New Intel Grahpics Chipset Drivers!

[Thagarr]

It's not often I post anything hardware related on the front page, but then again it isn't often that I find hardware news that is really going to affect a lot of users in a big way. Although technically this is software news, it has the potential to affect a lot of peoples stock hardware hopefully for the better! Intel graphics chipset have long been a joke in the gaming world, they may do just fine for business applications, but computers are meant for gaming! A few weeks ago, AMD unveiled a new set of drivers that dramatically improved performance on their graphics cards and chipsets, that's not news though, AMD\ATI has been doing that for years. Apparently this time though, the improvement was so dramatic that even Intel noticed and decided they had to do something about it! Intel has unveiled new chipset drivers that improve graphics performance in games as much as 40%, a dramatic improvement on their stock hardware! This is big news for a lot of people around PA, as it has the potential to solve a LOT of problems people have had playing POTC, AOP and CoAS.

I have spent many, many hours pouring over the forums helping people over the years, and a lot of the time, the problem has been Intel graphics chipsets! Until now, really the only solution was to try Swiftshader and hope that worked, but that solution really slows things dramatically. Swiftshader is a software solution to a hardware problem, and it takes precious CPU cycles away from what would normally be used for running the games. Intel's drivers work natively with their own hardware, freeing up the CPU to do what it is supposed to be doing. I ran across this article over over at KitGuru Gaming, a British gaming news site.

Yesterday, KitGuru attended an unusual press-conference. It was called the Intel Tweet Up and the idea behind it was that each presentation would only take two minutes. We were shown Solid State Drives the size of a matchbox, TV’s that know what you want to watch and a working Asus Utrabook, this season’s ultimate laptop. There was even an attempt to explain how Intel makes its chips, in layman’s terms. It was still too complicated. But what caught this writer’s attention was the outrageous claim by Intel’s Anna Cheng that a new set of graphics drivers will boost the video performance of their chips by 40%. We were shown two identical laptops. Both were displaying Tom Clancy’s HAWX 2 on medium visual settings. Yes, it’s not Crysis 2 or something similarly demanding, but stock Intel GPU owners will testify that running any modern game on such a device is a pain. The one on the right was using the old set of graphics drivers, and stuttering quite a bit. The one on the left was running smoothly. When the benchmark ended, we were presented with numbers. 15 frame per second maximum on the right laptop, and 79 on the left. The difference was due to new software, which very soon you will be able to download for free. Among other games optimized for HD chips we spotted Dragon Age 2, Star Craft 2 and Assassin’s Creed. Not too shabby.

I really don't know if this will help performance in POTC, AOP or CoAS, and that is part of the reason I am posting this! If you have an Intel graphics chipset and you try these new drivers, we want to hear about your experience and if they helped or hurt your game performance! As soon as I am able to find a link for the driver download, I will post it here. Please post your experiences here!

**EDIT**

Intel's download center is HERE, but I am not sure if the new drivers are available yet.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Definitely worth a try.

 

[Jonty]

Well it does sound like exciting news, for the people with the chipsets of course. ATI is still doing me proud with the up to date drivers. But will this mean that if I buy a new computer in the future, should I buy a motherboard with integrated intel graphics rather than that of AMD graphics in future? Would I reap better results if I bought the integrated intel graphics and installed the drivers, or the other option? Because if I am to buy different components for a new computer, I would need to know what would reap maximum results at the lowest price within my budget. I don't know everything there is to know about cost effective hardware within a budget range, so thats why I need help from time to time. Hell, in just under a yea's time, there will be better things, so it would make more sense to ask then. But I digress...

 

[Thagarr]

At this point Jonty, I think Intel is just playing catchup in the graphics department. This is something they should have concentrated on 10 years ago! If you buy a desktop, you should definitely have at least one dedicated graphics card, preferably AMD or Nvidia. These drivers may help, but Intel is still far behind on anything hardware graphics related. If your getting a laptop, I have the same opinion, if you plan on doing any gaming at all, you need a dedicated graphics chipset. And you are absolutely correct mate, when your ready to buy a year form now, hardware will have changed a lot.

Integrated graphics would save you money for sure, and that's why motherboard manufacturers do it, but you will never get near the performance of dedicated graphics hardware. It is rather handy to have integrated graphics in some situations. For instance, if your dedicated card dies, you always have the motherboard backup to fall back on. I have just seen way to many problems with Intel graphics over the years to recommend them to anyone. I am sincerely hoping that these new drives do work for a lot of people and they are able to play games that they couldn't before, but time will tell.

 

[tommy61157]

Good to hear that intel is actually getting their s*** together when it comes to making graphics cards. About time.

