Congratulations on the purchase of your new Radeon graphics card! We hope you’ll be able to enjoy years of hassle-free gaming, content creation and everyday work on your new hardware. If you’re coming over from a competitive solution, or simply new to the world of PC gaming, then keep on reading to find out what your AMD experience has to offer.
RADEON™ SOFTWARE ADRENALIN 2020 EDITION
The first thing to do after installing your card is to go online to www.amd.com/support and download the latest driver. If you’re upgrading your system, be sure to remove any legacy graphics driver from it, even if your previous card was Radeon. After completing the driver installation, you will be prompted to select a user profile.
Radeon Software User Profiles
Gaming: Select this option if you want the perfect balance between performance and visual quality. Features like Radeon™ Anti-Lag*, Radeon™ Image Sharpening and AMD FreeSync™** technologies will be enabled.
eSports: Select this option if performance is most important for you. We will limit tessellation to x8 to ensure you get the most performance out of your card. Features like Radeon™ Anti-Lag and AMD FreeSync will also help contribute to latency reduction to deliver more responsive gaming experiences.
Power Saving: As the name implies, select this option if you wish to lower power consumption on your graphics card. This feature enables Radeon™ Chill which caps frames within a certain range, providing you with power savings without significantly affecting your gaming experience.
Standard: Select this option if you’re an enthusiast user who knows your way around various graphics settings and want to customize settings to your liking. Standard leaves all features turned off except for Radeon FreeSync.
YOUR NEW HOME SCREEN
Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition Home Screen
Radeon Software can be opened anytime from either your desktop or while you’re gaming. Simply hold down ALT+R on your keyboard to bring up our application. We completely redesigned our UI for 2020, making it easier to access the most commonly used features like instant replays, gifs, video and image captures, as well as the game launcher. You can check to see if you have the latest driver installed, or if your hardware meets the requirements of the game you’re playing.
Easy access to commonly used features
STUNNING VISUALS
There are four tabs that run along the top left of our software. When you click on ‘Gaming’, you’ll get access to game specific settings that you can freely adjust.
Radeon Image Sharpening (RIS): This unique feature employs a contrast adaptive sharpening algorithm that restores clarity to in-game visuals that may have been softened by other effects. It brings out details of objects without creating some of the visual artifacts seen in other sharpening effects. The great thing about this feature is its minimal impact on performance. If you’re also running a lower end graphics card and want to push faster frames to your screen, you can lower the resolution down and enable this feature thereby delivering better performance with little impact to image quality. [Learn More]
RIS OFF:
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands
RIS ON:
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands
Virtual Super Resolution: If you’re running a 1080p or 1440p display and you’re using one of our new Radeon RX 6800 series graphics cards, you can take advantage of the extra horsepower those cards provide. VSR allows applications to render at resolutions higher than your display’s native pixel grid and then scales images down to fit the display. This has the effect of producing higher quality visuals, taking advantage of the great performance that the RX 6800 series graphics cards deliver.
FidelityFX: We are also working closely with developers on implementing game specific optimizations to improve visual experiences. If you happen to be playing a game and you’re going through the in-game menu looking at graphics settings, you may come across the following FidelityFX features:
- FidelityFX Contrast Adaptive Sharpening: Dynamic sharpening filter that draws out details in just the right places, with virtually no impact on performance. This feature employs the same algorithm as Radeon™ Image Sharpening (RIS), so it is suggested to disable RIS, so you don’t sharpen twice.
- FidelityFX Ambient Occlusion: Dynamically and efficiently helps improve the appearance of objects based on their exposure to light.
These are just a few of the FidelityFX features that are available to developers to deploy in their games. For a more comprehensive list, visit www.amd.com/fidelityfx
QUICK RESPONSIVENESS AND FLUID GAMING
Latency reduction features
AMD FreeSync™ Technology - A variable refresh rate display technology delivers a fluid, tear-free experience that provides quicker responses to the screen. [Learn More]
Radeon Anti-Lag - Introduced with Radeon RX 5000 series GPUs, Radeon Anti-Lag was the first of its kind. This software feature reduces lag by intelligently controlling the queuing of CPU work ahead of GPU work in DirectX 9 and DirectX 11 games. The result from enabling this feature is a reduction in input lag by up to 47% in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, as an example. [Learn More]
Radeon Boost*** - Radeon Boost is a unique feature in Radeon Software that's a step beyond Radeon Anti-Lag. In fact, Radeon Anti-Lag is a subset of Radeon Boost technology. For select games, Radeon Boost offers dynamic resolution in response to your mouse or controller inputs. Radeon Boost drops the resolution during camera rotation in first- and third-person games. You may not even notice that the resolution change is happening, except that your frame rates will be higher and, as a result, responses to your input are more immediate. [Learn More]
MEDIA CAPTURE AND STREAMING
Streaming content to social platforms like Twitch, Facebook and YouTube is becoming more popular these days and we wanted to provide Radeon users with an easy way to get started. Our streaming functionality has been simplified so even novice users can get started, but it also includes more advanced features that experienced streamers expect, such as the ability to have custom scenes and picture-in-picture capabilities with your webcam. To access our streaming capabilities, simply click on the ‘Streaming’ tab at the top of Radeon Software and get started right away.
