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Nvidia plans to lock Game Ready drivers behind GeForce Experience registration

So people dont want to use GFE and would rather download them from the website?
That's it?
There's bigger things to be worried about IMO.

Limiting consumer choice is never a good thing.

And yeah, there might be bigger things to worry about, but this decision does not bode well for the future.

What happens if Nvidia decides to start charging for Game-Ready drivers? Will you be okay with that?

Forcing people to register is step one leading towards that.
 

Caayn

Member
So people dont want to use GFE and would rather download them from the website?
That's it?
There's bigger things to be worried about IMO.
Let's put it another way. Why should we accept into being forced to register, yeah yet another account, when there's zero reason?
 

Sijil

Member
People saying we should've supported AMD, I would've if their products were better, but as far as I'm concerned AMD being cheaper isn't better, their hardware was always outmatched by Nvidia. I'm not about to shell out money for an inferior product for the sake of charity for a billion dollar company.

That said, what Nvidia is doing IS disgusting but at the end of the day a minor inconvenience and nothing more.
 

Stevey

Member
Limiting consumer choice is never a good thing.

And yeah, there might be bigger things to worry about, but this decision does not bode well for the future.

What happens if Nvidia decides to start charging for Game-Ready drivers? Will you be okay with that?

Forcing people to register is step one leading towards that.

How is using the app instead of the website a step to charging people for drivers?
Because they have your email address?
Like how have you come to that conclusion?
They had your email address when you registered your card for warranty.
 

Hasney

Member
How does this even benefit NVidia? How does forcing everyone to install the GeForce Experience allow them to make more money? I guess they get more emails in their databases, but that doesn't seem worth the price of pissing off even a small number of customers.

No doubt it'll be capturing usage data and can be easier tied to an individual using multiple machines if there's a single login.
 
Don't really see the issue with this, provided gfe works for everyone. I know a few have had issues with it.

Complaining about this is like complaining you have to register with steam to play content you own. An extreme comparison yes, but it makes my point.
 
How is using the app instead of the website a step to charging people for drivers?
Because they have your email address?
Like how have you come to that conclusion?
They had your email address when you registered your card for warranty.

You actually hit the nail right on the head. They already have our email address when we registered the card for warranty. So why would they need us to run GFE on our machines and register a second time to get Game Ready drivers?
 

kuroshiki

Member
That's the most defeatist attitude I've heard in this thread. I hope you are being sarcastic. Companies rise and fall all the time and in short spans of time. If Nvidia thinks that it can bludgeon its customers with policies they don't like then they will lose their lofty position sooner or later.

I really don't think so, as far as I know there is no competition, at all.

In this case you, as a consumer, is at the mercy of Nvidia, not the other way around. Yes, it is unthinkable, but it is true.
 

Stevey

Member
You actually hit the nail right on the head. They already have our email address when we registered the card for warranty. So why would they need us to run GFE on our machines and register a second time to get Game Ready drivers?

I know they dont need us to run GFE, but I dont have a problem with doing so is all.
 

No_Style

Member
I wonder how much effort they'll put in to keep the servers from people. Someone is going to sniff out the URL that the app uses to download the drivers.

It's an annoyance for sure but people will find a way to distribute the driver package.
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
I dont know why they are no longer being released on their own but there is literally no issue I have ever encountered with Geforce experience.
It's still dumb but it's not that bad.
 

Geist-

Member
I guess I'll be getting game-ready drivers from share sites now.
I wonder how much effort they'll put in to keep the servers from people. Someone is going to sniff out the URL that the app uses to download the drivers.

It's an annoyance for sure but people will find a way to distribute the driver package.
It's almost a certainty that it will get done, it's just a matter of when.

The real question is which is more annoying, downloading the file from a dropbox on reddit or using GFEx bloatware. I'm going with the former.
 

Bl@de

Member
You will register and you will like it. Bow before our great leader Jen-Hsun.

People won't give a shit. Just like with the 3.5GB GTX970 "feature"
 

Gumbie

Member
I know they dont need us to run GFE, but I dont have a problem with doing so is all.

We get it, YOU don't have a problem running GFE. A lot of us don't like it and don't want to be forced into installing/running it on our PC's just to get a "game ready" driver.
 
Shit, I didn't catch the bit about needing to install GeForce experience, I just glanced at the middle bit lol. I thought it was you need to login to GeForce.com to download game ready drivers.

I've never installed GFE and don't want to or have any need. Those fuckers.
 

Geist-

Member
My sole reason for Nvidia fanboying is their support and ease of driver updates. With this new direction, not so much.
What's really sad is that (at least in my experience), finding GF drivers from alternative sources will still be better support than AMD drivers. :p
 
This is stupid. Just have a stable and an experimental driver available through Windows Update, and make the experimental version opt-in.

I'm happy to be on Linux right now, much less bullshit.
 

