Catalyst 12.1 Preview enables customized Crossfire profiles

Anyone who owns a modern-looking Radeon can soon download a new driver from AMD. The new Catalyst 12.1 Preview contains several interesting news, but the most anticipated is the ability to sew together application profiles for Crossfire.

News in Catalyst 12.1 Preview

• Ability to create individual application profiles for Crossfire and HD3D

• AMD HD3D for Crossfire configurations

• Support for 1080p at 30 Hz via HDMI 1.4a

• Simplified control panel for video quality and color settings

• Skyrim: 10 percent better performance with MSAA enabled (Radeon HD 6900)

Unlike Nvidia, AMD has previously always had control over the necessary application profiles for Crossfire, so-called Crossfire Application Profiles. The problem is that it often takes between updates, in some cases several weeks or months, before users with multiple graphics cards can take advantage of the extra computing power of new game titles.

Catalyst 12.1 adds the ability to create your own application profiles or edit existing ones directly in the control panel. The settings can be tailored for individual applications, but only programs that use Direct3D.

More features in the new driver are stereoscopic 3D via AMD HD3D in Crossfire, an updated user interface for video quality settings and about ten percent better performance in Skyrim with Radeon HD 6900 and MSAA enabled.

AMD Catalyst 12.1 Preview will be available on the company’s official services later in the day. Anyone who does not want to wait for AMD can, however, download all the necessary files right now, including from Guru3D.