Windows Catalyist or Bootcamp Drivers?

[orbitalpunk]

I ordered a nMP and wondered if its better to just use the Bootcamp video Drivers or to install the Catalyst/beta drivers from ATI?

Thanks

 

[Washac]

Should this not be in this area.............

https://forums.macrumors.com/forums/86/

 

[Dirtyharry50]

I can see this being a gaming related concern myself. We are among the most likely users to care about this.

If you just got the system, you probably don't need to bother. It depends on how recent the games you are playing are more than anything really. From one driver revision to another is usually more about making fixes and optimizations to support new games more than it is more performance in general with every single driver revision.

That said, I am not sure how recent the driver is in the most current bootcamp drivers installation. If you are playing games released in 2014, it would probably be a good idea but not a necessity unless some game is giving you problems. I'm on a late-2013 iMac and I haven't bothered getting Nvidia's most recent drivers and thus far I have no issues with performance or stability that would make me bother.

Now, I am probably the only person who will offer you this conservative advice but I do tend to favor not fixing stuff that isn't broken. So I'd recommend just playing whatever you want and if performance is less than desirable or you encounter stability problems, then go ahead and make a driver upgrade your first step in attempting to fix that.

One last thing, I have always gone with stable drivers over the years if I do elect to upgrade them. I wouldn't do beta drivers unless there is some explicit reason to use them, such as xyz game doesn't work right without them or something. I am not a fan of beta testing anything, particularly drivers.

 

[orbitalpunk]

I can see this being a gaming related concern myself. We are among the most likely users to care about this.

If you just got the system, you probably don't need to bother. It depends on how recent the games you are playing are more than anything really. From one driver revision to another is usually more about making fixes and optimizations to support new games more than it is more performance in general with every single driver revision.

That said, I am not sure how recent the driver is in the most current bootcamp drivers installation. If you are playing games released in 2014, it would probably be a good idea but not a necessity unless some game is giving you problems. I'm on a late-2013 iMac and I haven't bothered getting Nvidia's most recent drivers and thus far I have no issues with performance or stability that would make me bother.

Now, I am probably the only person who will offer you this conservative advice but I do tend to favor not fixing stuff that isn't broken. So I'd recommend just playing whatever you want and if performance is less than desirable or you encounter stability problems, then go ahead and make a driver upgrade your first step in attempting to fix that.

One last thing, I have always gone with stable drivers over the years if I do elect to upgrade them. I wouldn't do beta drivers unless there is some explicit reason to use them, such as xyz game doesn't work right without them or something. I am not a fan of beta testing anything, particularly drivers.

Thank you for your input.

I mostly play Battlefield 3. I may go into Battlefield 4. On my old tower I ran a Nividia 295gtx and used Nvidia's drivers. It worked fine. I've searched the forums and have read mixed reviews concerning using AMD Catalyst drivers. So I think I will just have to do my own tests. I will run Battlefield on Ultra and observe my FPS on Bootcamp drivers. If they are worse after installing Catalyst then I will reinstall windows again and leave it with Bootcamp drivers.

Thanks again.

 

[antonis]

The first comparisons that some people posted concerning the nMP and the catalyst vs bootcamp drivers, showed an advantage for the catalyst for games (directx), while the bootcamp ones seem to be more optimized for OpenCL applications (mostly 3d animation apps etc).

Additionally, the catalyst drivers have more frequent updates as they are constantly optimized for latest games, especially concerning issues with crossfire and performance.