Spaghetti

Member
why?

like, what's actually the point? strong-arming people onto geforce experience?

it's a sorta helpful little tool in some cases, but i don't see the point in forcing people to use it.
 

kuroshiki

Member
My sole reason for Nvidia fanboying is their support and ease of driver updates. With this new direction, not so much.

by the way market goes right now, driver support/easy of update probably won't be the reason why you will choose nvidia in near future.

You will choose it because you won't have a choice. =P

We get it dude.

"YOU" get it, bro. I still see plenty of people who think this will actually change anything in Nvidia's dominance.
 

Zojirushi

Member
What's really sad is that (at least in my experience), finding GF drivers from alternative sources will still be better support than AMD drivers. :p

To be honest you seem to be hearing about broken ass NVidia drivers a lot lately

I'm not really convinced NVidia has the "Awsome drivers!" argument on their side anymore. AMD has Beta stuff available for every major releases now (cue up the exceptions here) and they are solid.

It always seems that most people complaining about the AMD driver situation haven't actually owned an AMD card for a while.

Can't speak to SLI/Crossfire stuff though so things might be different there.
 

alexbull_uk

Member
Pointless and annoying change, but I'd be happy to put up with it if they just got Surround working properly on Windows 10. No hotkeys and the Start menu/action center display on the wrong screen :/
 
terrible.

the software gap between amd and nvidia, esp for single gpus, has narrowed considerably these days. nvidias software advantage isnt nearly what it use to be.
 

rbanke

Member
I actually uninstalled GeForce Experience a month or two ago, Sick of it re-enabling services and installing stuff I don't want or use. Ive only ever used it as a driver update reminder and it just wasn't worth the annoyance. This is a poor decision.
 
It'll reduce headaches for casual and enthusiast gamers......how?

I mean I don't care I already registered but seriously, don't just state something without backing it up.

I'm presuming they hope that people WON'T opt into the GFE system and just settle for the quarterly updates, their end game probably being to reduce the server load on pushing out updates and CS load on troubleshooting the casual user. I mean, they're probably right in that's it's not that big a deal for the enthusiast user, but why not just have a separate opt in for the GRD's instead of brute forcing a few more email accounts into their ecosystem? Granted, I really don't see the issue with GFE besides it just being another thing installed on your PC. I hardly notice it outside of driver updates and when I want to Shadowplay record.
 
but you guys, AMD has such shitty drivers, ever since I switched to Nvidia I've had nothing but bliss (involving manually uninstalling the 3D Ready drivers because they fuck with my media player, being unable to install several different versions of drivers over a period of a year because Geforce Experience is like "I dunno whatevs!", and getting exactly the same crashes I used to get with a Radeon card because, as far as I can tell, some games don't like me running 1920x1200).
 

Krappadizzle

Gold Member
"YOU" get it, bro. I still see plenty of people who think this will actually change anything in Nvidia's dominance.

Hahaahaha.

What would you have GAF do then? You seem annoyed that people are making comments that they are annoyed. Your snide little comments don't do anything either so I'm not sure why you are acting like people saying this is dumb is some kind of hypocritical statement.
 

kuroshiki

Member
Hahaahaha.

What would you have GAF do then? You seem annoyed that people are making comments that they are annoyed. Your snide little comments don't do anything either so I'm not sure why you are acting like people saying this is dumb is some kind of hypocritical statement.

Hahahahahahaha.

Nothing. I'm just stating my opinion, and I'm not delusional enough to believe that neogaf has any power over how GPU market works. Of course if you believe I'm not supposed to share my comment on how this thing is going, then more power to you.
 

$h@d0w

Junior Member
This is the right thing to do, systems would be getting hosed if they didn't wall off the drivers (win10).
 
How is using the app instead of the website a step to charging people for drivers?
Because they have your email address?
Like how have you come to that conclusion?
They had your email address when you registered your card for warranty.

Don't you register your card for warranty to the manufacturer and not nvidia?
 

Rur0ni

Member
Supposedly over 95% of driver installs are through GFE currently. I don't see the point of not simply releasing the files over the internet as usual though, I can't imagine it's any real overhead. Seems they are trying to drive users through this app for general use/ecosystem reasons.

Honestly it kind of reminds me of Steam. People will be upset now, most will be fine/pleased later.
 

Reallink

Member
Whats wrong with Geforce experience? I just built a new PC with a 980 and it seems pretty cool

It installs like 10 background processes/services that are always running, consuming memory and potentially slowing boot time and other tasks, all of which are completely unnecessary unless you use Shield Streaming or Shadowplay. There was a kerfuffle a few months back that the Streamer process was appreciably reducing frame rates even when not in use. The tent-pole feature of the whole software package (the recommended auto-application of settings/configs per game) are often completely nonsensical and sub-optimal. This isn't even getting into general software glitches, like it's auto updater getting stuck in a loop, crashes, or failures installing drivers.
 
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