A few tips for 9070 XT owners who also have an Evnia 42M2N8900 OLED Monitor...and other remarks...;)

I am playing this game every day now (v1.0.6.0), I do try and resist it, but it keeps drawing me back, with me unable to resist the siren call!  I am retired, now, so this is how I have the time to invest in this game (and the ROI is remarkable...;))--and I struggle with a real guilt complex I have developed because I haven't written nearly as many wonderful, gushing posts about this game as I feel it deserves!  I can't though, because that would wind up having the opposite effect!  But everything in it--the artistry, the music, the dialogue, the voice acting, the GRAPHICS--are just great--first-class entertainment all the way...;)  I love the plot(s), the humor, the amusing and thankfully under-done sarcasm and wonderful satire--it just all works together so well.  And this game richly rewards exploration and discovery like few other games I've played through.  (I haven't finished this one yet--no way am I rushing this experience. It's too rare in gaming. I shall s-t-r-e-tch it out to the max!)

If there were Oscars for 3d games, then this game would carry most of the awards, I'm confident.  The game is non-stop content--so many aspects to so much!  Ok, I love the game, if that hasn't been apparent thus far!    It's a tour de force in all respects!  It seems if intriguing things are hidden under every leaf and rock, and when you turn a few over you will see what I mean! Let the game pull you into one new direction after another, and you will be delighted you did! Savor every moment the game delivers, because there are a ton of them...;)

OK, with that out of the way, let me advise 9070 XT owners to please INSTALL the latest 26.1.1 WHQL Adrenalins under Win11!  (I play under Win11 build 26200.7623, 32GBs system ram, 7800x3D running stock, several NVMe's--nothing out of the ordinary, really.  I run at 4k, full screen, all eye-candy on, with all RT options maxed with HDR maxed!  This game utilizes all of it--and sometimes I just look around and get absorbed by my environs!  That's so rare in gaming, you know? But I feel like the hardware is finally getting good enough to convey what the artists see in their minds when they draw and paint and sculpt inside their game environment.)

The read.me with the newer drivers states that they've done something to get the drivers working well/better with aspects of the Unreal Engine 5.x, and although it didn't mention TOW2 by name, it's easy to see that the game is benefiting from it!  Whereas even with the 1060 patch I would get hitching in motion every once in a while, just often enough to draw my attention when it happened--but OK, now, I've played for hours and so far I haven't experienced ANY hitching! (I play at 4k at 120Hz with Vsync ON AND also with AMD VRR support ON, and AMD's Freesync Premium is now working fine, ( see edit below) fixed it--and not a single Arkansas crash thus far (I'd love to get the story on that little naming convention...;)) 

So needless to say (but I will say it anyway--silly expression), I am extremely happy with all things TOW2!  And one last plug for this remarkable game: the combination of this 9070 XT plus this Philips Evnia 42" OLED is the best yet--the best I've ever seen (and I've been buying and using computer monitors for ~35 years!)  This hardware is highly recommended! (Time to buy through Amazon was Thanksgiving BF sale when you could snag it direct to your door, brand new w/a 4-year-advance-replacement factory warranty for  a mere $649.) (Price is already headed North again, but even the current $997 price is a sizable improvement over the monitor's original shipping price of ~$1400.)

EDIT (1/22): I forgot to include this yesterday, but I cannot emphasize it enough: The 9070 XT is a 2.1b Display Port GPU and even if your monitor features a 1.4a DP input spec, like this monitor, don't make the mistake of thinking that your monitor's DP port will completely pare down the 2.1b DP signaling to a bog standard 1.4a, like I did, initially.  So I thought that the GPU would simply route a 1.4a backwards-compatible signal to the 1.4a monitor input, and so there was no reason to buy a VESA-Certified, DP 2.1b cable. RIght?  WRONG...;)  This monitor supports HDMI 2.1b, as well, and it seemed to me that since the monitor circuitry for HDMI 2.1b is supported, that possibly, with the right cable, I might see improvements over the current DP1.4 cabling I was using--a top-rated DP cable I bought in...2019...;)  There is a noticeable display-quality difference between a DP 80, VESA-Certified cable and a DP1.4 VESA-Certified cable, using the DP2.1b DP output signaling  of the 9070 XT with this Evnia 42" OLED beauty.  Pleasant surprise. Here's the one I bought:

https://www.amazon.com/IVANKY-Certified-DisplayPort-Compatible-7900XTX-6-6FT/dp/B0F6LJ5Q6R/ref=ast_sto_dp_puis?th=1

There are several brands of these DP2.1 cables to choose from. 

Keep it coming, OBSIDIAN!

Edited January 22Jan 22 by waltc