ArmA1 & 2 supports of ATI GDDR5 v-cards

[sluggCDN 0]

I decided to start a separate thread since it's seem to be the recurring issue with ATI cards and ArmA. And it's a serious one - ArmA doesn't run on one of the best video cards on the market regardless what version of ArmA is installed.

I just got myself this video cards (to see specs see the link below):

Diamond Radeon HD 4890 Xoc 1GB 925MHZ 1GB 4.2GHZ GDDR5

ArmA doesn't seem to be able to start with it at all. Upon starting the game the screen goes black for about 5-10 minutes with only a sandclock visible in the centre. Once we are past that stage ArmA starts in what I think is 600x480 screen mode; the top half of the screen is completely black, the bottom half is filled with nothing but ArmA infinitae ocean. There are also 5 black squares where the interface buttons should be, along the bottom of the screen. I assume it's them since by clicking on the last one I can close the game.

This cannot be! - after all the issues ArmA had since its release I thought this card might finally give me an opportunity to experience the game the way it should be. Instead I get the blank screen. What does it take to play ArmA normally?!

My system specs:

Core2Duo E6400 2.13ghz

6gig DDR2-800 RAM

Diamond Radeon HD 4890 Xoc 1GB w/ Catalyst drivers ver.9_4

Windows XP Pro 64bit

Can devs or anyone else shed some light on what's going on or someone has similar issue? I'm affraid that buying this card I can play any latest game out there but ArmA. Since ArmA2 is based on the same slightly upgraded graphics engine I won't be getting ArmA2 either. But that might be the case for everyone who gets a 4800 GDDR5 generation ATI card.

[[frl]myke 14]

...regardless what version of ArmA is installed.

Does this include the latest beta patch 1.16? At least the cangelog states that this betapatch should resolve some ATI related issues.

Did you ever deleted the arma.cfg? This could also help (occasionally it does, no guarantee though).

Does the arma.rpt say something about it? If you could make it possible that we could take a look at it, this could be very helpful. Also the dxdiag.txt could help us to help you.

And one thought i had while looking at your system specs: you're running "one of the best video cards on the market" with a CPU on the lower end? ArmA scales better with CPU power than with GPU power. No offence mate but if i were you i would look for a better CPU also. Take a look at the E8400 or the E7500. Even better for a quad with around ~3GHz but there it is a question if you can afford it.

And for completeness: Phenom X4 @ 3GHz, 4GB DDR2-800 and a HD4870/512MB with Catalyst 9.4 also.

I strongly doubt that architecture is so different between your GPU and mine. For sure yours is faster but general internal structure should be quite similar. I think to remember it is exactly the same and the improved performance is a result of a die-shrink. Both GPU's are named RV770.

On my PC ArmA runs quite well with high settings and viewdistance of above 5km.

I write this to show you it can be solved and ArmA should run on ATI with Catalyst 9.4. So please provide the missing informations i've asked at start and we'll see where your problems lies.

[sparks50 0]

My new 4890 is working ok with Arma.

Edited April 30, 2009 by sparks50

[Mr_Tea 0]

It will more likely be an problem with the driver than one with the cards itself.

Blame ATI for crappy driver support, my next card will come from Nvidia again.

[kklownboy 43]

It will more likely be an problem with the driver than one with the cards itself.

Blame ATI for crappy driver support, my next card will come from Nvidia again.

Well for me, since the ATI 9.2 drivers ARMA ran/runs great. But untill the 1.16b patch i had to run in window mode, or boot with less than 4GB of system RAM. Window mode makes CF/CFX and some SLI setups, not use multiGPU.

But yeah no bad issues, ATI 4870x2's and 9.4ATI+1.16b.

Edited May 1, 2009 by kklownboy

[sluggCDN 0]

Persistance pays off!!! :) After about 6th session of ArmA reinstall and patch updating up to 1.16 I managed to get ArmA running on my card. There is an issue when updating ArmA from 1.08 to 1.14 and 1.14 to 1.16. The installer throws out the error saying "There isn't enough space" or something to that extent. Cancels the installation process but the Installer windows still says "Installation is successfuly completed". I assure you I have 499 gig of free space on my hard drive. But ArmA still plays. I will post feedback. It plays overall well with all settings on high/very-high in forested areas. Quite beautiful. But after a while, probably due to buffer overflow, frame rate drops. I will post more feedback later.

[Dwarden 1124]

maybe your temp drive (temp directories if manually defined) or/and system drive got not enough space (not the destination drive where game is installed to) ...

so in multi drive system make sure these 3 drives got enough free space ...

[Yoma 0]

There used to be an issue with the installer not able to tell true drivespace on 64 bit systems if i recall correctly.

[PuFu 4591]

There used to be an issue with the installer not able to tell true drivespace on 64 bit systems if i recall correctly.

never had an issue on XP 64

[POTS 0]

I don't think ddr5 is the reason why it's not working (i've got ddr5). But I do think ArmA doesnt recognize the performance capabilities of ddr5, so I'm crossing my fingers for full support in arma2.

[Grodin 0]

4870x2

Game runs flawlessly, high settings @ vsync capped 75fps for most times after enabling crossfire. With just 1 gpu its quite bad.

However nVidia cards seem to get the same performance for less money :o

[echo1 0]

I don't think ddr5 is the reason why it's not working (i've got ddr5). But I do think ArmA doesnt recognize the performance capabilities of ddr5, so I'm crossing my fingers for full support in arma2.

A game doesn't 'support' GDDR5, as the video memory is controlled by the card itself and not any software. And it's the design of the HD4000 GPUs that make them fast, not the GDDR5 (it would probably run just as fast with GDDR3 memory) It's just a case that ArmA doesn't support the GPUs properly.

[Dwarden 1124]

GDDR5 is quad while GDDR3 is double rate

anyway the 4870 architecture was designed from ground with GDDR5 in mind

(AMD sponsored GDDR5 development with huge risk but it was worth it)

anyway the problem was solved as issue with installer and is NOT related to anything else ... period

[sluggCDN 0]

anyway the problem was solved as issue with installer and is NOT related to anything else ... period

Dwarden, thanks for the participation on this one!

What do you mean "the problem was solved"? Was it considered by BIS?

Ultimately the game does work now with ver.1.16 on my Radeon 4890 card. I will run a FRAP test later

But I'd dread to experiment with re-installing it all over again just to confirm it's the installer issue. Who knows how many more time I will have to re-install it if it doesn't work. How can I adjust temp/system drive intake capacity? My HD space is 500gig.

[kklownboy 43]

A game doesn't 'support' GDDR5, as the video memory is controlled by the card itself and not any software. And it's the design of the HD4000 GPUs that make them fast, not the GDDR5 (it would probably run just as fast with GDDR3 memory) It's just a case that ArmA doesn't support the GPUs properly.

In Vista, the OS controls the vidram, not the Drivers of the card.. in the case of ATI. And as explained in the 1.16 notes they had to fix two related vidram issues ( i would awesome GDDR5 in Vista).