AMD Catalyst 14.9 Officially Released For Linux

[ungutknut]

Very short review of the new driver (after updating from 14.30.1005):

+100 points in Unigine Valley (from ~1800 to ~1900, no AA)
still graphics corruptions when scrolling fast through lists (filebrowser for example)
supports kernel 3.16.2 out of the box

(Xubuntu 14.04 64bit, R9 270)

[[Knuckles]]

When you unpack "amd-catalyst-14-9-linux-x86-x86-64.zip" you get "fglrx-14.301.1001" and so on

As always, it more matters what is inside a package

Never understood why they can't make it like nvidia and use a single version number which you can map to the release stream.

[idanny]

Yes it's bad, acceleration will not work. What Linux distribution do You use?

In case of ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install linux-headers-generic dbs fakeroot build-essential dh-make debconf execstack dh-modaliases debhelper dkms

And then reinstall fglrx packages.

Thank you! it worked :-)

[idanny]

After succesfully installing this driver here are my experiences so far.

My system:
Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (with all updates)
16 GB ram
MSI Radeon 280X
AMD X6 3.4 Ghz overclocked

Pro's

• Improved 4K video playback
• Unity desktop effects are running smootly (finally)
• Fan is running silent (had some issues with that in 14.4 and 14.6)

Cons

• Terrible screen tearing (even with the anti-tearing option turned on)
• Black screen with Dota 2, Star Conflict, Team Fortress 2 in Steam (which i don't have with the default open source driver)
• Scrolling trough large pages (Firefox, Libreoffice) is going very slow

[user82]

+100 points in Unigine Valley (from ~1800 to ~1900, no AA)

Which settings/resolution?

[d2kx]

Fun fact:

While not mentioned in the changelog, this driver introduces a binary shader cache for OpenGL which might be responsible for some performance improvements all over the place. Enabled by default.

[xpris]

Someone can insert screen with 14.9 catalyst section properties? Or at least, what he has a 2D version of the driver and driver package?
For me, pretending to be installed, but the value of these drivers are like the older version.

[ungutknut]

Which settings/resolution?

Sorry, I had different values in my mind. I just looked up and it was more 1500 to 1600 points.

Settings 1920x1080, Quality Ultra, no AA

[user82]

Sorry, I had different values in my mind. I just looked up and it was more 1500 to 1600 points.

Settings 1920x1080, Quality Ultra, no AA

2957 on R9 290.
Seems like they really fixed the big performance problems with my card, this driver is fantastic.

I also compared Heaven on Linux OpenGl vs Windows DX11 and Windows was only 10% faster with the same quality settings.

[jmickelonis]

I've seen a couple people say that Unity is finally smooth. That's not my experience at all with this driver.

I finally got around to trying out Trusty + Unity + 14.9 on another hard drive, and it's more of the same. A lot of stuttering, and extremely slow window resizing. I can't believe they haven't fixed these things yet.

I've tried so hard to stay loyal to AMD but I just can't anymore. I've torn more hair out over fglrx than anything else during my Ubuntu experience.

Edit: I should probably mention that I'm using a Radeon HD 7770.