Just a few hours after the new Nvidia 178.24 ForceWare release, AMD posted its new Catalyst 8.10 graphics drivers. The new Catalyst, like with every other release, this one brings performance increases within certain applications as well as minor bug fixes and some new control panel features.

Some cards will apparently gain up to 15 percent performance increases in certain games. And CrossFire users can expect gains of up to 5 percent.

Interestingly however, the Catalyst 8.10 release adds a fan speed control setting in the Overdrive tab of the Catalyst Control Center (CCC) for Radeon 4000-series cards. AMD claims the feature will give its users ‘greater control and flexibility when over-clocking their graphics accelerator’. Now, considering how the HD 4850 and HD 4870 run, heat-wise, this feature adds some value to those packing these cards into poorly ventilated cases or areas of the home. You can also look at the fan speed feature the other way if you are all about keeping your system on the down-low for volume, you can knock it down a few RPM’s if you like.

Aside from the fan speed control being a highlight in this release, the drivers add an option to force component video detection that enables users to force certain Component Video modes to be shown in the CCC display manager.

32-bit and 64-bit editions of the new release for both Windows XP and Vista are available on AMD’s Game Website. Linux users can seek out their own Catalyst 8.10 release on the old AMD drivers page, although release notes have not been published for the Linux flavor as of yet.