Microsoft removes problematic AMD driver that was causing BSODs on Windows 10 PCs

[Thorney]

I had this error last week, twice after playing two new games so I checked it out and it said it could be a motherboard driver issue, so I got new AMD drivers from Asus and that fixed it. It seems this was the real reason.

 

[Maxiking]

Ever heard about the amd gpu division? It was called rebrandeon for a reason.

 

[ACE76]

LOL. Microsoft releases a bad driver but it's AMD's fault...if you rely on Windows Update for your driver's, you have no business building PCs to begin with.

 

[ACE76]

I had this error last week, twice after playing two new games so I checked it out and it said it could be a motherboard driver issue, so I got new AMD drivers from Asus and that fixed it. It seems this was the real reason.

You should be getting drivers directly from AMD, not Asus.

 

[Gimp65]

But yet oddly, AMD was right there in lockstep with M$ declaring, "all of our new CPUs will only be fully compatible with Windows 10".

Since AMD has had a questionable reputation for drivers for a couple of decades, I suppose Intel has been paying off M$ for the same period of time..

Face it, AMD fan boys like to foster a persecution complex, since it effectively excuses anything AMD screws up.

For what it's worth im sick of my gtx 1070 and it's constant issue with shadowplay and adobe premiere, its like half the times I update it breaks one of them or both and I have to roll back. Also being on an old 4790k, nvidia drivers have much more overhead, so if I had a similar classed AMD card I would get more FPS. Next is the sh*tty mandatory login, I never seen anything as stupid, there is zero good reason to have this.

 

[kiwigraeme]

M/S couldn't wait any longer and updated my system last night - generally have encoding running overnight. I have the Gigabyte 570 aurous pro wifi board ( can't remember exact name ) anyway this morning said system updated and driver rollback - so wasn't too painful for me - I generally wait awhile - plus I hate having to do a few 2FA when I log back in - another reason to hold off.
Though yesterday Bad news my PC shop cancelled my PNY 3080 order -as PNY failed to deliver their orders - Good news the guy who phone me managed to get 1 EVGA card for about same price from their Head office - coming in 2 days . So went in to put a deposit down and say thanks to guy who pulled the strings to get it ( only 1 of 2 floating in their system internally ) - on their website the only cards available are ASUS for US $500 - $700 more

 

[wujj123456]

From where I sit, the average Windows 10 proponent can't even do the simplest math. They'll tell you, "Windows 10 was free". I say, "how could it be, you had to surrender a $100.00+ license to get it"

Turns out there are indeed things you don't know about. MS doesn't publicize this (for business reasons I suppose), but unless you have an OEM license or pirated Windows 7, any retail license of Windows 7 and above still activates corresponding version of Windows 10 just fine today. I regularly do clean install from latest Windows 10 image when I do major hardware upgrades like CPU and MB. The Windows 7 keys I had for more than 10 years ago still activates. You just have to install it first without key and activate it later in control panel. (https://www.howtogeek.com/266072/yo...ws-10-for-free-with-a-windows-7-8-or-8.1-key/)

This is similar to the dark pattern MS use to fool people into signing in with MS online account during installation. If you don't connect to Internet during installation and know where to click, you still get away with only local accounts.

These days even if you don't activate Windows 10, it no longer comes with the penalty like no updates (probably would be considered a benefit now?). The main downside is just that you can't customize some preferences. They no longer even bother to have the activate windows watermark on desktop.

I just refuse to knuckle under to some creep using business tactics he picked in some New Delhi bazaar/slum.

I've never indicated it's not for business reasons. It is a business to begin with. As time goes, the code change accumulated in core part of the kernel would have made backporting increasingly costly and complicated. If you follow Linux development, you would know each new hardware comes with minimal kernel version requirement and there are limited backport support for kernels just a few years old. Turns out the community maintaining old kernels for free don't have the resources or appetite to keep supporting new hardware on years old kernel either.

To be clear, I commented only because I feel AMD/Intel is taking the unnecessary blame here from your initial comment. The fault is pretty much entirely all on MS. If they are willing to burn lots of resources to keep Windows 7 going for new hardware, they probably could. Though I suspect the developers tasked for this will likely quit pretty quickly. Working with legacy technology is generally not anyone's preference. So there is some people problem too.

 

[captaincranky]

This is similar to the dark pattern MS use to fool people into signing in with MS online account during installation. If you don't connect to Internet during installation and know where to click, you still get away with only local accounts.

These days even if you don't activate Windows 10, it no longer comes with the penalty like no updates (probably would be considered a benefit now?). The main downside is just that you can't customize some preferences. They no longer even bother to have the activate windows watermark on desktop.

Ya know, I put a video card in my perfectly legal and activated Window 7 machine, without an internet connection. I normally leave it offline. The instant I connected to the web, M$ told me I was possibly running a stolen copy of Windows.

Frankly, I didn't think a video card had enough "points value", to deactivate the OS. I know with OEM stuff, the mobo and LAN card are immutably locked to the activation. But putting a vid card in? Gimme a break.

IF M$ had any morality whatsoever, they would permanently activate Windows editions they no longer support..I mean really, I have to continue to kiss their corporate a** to keep an XP machine running?

To be clear, I commented only because I feel AMD/Intel is taking the unnecessary blame here from your initial comment. The fault is pretty much entirely all on MS. If they are willing to burn lots of resources to keep Windows 7 going for new hardware, they probably could. Though I suspect the developers tasked for this will likely quit pretty quickly. Working with legacy technology is generally not anyone's preference. So there is some people problem too.

Here's the thing, mobo chip set and video card drivers are, and have always (?) been, proprietary..

I was perhaps making the assumption that AMD wrote and supplied these drivers to M$. As you're saying that's not the case, and M$ is whacking off into software components which should be written by AMD, then both parties are at least partially responsible.

