Nvidia officially ends driver support for Kepler GPUs, Windows 7 & 8

[meric]

Come on people get used to the fact that win 7 is an outdated OS now, even MS abandoned their own child and it's not unusual for others to do so.

 

[Squid Surprise]

As long as a significant portion of the public still uses that software, Yes, it should continue being supported. I find your narrow-minded perspective disturbing.

Oh please. Grow up, do.

I'll use what I like as I see fit and if I want to complain because NVidia has removed support for an OS that myself and 20% of the rest of the world still use, I'm well within the bounds of reasonable relevance(going back to your original comment) to do so. You don't like that? Aww, look at the rest of us not caring.

Except a significant portion of the public DOES NOT use that software when purchasing a new PC (which is the only reason you would need Windows 7 support - existing hardware will still work on Win 7). That % is almost certainly less than 1%.

I've grown up - I'm using software that isn't obsolete... YOU, on the other hand, are living in the past - kind of the definition of NOT growing up...

You can certainly use whatever you see fit - just don't whine about it when it doesn't work anymore...

 

[Gezzer]

Ending driver support for Windows 7 is probably not the greatest decision. There is a significant minority who still prefer it, particularly for compatibility reasons, and who are using the latest GPUs on the old reliable OS.

I think it'll only be a real problem with any games that still support Win7 at release and need to have Nvidia optimized drivers. Pretty sure that we'll see very few games that fit that category moving forward. Truth is once I find a driver that works well, I only update it when they release a game optimized driver that's mandatory and I haven't had to do that in a long while for my Win7 installs.

 

[Gezzer]

As long as a significant portion of the public still uses that software, Yes, it should continue being supported. I find your narrow-minded perspective disturbing.

Oh please. Grow up, do.

I'll use what I like as I see fit and if I want to complain because NVidia has removed support for an OS that myself and 20% of the rest of the world still use, I'm well within the bounds of reasonable relevance(going back to your original comment) to do so. You don't like that? Aww, look at the rest of us not caring.

In an ideal world support should exist for the foreseeable life of a product. Problem is that doesn't come without a cost. Even the simple act of insuring backwards compatibility uses resources. So there has to be a cutoff regardless of how many people are still using the product. Try buying new OEM parts for a car made in the 60s. Pretty much impossible. Even new aftermarket for some makes are rare.

As well another consideration is that supporting an really old legacy product can actually degrade support for newer products if there's been a radical shift in how a product works from the older one to the newer one. Perfect example is the shift from XP to Vista. Most issues with Vista were caused by the new direct x driver API and vendor supplied GPU drivers. If MS hadn't changed it Vista would of been much more stable and wouldn't of had the infamous reputation it was saddled with.

So, yeah it would be great if GPU vendors continued to support Win7 for the few users that really have the need. But while it benefits the users, how much does it benefit Nvidia or MS? I'd suggest not enough to make the potential backlash all that much of a factor, especially when you consider how much it'll cost.

 

[ZedRM]

Except a significant portion of the public DOES NOT use that software when purchasing a new PC (which is the only reason you would need Windows 7 support - existing hardware will still work on Win 7). That % is almost certainly less than 1%.

I've grown up - I'm using software that isn't obsolete... YOU, on the other hand, are living in the past - kind of the definition of NOT growing up...

You can certainly use whatever you see fit - just don't whine about it when it doesn't work anymore...

you're a pretty entitled fella, aren't you

Wow, you two sure showed me... Not..

Now let's see how someone responds when they have maturity and understand the ideals of respectful, dignified and civilized conversation...

In an ideal world support should exist for the foreseeable life of a product. Problem is that doesn't come without a cost. Even the simple act of insuring backwards compatibility uses resources. So there has to be a cutoff regardless of how many people are still using the product. Try buying new OEM parts for a car made in the 60s. Pretty much impossible. Even new aftermarket for some makes are rare.

As well another consideration is that supporting an really old legacy product can actually degrade support for newer products if there's been a radical shift in how a product works from the older one to the newer one. Perfect example is the shift from XP to Vista. Most issues with Vista were caused by the new direct x driver API and vendor supplied GPU drivers. If MS hadn't changed it Vista would of been much more stable and wouldn't of had the infamous reputation it was saddled with.

So, yeah it would be great if GPU vendors continued to support Win7 for the few users that really have the need. But while it benefits the users, how much does it benefit Nvidia or MS? I'd suggest not enough to make the potential backlash all that much of a factor, especially when you consider how much it'll cost.

While those are some good points, the cost & effort of continued support can't be significant because all the tools and knowledge already exist, for both companies. This decision was not about cost so much as it was about driving future sales. NVidia has jumped on the the "Let's force everyone to upgrade" bandwagon with ms. This move isn't an effort to save money, it's an effort to make money. Plain & simple.

And it is still the wrong choice with people still using, and upgrading, PCs that have Windows 7 installed.

 

[Gezzer]

Wow, you two sure showed me... Not..

Now let's see how someone responds when they have maturity and understand the ideals of respectful, dignified and civilized conversation...

While those are some good points, the cost & effort of continued support can't be significant because all the tools and knowledge already exist, for both companies. This decision was not about cost so much as it was about driving future sales. NVidia has jumped on the the "Let's force everyone to upgrade" bandwagon with ms. This move isn't an effort to save money, it's an effort to make money. Plain & simple.

And it is still the wrong choice with people still using, and upgrading, PCs that have Windows 7 installed.

You could be right about the cost... or totally wrong. Problem is it's pure speculation on that point unless either you or I have any "insider" information, which I certainly don't. As for driving future sales that might be true of dropping the older generation cards, but I seriously doubt it's the case for Windows 7&8. Why would they do that if continuing support would surely mean new card sales for those operating systems? Maybe the potential sales aren't sufficient to cover the costs in Nvidia's eyes.

