ATI/OGL driver issue

[22point8]

Below is all the evidence I have found so far to show how well known their OpenGL drivers are to be problematic:
Another FFVII

FFVII black triangles?

Pete`s Messageboard Forum - PSX GPU plugins - Attn Pete: OpenGL GPU Plugin, vertex buffer/primitive assembly bug - Seite 1

Pete`s Messageboard Forum - PSX GPU plugins - New drivers, new problems. OGL2 - Seite 1

Pete`s Messageboard Forum - PSX GPU plugins - Opengl plugins on vista ? - Seite 1

Performance issues w/ Pete's OpenGL2 2.8 and Vista/Vista ATI Drivers

Extreme graphics Gliches on FFIX

Black traingles problem on XP

openGL misses with all driver execpt this one... - DriverHeaven.net

Epsxe emulation ATi Radeon drivers?! - DriverHeaven.net

Why do my games look like this? - The Emulator Zone Forum

AMD Game Forums - ATI 9600 pro Opengl does not work

- ATI Driver Issues

ATI Catalyst 8.3 Out Now - Page 2 - DriverHeaven.net

[Mako Eyes]

Originally Posted by 22point8

Below is all the evidence I have found so far to show how well known their OpenGL drivers are to be ****:

I don't understand where these problems are coming from. I can't say I have even come remotely close to such issues using WindowsXP. My X800 runs OGL2 plugins flawlessly using Omega's drivers.

[22point8]

Mako Eyes, can you post a screenshot of your [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\OpenGLDrivers\ati2dvag] folder because I had to manually create mine for OpenGL extension viewer to recognise the ICD.

[jonc2006]

Originally Posted by Mako Eyes

I don't understand where these problems are coming from. I can't say I have even come remotely close to such issues using WindowsXP. My X800 runs OGL2 plugins flawlessly using Omega's drivers.

from what i understand it seems to be the catalyst drivers that are at fault.

[Clements]

I have exactly the same issue, so I just use Pete's D3D plugins and it works fine. ATI ought to get the drivers sorted anyway.

[jonc2006]

i wouldnt hold my breath. ive talked to several people who have attempted to get them to do something about this and they have told me they were completely ignored.

edit- and i would imagine there has been a decent amount of other people complaining because (and anyone can correct me if im wrong here because like i said before, im just going off the large amount of talk and what i have heard/read about this) this isnt limited to the OGL plugins, apparently it affects other OGL applications, so they cant use the "not important enough" cop-out.

[Mako Eyes]

Originally Posted by 22point8

Mako Eyes, can you post a screenshot of your [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\OpenGLDrivers\ati2dvag] folder because I had to manually create mine for OpenGL extension viewer to recognise the ICD.

Here you go. I did absolutely no manual editing. Actually, I haven't even tried using ATi's factory drivers with ePSXe.

[Degeon]

I suggest making a petition for Ati, bringing all the evidence we have about these problems that connects them to Ati drivers, and see what they do with it. I'll sign (I have these problems too)

[jonc2006]

good luck on that one.

[22point8]

Thanks Mako Eyes, thats exactly what I have except I had to change atioglxx to atio6axx because I'm on Vista x64. Degeon, see if you have that registry entry, I had to add it manually it enabled the ICD but not hardware acceleration.

[jonc2006]

so you have found a fix for this issue? lol ATI owes you fools a job.

[22point8]

Only a partial fix, look at one of the screenshots in my first post from PC Wizard 2008 v1.84 you'll see that I have no OpenGL hardware acceleration ("software, no"), I believe Degeon can confirm this too. However, on my other computer (P4 Northwood 2.66ghz, 1gb ram, Nvidia FX5200 AGP) it says "hardware, yes".

I don't understand where these problems are coming from. I can't say I have even come remotely close to such issues using WindowsXP. My X800 runs OGL2 plugins flawlessly using Omega's drivers.

