AMD Pulls Catalyst 14.4 WHQL, Reposts it with a Cautionary Note

[btarunr]

Over the weekend enthusiasts couldn't find AMD's Catalyst software suite 14.4 WHQL on the company's Game portal. The company reposted it a little later, with a cautionary note about why they had to pull the download. Apparently, the AMD motherboard chipset drivers included in the suite were later found to be unstable on some systems, particularly the southbridge AHCI driver. The issue seems to affect only certain southbridges, the SB700, SB710, and SB750. There's no word on newer generations of southbridges with SATA 6 Gb/s controllers and FIS switches, such as SB850, SB950, and A-series FCH chipsets, being affected. Our SB950-based motherboard isn't showing any signs of instability. AMD rebuilt the suite without the affected driver when it re-posted the suite later on Monday.



View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[GreiverBlade]

There's no word on newer generations of southbridges with SATA 6 Gb/s controllers and FIS switches, such as SB850, SB950, and A-series FCH chipsets, being affected. Our SB950-based motherboard isn't showing any signs of instability. AMD rebuilt the suite without the affected driver when it re-posted the suite later on Monday.Source: Heise.de

no instability or problems of any sort noticed on my build (A88X chipset) for myself, at last.

 

[pidgin]

no instability or problems of any sort noticed on my build (A88X chipset) for myself, at last.

My driver was crashing about 1-4 times per day on A88X system + 270X. After toying around with different versions finally looks stable with the latest ones.

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

Why are they bundling motherboard drivers with their graphics drivers anyways?

 

[Aquinus]

Why are they bundling motherboard drivers with their graphics drivers anyways?

...because they have more than just graphics components? I think this is mainly beneficial for APU and SoC users since you know that they'll always have an AMD chipset. I could see them making an argument for killing two birds with one stone. I would just prefer them actually tell us things like this before doing it though and actually giving you the option to install it or not. I'm not sure if the option is there or not, but I'm assuming it's not since no one has seem to have seen it.

 

[Mathragh]

These drivers were the first drivers in quite a while that caused me bluescreens. This hasn't happened for quite a while, even with me always using the latest beta drivers.

 

[medo]

Why are they bundling motherboard drivers with their graphics drivers anyways?

Here, Here +1

 

[GreiverBlade]

My driver was crashing about 1-4 times per day on A88X system + 270X. After toying around with different versions finally looks stable with the latest ones.

i had a 270 (non X) + a X4 760K on that A88X setup: never had a problem of any sort or crash, only when i had a GTX580 between my 270 and 270X swap, some minor problems appeared : stuttering in game, non working USB3.0 (clean removale + re installation of all the drivers) even a fresh Win install didn't do the trick ( at last not completely) but the A10-7700K + R7 240 or the A10 7700K + R9 270X no problems at all (13.2 or 14.4)

my graphic driver only crash upon unstable OC

Why are they bundling motherboard drivers with their graphics drivers anyways?

Here, Here +1

...because they have more than just graphics components? I think this is mainly beneficial for APU and SoC users since you know that they'll always have an AMD chipset. I could see them making an argument for killing two birds with one stone. I would just prefer them actually tell us things like this before doing it though and actually giving you the option to install it or not. I'm not sure if the option is there or not, but I'm assuming it's not since no one has seem to have seen it.

well ... Aquinus answered pretty right.
and also whether you install AMD AllInOne driver or Catalyst the program choose the right component to install or let you choose the one you want upon system configuration detection (expert installation : custom installation) ... so where is the problem to pack 2 set of drivers in 1 package???

 

[pidgin]

What's the difference between the all-in-ones that mobo sites offer compared to the AMD ones? All-in-ones are ~twice the size

 

[john_]

This is maybe an older problem because with the latest* AMD AHCI drivers I couldn't boot in Windows 7. I had to go back to Microsoft drivers for this to be fixed. That on a 790FX board(MSI 790FX-GD70). On an ECS 890GX board, no problems.
The problem was that at windows logo the system wouldn't continue booting but instead it was like getting stuck doing retries again and again. Something wasn't right.


*latest meaning a few versions not the last one

 

[RejZoR]

Why are they bundling motherboard drivers with their graphics drivers anyways?

What's even worse, those AHCI drivers aren't even getting installed on my AMD E-450 laptop. I have to force insatll them by hand. Really lame. Before they offered a clean separate installer for SATA AHCI and it always worked fine. Until few months ago when they fucked all up.

 

[TheMailMan78]

People always call me a "fanboi" when I complain about AMD drivers. Its not because I dislike AMD or favor NVIDIA because I like the color green. Its because of things like this. AMD has gotten much better with their drivers. However when I used to run AMD EXCLUSIVELY FOR YEARS this kinda stuff was far more common than it was on the NVIDIA side.

