It’s tedious at times, but keeping up with the latest drivers is the best way to make sure your PC is performing at its best. That’s true no matter what component you’re talking about, and it’s definitely true about one of the most important components, the graphical processing unit (GPU).
While many component drivers are updated when the operating system is updated, some are most often updated separately, and the GPU falls into the latter category. In fact, AMD just released the latest version of its Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition software, offering a number of important fixes and enhancements.
First up for version 17.2.1 is the obligatory performance improvements. This time around, AMD focused on two titles. For Honor received optimizations providing up to a four percent performance improvement on an RX 480 compared to AMD’s 17.1.2 software version. Sniper Elite 4 is the other optimized title, receiving up to a 5 percent performance improvement. In addition, both titles also received multi-GPU support for DirectX 11.
AMD also fixed a number of issues in version 17.2.1, and here are the highlights:
- For Honor should no longer crash when switching to full screen or menu view while playing on multi-GPU configurations.
- A problem that caused some Radeon GCN products to experience corruption when fast forwarding or seeking through DXVA H.264 encoded video.
- Some full-screen applications that were causing AMD FreeSync technology to fail to load should no longer do so.
- Counter-Strike: Global Offensive should no longer show incorrect slider values when Radeon Chill is turned on.
- The system information overlay on video captured using Radeon ReLive should no longer omit graphics processor information.
- DayZ should no longer crash when Radeon ReLive Instant Replay/Recording is active.
- Radeon R9 380 series GPUs should no longer experience having their memory clocks become locked at low states.
- Radeon ReLive recording played in fullscreen mode in Windows Media Player or Power DVD should no longer demonstrate flickering.
- AMD Radeon HD 7900 series GPUs should be able to disable shadows in Civilization VI without experiencing shadow corruption.
You can download the new drivers at the AMD support pages. While there, you can also check out the complete list of changes to the Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition.