 

[Black Bart]

A lot if issues we seem to get are either from people trying PotC+build mod on a Laptop or using desktops that come with intel on-board GPU solutions, so this does indeed hold lots of promise for those players. Amazing what a bit of competition in the market place can do, fingers crossed it works for PotC

 

[tommy61157]

Competition is good for sure in any market :ixi

 

[Thagarr]

I have done some looking over the past couple of days, and I have yet to find out any additional information. The newest drivers I could find on Intel's download center were for Linux and dated 8-23-11, so it doesn't look like they have released anything yet. Given what I know about Intel and the way most hardware manufacturers work, when they do release these new drivers, they will most likely only work for their latest hardware.

I find it very strange that I am only able to find information about this on just one web page, surely there had to be more than just one tech writer there. If these numbers are anywhere even close to accurate, that is big news! I would think this is the kind of thing Intel would want to make sure got some good circulation.

 

[Black Bart]

maybe as the gulf in performance between on-board gpu's(yes even those new fancy sandy-bridge ones and the new amd line) and seperate gpu's is still so vast they figure the market share is small? It's true many more people game on a laptop, but for years now(and still really in most top end AAA games that are gpu intensive) you need a seperate card in even a laptop to get 'average' performance. I think it still is the case that to be a modern serious gamer you need a seperate GPU over on-board. So maybe they just don't think many 'gamers' will be that interested? Which may or may not be true, but certainly for laptop gamers that use on-board gpus this is big news.

 

[tommy61157]

*smashes a rum bottle on black bart's head* Untrue to a larger degree than you think, not many gamers can afford a fancy set-up like that (unless they pirate their games), so there is still a large market they could tap into, especially in the USA. Black Bart will come to in about 30 minutes, just got tired of everyone saying the consumer is fine because we can throw money at some other obscure investment, now, where's my rum... oh, yeah... *Walks away slowly*

 

[Thagarr]

Save the brawlin for the brig tommy.

Black Bart is absolutely correct, every gaming laptop i know of in the past couple of years has been released with a dedicated graphics chipset, or some have a combination with shared Intel on-board graphics.

If you want the best possible gaming performance, there is simply no alternative to a desktop with a dedicated graphics card, or four. Whether it is affordable or not is another matter entirely.

 

[Thagarr]

Hmmm, I think I have found where the confusion about these new drivers is coming from, and why this issue has not been very well publicized by Intel. I saw this article originally a few days ago, but really paid it no mind at the time, I just read the headline and moved on. I think the tech writer that wrote the original article either didn't understand what he was being shown, or simply misunderstood.

I believe this was a demonstration of Intel's new graphics chipset to compete with AMD's new Fusion, I haven't yet found definitive proof, but everything I have been able to find so far points to this as the only logical conclusion.

Intel Cedar Trail delayed due to DirectX, will lack key features

It seems that Intel's attempt to make its next-generation 32nm Cedar Trail Atom platform more competitive in the graphics department and perhaps go toe-to-toe with AMD's Fusion APU's will result in a two-month delay and better yet, when it finally ships, a handful of the platform's more exciting features will be crippled by incomplete drivers.

The problems seem to have arisen from Intel's decision to outsource the GPU on its upcoming Cedarview Atom processors. Instead of sticking to the Intel GMA line of integrated graphics solutions, Intel is using the newer PowerVR SGX545, a DirectX 10.1 GPU that is similar to those found in the latest ARM-powered tablets and should be twice as fast as the integrated GMA 3150 found in the two-year-old Atom Pine Trail/Pineview chips. The SGX545 is a tenacious GPU that should give the Atom platform a little more oomph, and possibly power a brief netbook (or Chromebook) resurgence.

In theory the SGX545 should make Cedar Trail DirectX 10.1-compatible, anyway: in reality, according to DigiTimes, Intel is struggling to get its drivers certified for Windows 7. Not only will this delay the platform's release by two months, but VR-Zone is reporting that Intel is now also planning to only ship 32-bit DX9 drivers initially with 64-bit DX9 drivers due sometime before the end of the year, and DX10 drivers following sometime in 2012. This means that OEMs won't be able to ship 64-bit Windows 7 on any netbooks that are released in time for Christmas but hopefully the updated drivers will be shipped out via Windows Update so that users can eventually actually enjoy DX10′s shiny new shaders. Incidentally, the SGX545 is also OpenGL 3.2-compatible, but there's no word on what state Intel's OpenGL drivers are in.

There is probably an internal reason for it, but it's odd that Intel hasn't just used PowerVR's internal, reference drivers. According to VR-Zone, Intel is also having problems with Wireless Display and Smart Connect, two of Intel's more exciting mobile-oriented technologies, so perhaps DirectX is merely collateral damage.

Finally, it's worth noting that Cedarview is basically Intel's answer to AMD's Brazos (Fusion) platform but Brazos has a DirectX 11-capable GPU with drivers that actually work.

My apologies mates, I should do more thorough research before I post these things. I have just tried to help so many people with Intel graphics over the years, I let my enthusiasm for a possible solution take over.

Original story HERE!