NVIDIA has focused on the development of DLSS and Ray Tracing, as well as adjacent technologies. AMD FSR is the open source DLSS competing solution. We see how both companies have opted for Ray Tracing and technologies that compensate for the loss of frames due to this technology. But, in this very development, they have forgotten about the most important software on a graphics card.
Palpable degradation of driver quality
The drivers are a complement to software which should allow a performance optimization. In the case of gaming graphics card drivers, we should see a improvement of the frames in games. At least, theory and common sense dictate that this should be what these utilities are.
Creating perfect drivers is a utopia, it is normal for certain problems to appear. There are different generations of graphics cards on the market and a wide variety of games and third-party software. That does not mean that problems that are difficult to explain appear.
Some days ago NVIDIA threw a minor update and urgency to correct two serious deficiencies of its last drivers. On one hand, the NVIDIA Container generated a excessive processor usage after closing the game. It was not the only important problem, since it generated instability with Adobe softwarecome on, with Premiere and Photoshop.
We have on another line AMD and their controllers Adrenaline 23.2.1. If the user has a graphics card with a RDNA 2 or RDNA3 GPUsyou could find a curious case of crashes. It seems these drivers change boot options, doing it from a secondary unit. Such a problem can be easily fixed in BIOS, but this type of problem is rare to say the least.
Intel He is more or less saved from all this. Their drivers are pretty green still and do not present many notable problems, although they do generate some. They also only have one generation of graphics cards on the market, we’ll see when they have several what happens.
Wrong software development
Graphics cards are becoming more expensive, that’s obvious. We find that the mid-range has gone from costing over 400 euros, to costing double or more. Hardware is becoming more powerful, more expensive and more inaccessible to the average user. Normal for many video game fans to buy a console, if it does the same thing and costs less than half that of a decent gaming PC.
From what I see, as a user, drivers are no longer relevant. It imports ray tracing, rescaling technologies to compensate for losses from Ray Tracing and other solutions such as RTX Voice or NVIDIA Reflex, which I would like to know who uses them. I’m going to take the Reflex technology, which reduces mouse input latency, which is a good idea, but of course, you’re going to buy a compatible mouse and you see prices above 100 euros.
Sure, they are software developments that are not really used by everyone who buys a graphics card. We are paying for things that we do not need, while the drivers are essential for the proper functioning of the hardware. But curiously, this element used by all and fundamental, has suffered a quality degradation.
I, at the user level, feel annoyed. I have paid a lot of money for a product and I demand a certain quality. Currently, I wait a long time to update drivers (and let’s not even talk about Windows) to see what problems arise. Tango, if you think I’m right or if I’m wrong, leave me a comment explaining your position on the matter, I’m interested in knowing what you think as a user.
