Just a FYI for people out there, this card can be a royal pain in the neck to deal with. I know its been featured for at least 2 months in the best vid card for the money articles.

Short story, ATI doesn't support them, the official drivers don't work at all on them, and Omega hasn't updated his drivers since this card came out, so it doesn't even detect it as a valid choice when trying to install them. So basically you have to use the manufacturer's drivers, and they churn them out non-functional. I bought a Sapphire version of this card that they produced in February, and they didn't actually have working drivers for it until June.

So just a word of caution, be VERY careful if you try to get one of these.

(This warning only applies to the AGP version of the card)

I havnt got one so will take your word for it, however i feel i must ask if you are aware of the hotfix drivers for these cards. They seem to have been needed for AGP versions since the 2000 cards.
Mactronix

true

Hmm... Someone else had also mentioned to me, previously, a driver issue regarding the HD 3850 for AGP as well. So I think that there is definite merit to your statement. Though admitedly, I don't have personal experience with AGP cards newer than the X800XT I have, so I can't quite say for certain what the proper way of going around these things are.

I have a 3850 AGP, on my ol socket 478 mobo. Yes my CPU is a huge bottleneck.

However I must state that i have had minimal driver problems. For both my Vista and XP partitions.

I used the official drivers with the AGP hotfix. All my games run great at improved settigns (from my 6600gt). As long as my CPU can provide enough speed to run the games at over 30fps (mostly older games), my 3850 AGP allows me to crank to well above my previously playable settings.

Also, my 3850 combined with MPC-HC, allows complete 100% DXVA acceleration of 1080p MKV files (as long as they are L4.1). My CPU at 100% could not even come close to decoding these movies at watchable levels. Now my 3850 does all the work and my ancient P4 2.53ghz sits at below 10%.

Once again i state, I have incredible fortune with ATI's drivers for the 3850 AGP. Try the catalyst 8.5 with hotfix.

and I have a 100% fix and solution for that.
ATI had work on a hotfix 8.6 Driver for all 3000 series model AGP video cards.
This one is 100% workable and is 100% the best driver with no problems for 3 months already
There is the link to the driver you need for all 3000 series AGP cards

http://support.ati.com/ics/support [...] onID=31542

what you need to do is scroll down to click on the 8.6 Hotfix driver in green link and it will the driver download is
right under solution. bring you to the download driver ATI 8.6 Driver
This driver was release June of 2008.

I just purchased my HIS Radeon HD 3850 AGP card, my question is after installing the drivers from disc and Catalyst I than download the hotfix correct ?

Also run drive cleaner when ever changing cards. for the new guys

Speaking of Newbie.. I'm new myself ... Nice website.. Lots & Lots of great info... I like !

To armani2468,

Welcome to the forum, In an ideal world you would have downloaded the hotfix drivers before uninstalling the present Graphics card just in case you get a really bad problem. Personally i always do what i can before the fact. Then uninstall the old card, Driver cleaner etc as you know. The hotfix drivers are for a specific DX related problem and i guess they may not be needed but most people seem to get the problem. AMD state that it isnt an officially supported driver and should only be used if the DX problem is experianced. So you are correct that you shouldrun the normal drivers CCC first and you then only use the hotfix ones if needed.

Note: This driver is provided as is and is not supported by AMD. It has not completed full AMD testing, and is only recommended for users experiencing the particular issue described above.

Mactronix

You don't even have to install the driver from the disc, you can just download the hotfox from the site and it will work better.
This is what I learn and know, if you install the driver from the disc, the system will always do a backup it your PC is set up in that way.
Meaning if you always have issues with other hardware and you need to go back to the last known working config, (specially) with AGP, the system will hardware will act if the old driver is there. It's always best to uninstalled the driver first, then reboot and install the new driver, and to a restore backup on the day you install the driver congfig. So if anything goes wrong you know when to set back the date when you install the driver. I say this because other hardware can damage or cause issues to other hardware. Specially when it's software and drivers.

But the hotfix driver for the AGP 8.6 is everything, not just the driver but a new version of the CCC and DX for AGP.
This is why I download it when I started to add software and hardware to the system. The first time I'd installed the 8.4 drivers because
before I install it in my other system the P4 3.2HT and it made the system lock up each time I start up my computer. It even didn't wan to load in safe mode as well, when it try to it stop at windows\driver\system\AGP440. and nothing else.
Lucky me I had install another harddrive on that system and store all her work and my work on that harddrive.
What happen was the motherboard got lock up because of those drivers they send with the 3850 card.
Even when you do an update from HIS website and they have the 8.5 driver, there were alot of issues with it.

Now
So far On the P4 system that my fiance is using the driver 8.6 bundle hotfix , it hasn't act up not once.
I play with her on NFSPS I am on my quad core extreme and she is on my P4 3.2HT system.
Not to worry everything on that system as update date parts, like controller panel, new heatsink, Five 120mm fans more than 2100rpms, two 80mm fans at 2700rpm, 650 powersupply by Xigmatek, some consair XMS series led memory up to 4GB.
Computer is in great shape now and card work better with the hotfix drivers bundle.

Just want to tell you my story if you don't mind
Thanks

Usually I'd recommend installing the software off the disc for components not included in the online packages, like DVD software or even just MPEG decoding support.

However as I don't have experience with this card, I would defer to K646's experiences with the driver.

It goes against the norm for me of getting the system working and then updating, but if the build is significantly different and there are significant issues then, it might just save headaches overall and would make sense to skip the install disc.

Wow, you guys Rock! This is great feedback. I've also read that the drivers on the CD can and will lock up your rig to the point of no return as the other member stated he was able to go to his back up QB (HD) I plan on imaging my Rig before I install the hotfix. Using Acronis back up Image. for clarification purpose the hotfix will INCLUDE everything that I need for the card .. correct????

You can but that is up to you my friend.
Yes it's true about those drivers 8.4 and 8.5 will lock up your system agp slot and force it to not boot up the system correctly.

Installing the hotfix driver on my other system for this 3850 HD video card has show alot of excellent performance for an agp slot
I am happy with it and just want to share the love.

Good luck

If you have only one HD, you can split the HD into 2 drives as well, if anything goes wrong you can save your work and other data onto
that split HD. That is another option for you as well that is if you want to do the split hard settings.
I used to do it before and save my butt when computer crash, So even if you have to reformat the C drive again the other split drive will not be reformatted. The first HD Drive will always be C: and the second will be either D: so you know what spilt HD to reformat when your PC crash like that. Always have the software and data work you have other any files to the D; HD split drive
Just another option for you. Oh how to do that is another topic.