You're lucky Mako Eyes, see this: AMD Game Forums - OpenGL with a Radeon X800xt on Vista

[Degeon]

yes, PC Wizard Shows Software acceleration as well...
hhmmm, I have atioglx2.dll in the value, but im talking XP-ish most of the time. Ati drivers for XP and Vista are "radicaly" different. should I leave it at that?

[22point8]

ATi are false advertsing Radeon™ X1600 Series - GPU Specifications

Ultra-Threaded Shader Engine

* Support for Microsoft® DirectX® 9.0 Shader Model 3.0 programmable vertex and pixel shaders in hardware
* Full speed 128-bit floating point processing for all shader operations
* Up to 128 simultaneous pixel threads
* Dedicated branch execution units for high performance dynamic branching and flow control
* Dedicated texture address units for improved efficiency
* 3Dc+ texture compression
o High quality 4:1 compression for normal maps and two-channel data formats
o High quality 2:1 compression for luminance maps and single-channel data formats
* Multiple Render Target (MRT) support
* Render to vertex buffer support
* Complete feature set also supported in OpenGL® 2.0

[jonc2006]

i suppose you could sort of say that. but this seems to be more of a driver issue than it is a card model issue. i believe the cards themselves are *capable* of supporting OGL fully, its just their drivers that have the ****ty support.

[Mako Eyes]

Originally Posted by jonc2006

so you have found a fix for this issue? lol ATI owes you fools a job.

Haha, zing.

Originally Posted by 22point8

You're lucky Mako Eyes, see this: AMD Game Forums - OpenGL with a Radeon X800xt on Vista

Am I? Like I said, I never use ATi's factory drivers and I'm running Windows XP. Whether or not these problems will occur on my machine when running on Catalyst drivers and/or Vista is yet to be determined.

[jonc2006]

from what i have heard its just the catalyst drivers. i imagine if you were to test some out you would run into this.

[22point8]

I don't know if anyone knew this, but ATi covered up (didn't mention in known issues or knowledge base) that AGP cards were broken (no Direct3D/hardware video decoding) from Catalyst 7.8 to 8.1 hotfix, I think the OMEGA drivers still worked.

[PCXL-Fan]

Go start a class action lawsuit against them.

[Degeon]

If I remember correctly Omega's didn't work for me either... I'll wait for a newer driver because his last one is 7-12 me thinks...


It is really weird that the Ati drivers causes these sort of things. I know that they are main suspects in this case but we have to keep an open mind and check other leads as well.
i have a few ideas for "experimentation" to try and isolate the problem
1) Have anyone who have experienced the problem tried using a different VGA and/or main board?

I have tried using an Ati HD 2600 for testing, but it doesn't count(and, obviously, it didn't work)
if possible, we need someone to test it on an Nvidia card and/or replaced main board(with the same model).
if someone replaces something, and the problem appears or disappears any info would be value
Main boardnew/old model and revision if possible), New and old Bios vr. PCI-E or AGP(new vs. Old)
VGA: Compeny(Asus Radeon/nNvidia for example) suffix(GTO, XT etc.) drivers(Official,Omega's. witch vr?)
OS: XP, Vista? 32/64Bit?

2)also, if someone who suffer from these could provide evidence on the absence of the problem on Omega drivers and the registry value 22point8 has aforementioned?(For xp and Vista)

3)the same (question nu. 2) applies with someone who hasn't experienced the problem and we'll need the registry values of the Ati factory Drivers and Omega Driver's Value as well (For XP and Vista)

4) don't we need to name this phenomena?
I say the Triangles of Doom! :P

anyway, I know this may be difficult to accomplish but if more and more people would volunteer to help we may be able to prove/dispute our claim about the drivers. and maybe to find a solution on our own(As Ati, doesn't really care, apparently)
Since I have both Xp and Vista, I'll try Omega Drivers on both OS's.
speaking of vista, did Omega solved the Driver signing problem on Vista x64? normally that OS is designed to allow the installation of Signed drivers only(witch is secure, but may cause problems on some hardware manifacturers)