Does NVIDIA have driver issues? SURE! But.....they are far less common on the green side. My sympathy goes out to anyone who got a BSOD because of this. I've been there and it sucks. AMD needs a driver team like NVIDIAs because their hardware is awesome. Its the damn software that sucks.

 

[Bow]

Nothing but problems, Took several tries to install, crashing, stuttering,

 

[pidgin]

Drivers just crashed again, twice

and BSOD

 

[pidgin]

Yeah I'm on AMD for the first time this year and experience is terrible compared to intel+nvidia

~once a day my monitor won't wake up from sleep, have to replug DVI cable to get picture

 

[GreiverBlade]

People always call me a "fanboi" when I complain about AMD drivers. Its not because I dislike AMD or favor NVIDIA because I like the color green. Its because of things like this. AMD has gotten much better with their drivers. However when I used to run AMD EXCLUSIVELY FOR YEARS this kinda stuff was far more common than it was on the NVIDIA side.

Does NVIDIA have driver issues? SURE! But.....they are far less common on the green side. My sympathy goes out to anyone who got a BSOD because of this. I've been there and it sucks. AMD needs a driver team like NVIDIAs because their hardware is awesome. Its the damn software that sucks.

well it depends on user... as i wrote i had problems only with nV cards and driver and less with AMD also never got a BSOD in years be it AMD/AMD or Intel/Nvidia

Yeah I'm on AMD for the first time this year and experience is terrible compared to intel+nvidia

~once a day my monitor won't wake up from sleep, have to replug DVI cable to get picture

i had this issue with my previous rig who featured a Xeon E3-1275v2 and a GTX 770

 

[xBruce88x]

No problems so far with my SB700 system. Also, I think the option is there in the installer. Not 100% sure but i did remember seeing a list of components to choose from.

 

[Mussels]

Hmmmm.... i've been having BSOD's for a little while now thats graphics related, but its to do with turning off my TV before sleeping teh computer.

seems like turning the TV off counts as unplugging HDMI, and the PC gets a bit unhappy if that happens before its asleep.

 

[MustSeeMelons]

Didn't have any problems installing, but with the new drivers my GPU wasn't boosting to it's max clock in Crysis 3, so I went back to 13.12. Next car game runs so much better with it.

 

[Tatty_Two]

I must be a very lucky boy, had an AMD card for 2 years now and not ever had a single BSOD, I am sure however that should NVida read this they will no doubt message me to convince me that they can better a 0% driver fail rate by some margin

 

[GreiverBlade]

I must be a very lucky boy, had an AMD card for 2 years now and not ever had a single BSOD, I am sure however that should NVida read this they will no doubt message me to convince me that they can better a 0% driver fail rate by some margin

ahahah that post made my day thanks!

 

[Tatty_Two]

ahahah that post made my day thanks!

Well to be fair, I am not trying to dismiss issues that some users are having, I acknowledge there have been issues, before this card I had a GTX 560Ti for a year and I had no driver issues with that either.... clearly I am a lucky boy!

 

[GreiverBlade]

Well to be fair, I am not trying to dismiss issues that some users are having, I acknowledge there have been issues, before this card I had a GTX 560Ti for a year and I had no driver issues with that either.... clearly I am a lucky boy!

nono i mean the funny statement is just what i needed to forget about the pain in the *ss that i have to do a nocturne today ...
and as you can read i had several gpus from both brand and never had any serious issues ... just the one with the A88X and the GTX580 was annoying

 

[R-T-B]

People always call me a "fanboi" when I complain about AMD drivers. Its not because I dislike AMD or favor NVIDIA because I like the color green. Its because of things like this. AMD has gotten much better with their drivers. However when I used to run AMD EXCLUSIVELY FOR YEARS this kinda stuff was far more common than it was on the NVIDIA side.

Does NVIDIA have driver issues? SURE! But.....they are far less common on the green side. My sympathy goes out to anyone who got a BSOD because of this. I've been there and it sucks. AMD needs a driver team like NVIDIAs because their hardware is awesome. Its the damn software that sucks.

That has been my experience. I'm truly not a fanboi too, I've run both NVIDIA and AMD and switch between them frequently. I recomend NVIDIA to people who don't want to have issues. I personally am currently running AMD because the Graphics Corenext architecture is pretty awesome, and I don't mind messing with stuff.

Individual experiences may vary of course. It's the nature of PC builds.

 

[Blín D'ñero]

[...]
I recomend NVIDIA to people who don't want to have issues.
[...]

Lots of laughs. Hopefully nobody takes your "recommendation" seriously; both brands have issues.