Make all the fun you want of Intel IGP, but I've never had, or even heard of, driver issues with them..And that's in my own personal experience, with everything from 915 boards, to Sandy Bridge CPUs.

EDIR: I do think I recall Intel recently screwing up and not writing drivers for something or other.

FWIW, I'm pretty sure DX-12 could have been installed in Windows 7 via update. But IMO, that was M$', "gamers bribe", to load 10 into all those machines. And now you can't buy DX-12 video cards, oh the irony, oh the irony...

 

[wujj123456]

I was perhaps making the assumption that AMD wrote and supplied these drivers to M$. As you're saying that's not the case, and M$ is whacking off into software components which should be written by AMD, then both parties are at least partially responsible.

Your assumption is mostly correct, especially for peripheral drivers that would not be needed to boot. That's why you see much longer support for all kinds of peripheral, GPUs included. It mostly only needs to follow the driver API from each OS to implement the communication with their device. Of course until it needs a major kernel feature that doesn't exist on older kernel.

Unfortunately same is not true for CPU since such kernel API doesn't function until OS boots far enough. In fact, if the registers are different enough for the new architecture, some of those API would likely need different implementation on kernel side, even though from driver developer's perspective, they still call exact same API. To utilize new CPU features you will always need kernel to write to new control registers.

The way it works is that Intel/AMD have their architecture developer manuals which details exactly how each register functions. Think of it as a contract between hardware and OS so each can make progress independently. This usually starts very early under NDA with emulator before silicon exists because chip vendors also rely on OS to be fully up before they can do real silicon testing. In case of open-source kernel like Linux, both Intel and AMD directly implement and upstream the patches. Unless they have access to Windows kernel source code, MS would be the sole owner of implementation, though there will be very close collaboration, including engineers from both companies sitting together debugging. The whole process usually involves finding lots of erratas that require multiple silicon re-spin to fix.

The development also obviously always happen on latest code base, which is where the back-porting cost comes from. Code base deviating after years of new features and refactor is usually the cutoff point when a business or community would declare they won't support older kernel any more.

Make all the fun you want of Intel IGP, but I've never had, or even heard of, driver issues with them..And that's in my own personal experience, with everything from 915 boards, to Sandy Bridge CPUs.

Totally agree with this. In fact, how it handles drivers (not only GPU) in Linux is still a golden standard no other vendors come close IMO. Even if I am buying AMD MB, I always look for Intel NIC just to avoid any driver headache. Intel always had a much larger software team than AMD. Now that AMD is no longer that cash-strapped, I hope they will finally catch up.

PS: I was a Linux kernel developer responsible for part of silicon bring up for a mobile chip vendor as my first job. Nowadays, I work on datacenter stuff that also includes helping validating application for new hardware that many times aren't announced yet. Certainly not as close to the silicon as before, but we still find hardware bugs every now and then.

 

[daveteauk]

I don't know why this this news worthy because it is no news that MS updates always breaks something. I know some people will use this article to call out "poor driver" from AMD as usual, but perhaps they should look back at the many things that MS update broke in the past and still breaking. I recall they messed up Intel and Broadcom Wifi back then and not just once. All these should have been tested before the update go live for download.

Yeah, MS use us, their paying customers, as Beta testers. They throw out junk that's not tested properly, and when the S**T hits the fan, they look at the problems and THEN attempt to find the causes and fix it! Bar Stewards.

 

[daveteauk]

Ya know, I put a video card in my perfectly legal and activated Window 7 machine, without an internet connection. I normally leave it offline. The instant I connected to the web, M$ told me I was possibly running a stolen copy of Windows.

Frankly, I didn't think a video card had enough "points value", to deactivate the OS. I know with OEM stuff, the mobo and LAN card are immutably locked to the activation. But putting a vid card in? Gimme a break.

IF M$ had any morality whatsoever, they would permanently activate Windows editions they no longer support..I mean really, I have to continue to kiss their corporate a** to keep an XP machine running?

Here's the thing, mobo chip set and video card drivers are, and have always (?) been, proprietary..

I was perhaps making the assumption that AMD wrote and supplied these drivers to M$. As you're saying that's not the case, and M$ is whacking off into software components which should be written by AMD, then both parties are at least partially responsible.

Make all the fun you want of Intel IGP, but I've never had, or even heard of, driver issues with them..And that's in my own personal experience, with everything from 915 boards, to Sandy Bridge CPUs.

EDIR: I do think I recall Intel recently screwing up and not writing drivers for something or other.

FWIW, I'm pretty sure DX-12 could have been installed in Windows 7 via update. But IMO, that was M$', "gamers bribe", to load 10 into all those machines. And now you can't buy DX-12 video cards, oh the irony, oh the irony...

A question not associated with this here, so apologies, but can you, or someone, tell my why, when people are discussing MicroSoft, that they use the dollar sign instead of just using an 'S'? Why say M$ and not just MS, which is what it is? Is it a slag off that MS is a rich company?

 

[captaincranky]

A question not associated with this here, so apologies, but can you, or someone, tell my why, when people are discussing MicroSoft, that they use the dollar sign instead of just using an 'S'? Why say M$ and not just MS, which is what it is? Is it a slag off that MS is a rich company?

Believe it or not, "M$" (for Microsoft), has been an internet meme since dial-up! From what I believe would be sociologist's, (or possibly a Marxist's) perspective, It's the poor, (Proletariat), striking back against the overbearing power, (and obviously wealth), of the vast monopoly, and the major influence it has over their lives..

To be fair; yo Plebes y'all stole so many copies of early Windows editions, that now, (since XP), we'll be straddled with activation, for all eternity..