End of Win XP support from nVidia?

[ScrewFace]

It looks to me that nVidia will no longer be supporting GeForce 7xxx and below for Windows XP. I just bought 2 512MB BFG GeForce 7950GTs for SLI but I've noticed that no new WHQL driver has been released for 3 months now!

F*ck, I hate Vista!

 

[Genx87]

Do you usually jump to conclusions?

 

[DAPUNISHER]

It ain't so.

 

[MmmSkyscraper]

Tom Smykowski: It was a "Jump to Conclusions" mat. You see, it would be this mat that you would put on the floor... and would have different CONCLUSIONS written on it that you could JUMP TO.
Michael Bolton: That's the worst idea I've ever heard in my life, Tom.
Samir: Yes, this is horrible, this idea.

 

[theprodigalrebel]

You should be writing for The Inquirer (j/k)

 

[Aikouka]

I think from my previous experiences with nVidia, you get maybe 3 driver versions that are WHQL for your video card... max. So don't expect another one any time soon .

 

[chizow]

As much as nVidia would love to cut the number of driver revisions they need to write in half, I don't see them discontinuing support for XP any time soon. The overwhelming majority of gamers will stick with XP until they have a real reason to use Vista (DX10 games). Idk about actual numbers, but I'd expect something like 80% XP and 20% Vista in the next 3 months, with a 5-10% increase in Vista users per month after that.

What I would like to see (if they're not already taking this approach) is asynchronous updates for the different cards/OS platforms. Realistically, 7-series drivers for existing games in XP are pretty mature, so they require less updates than the 8-series drivers for XP and Vista along with the 7-series drivers for Vista. My biggest concern is nVidia holding off on driver updates for all 4 OS/GPUs until they have a revision for all of them, instead of simply releasing updates as they become available for any of the single OS/GPUs.

 

[JBT]

you serious?

 

[dug777]

i'm yet to see nvidia drivers that get my 6800GS@Ultra running smoothly in either of the games i've installed, Farcry and HL2...not sure if i've got another issue hitting me tho...

 

[Modular]

Originally posted by: dug777
i'm yet to see nvidia drivers that get my 6800GS@Ultra running smoothly in either of the games i've installed, Farcry and HL2...not sure if i've got another issue hitting me tho...

That's other problems for sure. I run FarCry on a 6600gt AGP w/ a p4 2.8 non-HT and it's playable with all in-game settings set to Ultra and 2xQ AA and 16X AF set through the control panel. Also, my image quality in the CP is set to "Quality".

I run it this way using both the 84.21's and the 93.71's. I average 40FPS or more. So, I'd have to say you've got something else going on there.

 

[SunnyD]

You do realize that the Forceware X (100-series) drivers for the 8800 ALSO have 6- & 7-series code in them right?

 

[KeithTalent]

Originally posted by: MmmSkyscraper

Tom Smykowski: It was a "Jump to Conclusions" mat. You see, it would be this mat that you would put on the floor... and would have different CONCLUSIONS written on it that you could JUMP TO.
Michael Bolton: That's the worst idea I've ever heard in my life, Tom.
Samir: Yes, this is horrible, this idea.

Haha, love that movie :thumbsup:

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: SunnyD
You do realize that the Forceware X (100-series) drivers for the 8800 ALSO have 6- & 7-series code in them right?

Ah, interesting, didn't notice nVidia was packaging the 100.XX+ drivers in a "unified driver". Still, it doesn't change the fact there's 4 discrete driver versions that nVidia needs to update each release even if they are packaging them together. It looks as if nVidia simply cut support for cards below the 6-series, allowing them to pack the 6-7-8 series in one download. The Geforce + Riva UDA for Vista RC1 was 50MB, the new Geforce 6/7/8 UDA Beta for Vista is only 30MB. Bad news is it answers the doubts I had concerning fixes for all GPUs instead of releasing fixes as needed.

 

[Lonyo]

nVidia has no driver release schedule. Don't be surprised if there's no WHQL for 6 months! Don't even be surprised if some sites have a WHQL driver while the official nVidia website has an older one listed as the most up to date.