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Despite Game-Related Glitches, AMD Discontinues Monthly Driver Updates

Posted by timothy on from the oh-the-humanity dept.

MojoKid writes "Recently AMD announced that it would cease offering monthly graphics driver updates, and instead issue Catalyst versions only 'when it makes sense.' That statement would be a good deal more comforting if it didn't 'make sense' to upgrade AMD's drivers nearly every single month. From 2010 through 2011, AMD released a new Catalyst driver every month like clockwork. Starting last summer, however, AMD began having trouble with high-profile game releases that performed badly or had visual artifacts. Rage was one high-profile example, but there have been launch-day issues with a number of other titles, including Skyrim, Assassin's Creed, Bat Man: Arkham City, and Battlefield 3. The company responded to these problems by quickly releasing out-of-band driver updates. In addition, AMD's recent Catalyst 12.6 beta driver also fixes random BSODs on the desktop, poor Crossfire scaling in Skyrim and random hangs in Crysis 2 in DX9. In other words, AMD is still working to resolve important problems in games that launched more than six months ago. It's hard to put a positive spin on slower driver releases given just how often those releases are necessary."

1 of 213 comments (clear)

  1. Which is worse, AMD or nVidia? by Futurepower(R) · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    LaptopVideo2Go.com is a very active web site entirely devoted to making nVidia graphics devices work correctly. nVidia tried to avoid doing anything about defective chips in HP laptops.

    When you download AMD's ATI drivers, the web site tries to sell violent video games. The new drivers often have serious bugs.

    If there is a competition, which CEO will be voted the worst? nVidia does not seem honest, and AMD seems to be trying to drive itself out of business.