AMD Catalyst 13.6 Linux Graphics Driver Beta Released

Written by Michael Larabel in AMD on 28 May 2013 at 05:32 PM EDT. 46 Comments
AMD
AMD has announced a new beta Catalyst Linux graphics driver. This time around, there are some new features to this Catalyst 13.6 Beta.

Announced this afternoon was the AMD Cataalyst 13.6 Beta driver for Linux. New features include Ubuntu 13.04 production support, X.Org Server 1.14 support, and support for the GLX_EXT_buffer_age extension.

There's been Ubuntu 13.04 support already, just not production-rated. Exciting Linux desktop users in general will be the long-awaited X.Org Server 1.14 support. X.Org Server 1.14 has been in released form since early March and the NVIDIA binary driver has supported the various xorg-server 1.14 pre-releases. Meanwhile, the AMD Catalyst support has been nonexistent until today.

Likewise, the NVIDIA binary driver has already supported GLX_EXT_buffer_age too. The GLX buffer-age extension can help out compositing window managers, including Compiz, and there's also been Mesa support. This extension is about exposing information to applications about the driver's use of front and back-buffers for a given surface so that the application can potentially re-use old frames for minimizing re-draws.

Aside from the new features, there's also bug-fixes for Team Fortress 2, UVD, WebGL, and other addressed items. Download links for the new AMD Catalyst 13.6 Beta x86/x86_64 Linux graphics driver can be found from this forum thread.
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