolutely agree, but the only reason their cpus don't suck is.. that they don't need any drivers :P

aniway, i just remembered this ages old quote..


ATI cards are like buses... They're huge, red and have bad drivers.

[chronozphere]

I still don't understand how ATI can get away with this crap. Fortunatly i have a GF 8600GT and i'm very happy with it. 8800 GT's are very cheap these day's so they are a good alternative for angry ATI users who are willing to spend 180 euro's.

But i must say that i'm very happy with my AMD 64x2 5400+. Their CPU's are very good and not too expensive. Too bad about their GFX drivers. Their GFX card would sell alot better, if they rewrite their crappy catalyst software. My freind spent an entire afternoon installing/removing different versions of this crap to get proper GFX for his laptop. :(

[JernejL]

But i must say that i'm very happy with my AMD 64x2 5400+. Their CPU's are very good and not too expensive. Too bad about their GFX drivers. Their GFX card would sell alot better, if they rewrite their crappy catalyst software. My freind spent an entire afternoon installing/removing different versions of this crap to get proper GFX for his laptop. :(

I agree, i myself use amd cpu, and it's great, but i now avoid their graphics cards like it's the devil.. it still feels as if ati and amd are mostly two completely separate and different companies, but lately this sort of problems with their cards might make me also rethink about which cpu i will buy next time..

My sistem is not too different from yours.. amd 64 dual core athlon 4000 with a 8600GT / 256mb..

[Robert Kosek]

Wow, my system is quite similar to both yours. AMD 64 x2 4800+, 8600GS 256mb, 2gb RAM. :D

I do have a 7900GS (maybe 7800GS, it's been a few months) on hand that I'm willing to sell, double lifetime warranty if I can find my paper on it once more.

[JernejL]

Wow, my system is quite similar to both yours. AMD 64 x2 4800+, 8600GS 256mb, 2gb RAM. :D

I do have a 7900GS (maybe 7800GS, it's been a few months) on hand that I'm willing to sell, double lifetime warranty if I can find my paper on it once more.

I got a 8600GT 256mb which will be converted with a heatpipe cooling and 4GB of ram, otherwise it's very similar configuration yeah.

[Almindor]

Amen brother! I have ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 and am using it mostly on Linux AMD64. Now.. a word of warning DON'T.

The performance is shit (gf6 is better), the drivers freeze often in 3D (hard freezing) and Cg shader code doesn't work on it (lots of games either crash or have shader issues).

It's horrible.