AMD Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Driver Launch Slides Leaked

In line with expectations, AMD is set to release new drivers this month with WHQL certification. As it is also the one year anniversary since the new Crimson Edition initiative was launched, we are also expecting a new major refresh for the drivers. Luckily for us, some of the launch slides for the new release have been leaked. Dubbed Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition, the new drivers launch this Thursday, December 8th.

First off the big focus, of course, will be on Radeon Software side specific improvements. Of course, there are the usual list of bug fixes and what not expected for a WHQL release. The company has also devoted 25% more resources to QA and testing. Performance improvements, however, are where it’s at. Compared to the 16.6.2 driver from the middle of the year, AMD is claiming up to 8% boost in performance in some titles.

In terms of new features, VP9 Decode acceleration is being added but it remains to be seen which GPUs will be able to make use of it. FreeSync is also getting improved with a new windowed borderless fullscreen mode. AMD is also adding a signal detection utility to troubleshoot HDMI cables. Lastly, Radeon WattMan support is being expanded to support everything GCN 1.1 and above.

Another major feature is Radeon Chill, a new efficiency feature. Radeon Chill detects if the game is displaying any high motion activity and adjusts the frame rate to respond. This helps reduce temperature by up to 13% and power consumption by 31%. While you might think that a lower FPS might impact responsiveness, AMD has worked around that. By reducing the FPS during low movement, the GPU queue is less full. This means when something does need to happen, it can happen a low faster with reduced latency and frame times. Right now the feature only works with certain compatible games so it remains to be seen how real world performance will be like. Of course, it is a completely optional feature.

Lastly, we come to the title feature, Radeon ReLive. The new feature is an overarching digital video recording tool built into Radeon Software. This allows for Instant Replay, Record, Stream and Screenshot. Instead of being only in use during games, it appears this might be a system wide feature. Hopefully, we will get more details about all of the upcoming features in just 2 days.