14 DAY TRIAL // Sunnyvale, California-based Advanced Micro Devices announced today the release of a new set of graphics drivers, specifically designed to cater to the needs of professional users. The new drivers are now available for download and will deliver support to users of ATI FirePro graphics cards. According to the chip maker, updating to the latest release should provide consumers with more than 20 percent improvement in performance in applications such as assault Systèmes CATIA, Autodesk 3ds Max and PTC ProENGINEER.
“With more than 20 percent performance improvement for many industry leading applications, this new performance driver increases the value for both existing and new ATI FirePro users,” said Janet Matsuda, senior director, AMD Professional Graphics. “Certified on more than 90 professional applications, ATI FirePro graphics drivers provide the right combination of application performance, reliability and feature support today’s professional need.”
Among the key features of the new release, the company claims that Dassault Systèmes CATIA should see a 25 performance boost, while Autodesk 3ds Max and PTC Pro/Engineer users will get a performance increment of more than 20 percent. In addition, the 8.702 driver version will enable Adobe Photoshop CS4 users to render images with 10-bit per component color and will support numerous active, passive and autostereoscopic displays, blue-line stereo for synchronization with 3D glasses. The new release also enables ATI FirePro professional graphics card to provide support for 5.1 Dolby Digital and 5.1 DTS surround sound and 8-channel and 2-channel uncompressed audio.
As with the recent Catalyst 10.2 drivers release, for Radeon graphics cards, AMD plans to launch bi-monthly driver updates for notebooks that have been designed with ATI FirePro graphics chips, as part of a collaboration with workstation notebook manufacturers. The new release is available for download through the company's website, where users will be prompted to choose their operating system and graphics card model.