Stream content online
GETTING THE MOST PERFORMANCE OUT OF YOUR GRAPHICS CARD
The performance tab in Radeon Software let’s you see how your system is performing, while providing you with tools to tweak your graphics card to either get the most performance out of it or save power for a cool and quiet operation. You can have metrics appear at the corners of your screen while you game so you can personally monitor your system performance and adjust settings on the fly to get the frames you want.
Performance Metrics - monitor your system performance and utilization
Performance Tuning Presets - one-click presets for quick and simple tweaking
If you recently purchased or are planning to purchase the Radeon RX 6800 XT or 6900 XT, then you have access to three new exclusive performance tuning presets found in Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition. These new presets automatically adjust power and fan levels based on the setting you choose:
- “BALANCED” is the default preset, and as the name implies, it delivers a perfect mix of performance and power savings to suit all your 4K gaming needs.
- “QUIET” preset delivers 4K gaming performance while keeping the graphics card quiet. Game performance is barely affected, with drops of only around 2% while the fan speed is reduced by almost 10%.****
- “RAGE MODE” is for those who want the ultimate, maximum performance on their Radeon RX 6800 XT or RX 6900 XT graphics card. Since there will be many AMD Partners who will offer variants and custom designs, “Rage Mode” will depend on the individual GPU and cooling solution found on your board, and will allow your card to take advantage of any extra headroom it may have.
For more information on these presets, you can read the blog here.
If you prefer to manually adjust settings such as engine and memory clock speeds, voltages and fan curves, you can take advantage of our manual tuning section where you can adjust these settings at a very fine level.
Advanced performance tuning for enthusiasts
PLAY YOUR PC GAMES FROM ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD
AMD Link, a free app available for download from the Apple or Android app stores, lets you fit your desktop PC in your pocket. By installing AMD Link on your supported phone or tablet, you can access your PC from anywhere with a WiFi or fast cellular data connection. AMD Link allows you to monitor your PC stats, capture and stream your content online, or even play your PC games directly from your device using either the integrated on-screen controls, or with a paired Bluetooth controller. [Learn More]
Connect your PC to your phone and play from almost anywhere
Hopefully this guide has been helpful for you. There are a lot of great features in our software that you can take advantage of, some of which aren’t covered in this blog. Feel free to learn more about Radeon Software by visiting www.amd.com/radeonsoftware
Happy gaming and welcome to Team Red!
Warren Eng is the Product Marketing Manager for Radeon Software at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such linked sites and no endorsem*nt is implied. GD-5
Disclaimers & Attribution:
* RadeonAnti-Lag is compatible with DirectX 9, DirectX 11, DirectX 12 and Vulkan APIs; Windows 7 and 10. Hardware compatibility includes GCN and newer consumer dGPUs and Ryzen 2000 and newer APUs, including hybrid and detachable graphics configurations. No mGPU support. Certain features require Adrenalin 2020 or later. GD-157
**AMD FreeSynctechnology requires AMD Radeongraphics and a display that supports FreeSync technology as certified by AMD. AMD FreeSyncPremium technology adds requirements of mandatory low framerate compensation and at least 120 Hz refresh rate at minimum FHD. AMD FreeSyncPremium Pro technology adds requirements for the display to meet AMD FreeSync Premium Pro compliance tests. See www.amd.com/freesync for complete details. Confirm capability with your system manufacturer before purchase. GD-127
***RadeonBoost is compatible with Windows 7 and 10 in select titles only. Hardware compatibility includes RX 400 and newer consumer dGPUs, Ryzen 2000 and newer APUs, including hybrid and detachable graphics configurations. No mGPU support. Certain features require Adrenalin 2020 or later. For a list of compatible titles seehttps://www.amd.com/en/technologies/radeon-boost. GD-158
**** RS- 346- Testing conducted by AMD Performance Labs as of October 1st, 2020 on the 16GB Radeon™ RX 6800 XT, using a test system comprising of AMD Ryzen 9 5900X CPU (3.7 GHz), 16GB DDR4-3200MHz memory, and Windows 10x64 with Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition 20.45. Select games were run in “Balanced” preset and “Quiet” preset. Games tested include Borderlands 3, Death Stranding, Doom Eternal, Horizon Zero Dawn, Metro Exodus, RDR2, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and Rainbow Six Siege. Quality was set at max presets running at 4K resolution. Reduction in power and fan speeds measured using MSI Afterburner Performance may vary.
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