AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin, the news of release 21.4.1

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin

AMD has released version 21.4.1 of the Adrenalin software, the suite that in 2019 marked a step change in support for Radeon GPUs and that has made great strides since the first release in July 2019, including technologies aimed at improving the performance, sophisticated image enhancement filters, streaming capabilities, fast overclocking, user profiles, full system monitoring and a helpful bug reporting system, recently arrived, which is an important step forward in fixing any problems. All of this, but in this case AMD has always given us satisfaction, accompanied by driver optimizations that have brought net performance improvements, reaching up to 23% in the case of Wolfenstein: Youngblood.

An update thought to improve usability

The new Adrenalin Software includes innovations for video capture, metrics, codecs and AMD Link 4.0 At its debut, in the middle of summer 2019, the Adrenalin software brought us technologies such as Anti-Lag, image Sharpening and FidelityFX Contrast Adaptive Sharpening. Then in December of the same year, a completely new interface arrived accompanied by Radeon Boost, by the Integer Display Scaling and by user profiles, useful for quickly recalling a certain configuration. In May 2020, however, the FidelityFX suite evolved with features designed to lighten the load on the reflection hardware, to optimize Ambient Occlusion, to facilitate the implementation of a quality HDR and to improve texture downsampling.

Later, in March 2021, we saw the arrival of Anti-Lag with DX12 support, Radeon Boost combined with Variable Rate Shading, an integrated Stress Test and tools to obtain a constant framerate. In the meantime, AMD has been working on stability by changing the way drivers are released, arriving at day-0 for 30 games, as well as adding the Crash Defender feature designed to prevent, where possible, unwanted system crashes.

To all this are added today the AMD Link 4.0, with support for Windows systems, as well as installation options, news for color management, greater usability of the recording and streaming functions, the implementation of hardware acceleration for decoding of the AV1 codec and an expansion of system statistics monitoring. With this version the metrics window, located in the Performance section, also includes CPU data and statistics, as long as you are using a Ryzen processor. All obviously integrated into the now familiar interface of the Adrenalin software which already includes a large number of sections including FidelityFX functionality, instant overclocking, layout customization and various other options.

The new Vivid Gaming color profile Part of the innovations introduced by AMD with this release look at usability and include a simplification of the interface dedicated to streaming, managed by the special Wizard that allows you to set up a complete streaming in a short time time with various integrations with major services, and video recording. On the other hand, look at the new section dedicated to color correction that includes three sliders to calibrate the level of compensation for both those suffering from protanopia and for those suffering from deuteranopia or tritanopia. In the same section we also find the new Vivid Gaming color preset that actually improves the liveliness of the image, evident in a colorful game like Overwatch. But to take advantage of the new features dedicated to colors it is necessary to have, at least for the moment, a Radeon RX 5000 or RX 6000 mounted on a Ryzen 4000 or, obviously Ryzen 5000, exclusively on Windows 10. Also note how the news related to streaming , like the Crash Defender, they only work on Windows 10.

Evolution in the round, or almost

AMD has also worked on the stability of the tuning options By switching to AMD Link 4.0, the prerequisites go to devices with iOS 12 for Apple devices, including Apple TV, and Android 7.0 for Google devices, including Android TVs. However, it works on all Radeons from GCN onwards and with a couple of clicks it allows you to launch games, see captured videos and play directly in streaming on a large number of devices. With some of these it is necessary to deal with the need, in many cases, to use external controllers, but this obviously does not concern laptops that are now fully supported thanks to AMD Link for Windows. All made even more interesting by a noticeable reduction in latency in titles like CS: GO, 144FPS support, 5.1 and 4K audio. In general, there is a slight delay which can be unpleasant in competitive titles, but trying other games, such as Cyberpunk, we were able to play without problems by fully exploiting the service.

Returning to the software, generic stability improvements are noted , including those related to overclocking and general performance tuning. The maximum frequency spikes are the same as we found with the previous version, with a GPU peak of 2744 MHz in the case of the Radeon RX 6700 XT, but the experience is still improved thanks to the increased responsiveness of the overlay and resolution. of some anomaly. In addition to this AMD has guaranteed more possibilities to customize the installation of the Adrenalin software. Options now include a minimal version of the suite, limited to essential menus and features, and a full version with all features and extras. But there is also a driver only mode for those who don't intend to get lost in the options.

Ryzen processor statistics integrated into Adrenalin metrics among the news Finally, AMD took advantage of the upgrade to add acceleration to the arsenal of Radeon 6000, installed on a system with Windows 10 and KB5000842 update hardware for AV1 decoding, a new high-efficiency codec that is not yet widespread, but is gaining momentum thanks to 30% higher compression than VP9 and with no loss of quality. Less data consumed for streaming, therefore, for a completely royalty-free codec that further enriches this undoubtedly interesting release, even if it lacks the functionality most awaited by the players. In fact, there is still no trace of the Super Resolution, the awaited upscaling technology based not on artificial intelligence, but not on machine learning, which promises a significant boost, even for new generation consoles. But we expect news on this in the coming weeks, given the approaching of important events for technology such as CES.

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