ATI has released the sixth edition of its graphics card driver Catalyst, I.e. Catalyst 8.6 which brings a whole bunch of performance and some new functions. First of all, ATI has revised the performance in several popular games and benchmarks. The performance in 3DMark Vantage has been boosted by 10-15% with the Radeon HD 3000 and HD 2000 series. The graphics cards series can enjoy performance boosts in Call of Duty 4 (up to 35%), Call of Juarez DX10 (2-9%), Lost Planet, Prey and Quake 4. Also ShaderMark 2.1 and ViewPerf 10 should see significant improvements with Catalyst 8.6 and ATI's latest graphics card series.
The new functions include a highly anticipated improved support for OpenGL as ATI has added both Adaptive Anti-Aliasing custom filters and CrossFireX support for OpenGL. You can now use 3 or 4 graphics cards in OpenGL-based games and get a substantial boost. Last but certainly not least, ATI has reworked the installation process and from now on you won't have to reboot your computer after a Catalyst upgrade. The drivers support ATI Radeon HD 4800 series too, just not officially.
More information about Catalyst 8.6 and download links can be found over at at AMD's website.
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