NEW Catalyst 6.6 out now.

[Papa6 88]

Catalyst® Release Note Version 6.6

This release note provides information on the latest posting of ATI's industry leading software suite, Catalyst®. This particular software suite updates both the ATI Display Driver (version 8.263), and the Catalyst® Control Center (version 6.6). This unified driver has been further enhanced to provide the highest level of power, performance, and reliability. The ATI Catalyst® software suite is the ultimate in performance and stability.

The Catalyst® 6.6 Release Note provides information on the following:

* Web Content

* ATI Desktop product family support

* ATI Chipset Product Support

* Operating systems supported

* New Features

* Performance Improvements

* Issues Resolved in Catalyst® Software Suite 6.6

* Known Issues for Catalyst® Software Suite 6.6

* ATI Customer Care

* Installing the latest Catalyst® Software Suite

* Catalyst® Crew Driver Feedback

Web Content

The Catalyst® software suite 6.6 contains the following:

* Radeon® display driver 8.263

* Multimedia Centerâ„¢ 9.14

* HydraVisionâ„¢

* HydraVisionâ„¢ Basic Edition

* Remote Wonder 3.04

* WDM Driver Install Bundle

* Southbridge/IXP Driver

* Catalyst® Control Center Version 6.6

Caution: The Catalyst® software driver and the Catalyst® Control Center can be downloaded independently of each other. However, for maximum stability and performance ATI recommends that both components be updated from the same Catalyst® release.

Caution: The Catalyst® Control Center requires that the Microsoft .NET Framework version 1.1 or 2.0 be installed. Without .NET version 1.1 or 2.0 installed, the Catalyst® Control Center will not launch properly and the user will see an error message.

Note: These release notes provide information on the Radeon® display driver only. For information on the ATI Multimedia Center™, HydraVision™, HydraVision Basic Edition, WDM, Remote Wonder™, or the Southbridge/IXP driver, please refer to their respective release notes found at: https://support.ati.com/

ATI Desktop product family support

The Catalyst® software suite is designed to support the following ATI desktop products:

* Radeon® X1900 series

* Radeon® X1800 series

* Radeon® X1600 series

* Radeon® X1300 series

* Radeon® X850 series

* Radeon® X800 series

* Radeon® X700 series

* Radeon® X600 series

* Radeon® X550 series

* Radeon® X300 series

* Radeon® 9800 series

* Radeon® 9700 series

* Radeon® 9650 series

* Radeon® 9600 series

* Radeon® 9550 series

* Radeon® 9500 series

Note: ATI All-In-Wonderâ„¢ variants based on the above are also supported.

Note: Unsupported desktop products:

# Radeon® 9250 series

# Radeon® 9200 series

# Radeon® 9000 series

# Radeon® 8500 series

# Radeon® 7500 series

# Radeon® 7200 series

# Radeon® 7000 series

Drivers for these products can be found here

ATI All-in-Wonder variants based on the above are also unsupported.

Note: All ATI Radeon® PC Graphic cards are optimized for Microsoft's Media Center Edition 2005 when coupled with a supported video capture card.

ATI Chipset Product Support

The Catalyst® software suite is designed to supportthe following ATI chipset products:

* CrossFireâ„¢ Xpress 3200

* CrossFireâ„¢ Xpress 1600

* Radeon® Xpress 200 series (for both Intel and AMD Processors)

Note: Software driver support and release notes for earlier ATI products can be found at: http://www.support.ati.com/.

Operating systems supported

The latest version of the Catalyst® software suite is designed to support the following Microsoft Windows platforms:

* Windows XP

* Windows XP Media Center Edition (graphics driver support only)

New Features

This release of Catalyst® introduces the following new features:

* Avivoâ„¢ Video Converter Extension for Windows Media Center Edition

* Theater 650 Pro TV Tuner Support

Avivoâ„¢ Video Converter Extension for Windows Media Center Edition

Catalyst® 6.6 introduces a Windows Media Center Edition Video Conversion utility. This utility will allow users to convert video content that is either recorded or available to Media Center Edition to a variety of different formats. The video content can be converted to MPEG-2, MPEG-4 SP, MPEG-4/AVC and Windows Media. iPod video and Sony PSP’s are also supported with an optimized profile for these devices.

Theater 650 Pro TV Tuner Support

Catalyst® 6.6 includes support for NTSC/ATSC and PAL/SECAM/DVB-T products based on the Theater 650 Pro TV Tuner chip. The Theater 650 Pro is a new chip from ATI for multimedia cards and DTV-on-a-chip solutions, integrating hardware video encoding, digital audio with noise reduction, and hardware PVR functions in a single chip.

Performance Improvements

As with most Catalyst® releases, performance has increased in various situations.

* Far Cry performance improves 4-5%. Larger gains of up to 18.3% can be seen when using anisotropic filtering.

* Fear performance improves as much as 8.5% on X1800 and X1900 Single card systems and as much as 14% on X1800 and X1900 Crossfire systems.

* Splinter Cell (original) performance improves as much a 7% on X1300 and X1600 Crossfire systems.

Issues Resolved in Catalyst® Software Suite 6.6

The following section provides a summary of the issues that are resolved in the latest release of Catalyst®. These include:

* Catalyst® Control Center: Connecting a display device capable of displaying a resolution of 1680x1050 to an ATI Radeon® X1900 no longer results in the display mode of 1680x1050 not being available in the Display Manager aspect. Further details on this resolved issue can be found in topic number 737-22011

* Using Catalyst® 6.3 or higher along with the MMC version 9.13 and performing a TV channel scan no longer results in some higher TV channels failing to be detected. Further information on this resolved issue can be found in topic number 737-21890

* Catalyst Control Center: Playing a media file using the Windows Media Player version 10 no longer results in Theater Mode exhibiting the same behavior as the Same on All option when clone mode is enabled 737-22504

* The pulldown detection check box is no longer greyed out under the All Settings for bob and adaptive settings found in the Catalyst Control Center 737-22508

* Clicking the Default button for AA and AF now restores the default setting for AA and AF 737-22512

* Placing the mouse pointer over the Temporal anti-aliasing check box found in the Anti-Aliasing aspect of the Catalyst Control Center no longer results in the tool tip for Let the application decide being displayed 737-22517

* Theater Mode is now functioning properly under the Windows 2000 operating system when clone mode is enabled 737-22614

* Audio is no longer lost when quickly and repeatedly toggling between two TV channels 737-22615

* The Desktop Area list found in the Display Settings is now translated for the Russian language when using the Basic View of the Catalyst Control Center 737-22519

* Setting the Catalyst Control Center skin to Quick Silver along with the display resolution to 800x600 when the language is set to Greek no longer results in cropped text being noticed in the Video->All Settings aspect 737-22529

* The Apply button in the CV Properties aspect of the Catalyst Control Center now become active when adding a custom format 737-22538

* x29: AV no longer occurs when fast window tracking is set to on 737-22643

* Minimizing the TV window using the TV Adjustments found in the Catalyst Control Center followed by attempting to drag the TV window around the desktop using the mouse no longer results in the TV window failing to move properly 737-22539

* DVD playback no longer blinks and the system entering a busy state no longer occurs when using the Windows Media Player v10 and having Theater Mode enabled in the Catalyst Control Center 737-22616

* Connecting a CRT as a secondary display device and enabling clone mode no longer results in unsupported display modes being available in the Catalyst Control Center for th

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