 

[Squid Surprise]

Wow, you two sure showed me... Not..

Now let's see how someone responds when they have maturity and understand the ideals of respectful, dignified and civilized conversation...

While those are some good points, the cost & effort of continued support can't be significant because all the tools and knowledge already exist, for both companies. This decision was not about cost so much as it was about driving future sales. NVidia has jumped on the the "Let's force everyone to upgrade" bandwagon with ms. This move isn't an effort to save money, it's an effort to make money. Plain & simple.

And it is still the wrong choice with people still using, and upgrading, PCs that have Windows 7 installed.

Alas, some people don't always have the ability to see - no matter how clearly things are spelled out for them...

First of all, Nvidia is a business - therefore ALL major decisions are impacted by the amount of profit (or perceived profit) they will give to them. For some reason, you have decided, despite having 0 knowledge of their inside workings, that you know better than this highly successful company.

Well, obviously we will never know the real truth... but I'd be betting on the multi-billion dollar company's decisions over some random internet poster...

The data we actually DO know all supports Nvidia's decision to discontinue Windows 7 support: I'll lay it out for you one more time - not sure why, but hey, I've got time to kill before I have to start teaching

Point 1: Windows 7 has already been discontinued by Microsoft. Regardless of the current user base, the future will inevitably reduce it down to virtually 0 (see Windows XP, 98, 95, etc).

Point 2: While there might be a sizable Windows 7 user base in existence (approximately 20%) these are all using EXISTING hardware - that hardware all operates on Windows 7 ALREADY and does not need to have driver updates - as Windows 7 has been discontinued (see point 1), there will be no "changes" to Windows 7 requiring new video drivers for existing video cards.
---> Your video card will operate exactly the same on Windows 7 today as it did yesterday, last year, next year and 10 years from now.

Point 3: The only possible reason to want Windows 7 support to continue would be if you were planning on buying a NEW PC - or putting a 4000 series video card (they don't exist yet) - with Windows 7 on it. The % of people doing this is almost certainly under 1% - and would therefore be foolish of Nvidia to waste engineers/programmers optimizing.

Point 4: Everything has a cost. Continuing support for ANY OS requires Nvidia to devote employee manpower/bandwidth/etc in order to make it happen. With almost nobody needing/wanting such a service (see point 3), devoting these resources would be foolish. Imagine reading an article saying that the Nvidia 4000 series was being delayed because they hadn't allocated enough resources to it - because those resources were being squandered supporting Windows 7 - you'd see quite the outrage then!

Point 5: Big Companies, while generally seen by the public as "dumb and stupid" are almost universally the exact opposite. You don't get to be a multi-billion dollar corporation by making a bunch of stupid decisions. Do they still make mistakes? Of course - everyone does. But the major decisions they make tend to be made utilizing manpower, consultation and research. They aren't just one random guy saying "I want this". If they are, they don't tend to stay multi-billion dollar corporations for long...

 

[Markoni35]

Point 5: Big Companies, while generally seen by the public as "dumb and stupid" are almost universally the exact opposite. You don't get to be a multi-billion dollar corporation by making a bunch of stupid decisions.

You've obviously never heard of Windows ME, Vista or Windows 8...

 

[Squid Surprise]

You've obviously never heard of Windows ME, Vista or Windows 8...

They still made a fortune from them despite the bad taste they left in our mouths...

 

[cliffordcooley]

You've obviously never heard of Windows ME, Vista or Windows 8...

And the now new Windows 11.

 

[Gezzer]

You've obviously never heard of Windows ME, Vista or Windows 8...

The problem with all those releases, and I predict the same for Windows 11, is that they were solutions to M$ problems/needs, not end user problems/needs.

ME: Microsoft was going to merge the 9X line with the NT one and originally it was going to be Windows 2000 they would release for this purpose. But someone at M$ decided that 2K wasn't simplified enough for home users and changed their minds. ME was rushed to market to fill a marketing void, lack of a year 2000 release. And didn't have nearly enough time to bake so it could release on time. The result was a buggy mess that would lock up if you just looked at it wrong.

Vista: Microsoft decided to bring some of the Direct X API into the NT kernel plus made many other major changes to the way it worked compared to previous versions. One change is new DX versions wouldn't be backwards compatible for previous versions of windows locking each to it's respective OS. But all the changes caused vendor DX3D drivers to continually have issues, making Vista almost as flaky as ME. By it's EOL these problems were pretty much corrected. It didn't help that there was such a lag between it and XP either.

Win8/8.1: Microsoft missed the mobile boat by a mile. This is something Gates owns up to, but I'd suggest having Balmer heading things didn't help. Before Google gave Android away for free, smart phones were considered more luxury items then the necessities they are today. What's more Android showed that the OS wasn't the big revenue maker, having a exclusive "app" store was where the real money was.
To recapture lost mobile market share M$ decided to leverage it's massive windows and Xbox user base and released Win8 as a touch/mobile centric OS. The one windows for all Microsoft devices as their marketing stated. As a touch/mobile UI Metro was okay, I used it on the one touch enabled desktop I had with no problems.
But as a "new and improved" UI for regular M&K desktop use it failed for the majority of users. Everything from the "start screen" to the "charms" and "apps" were a massive departure from previous designs. The UI was often very confusing for long time users who were used to the hierarchical style that had worked so well in pervious windows versions.

Win11: While the juries still out on Win11, most people can agree that the Windows store is a failure compared to Apple and Android. I'm pretty certain that the reason Win10 was marketed as the "last windows" was because M$ was aiming to make the store it's revenue stream moving forward. But one problem is unlike the competitors, M$ can't lock users into only using windows store acquired apps. It's still relatively easy to purchase programs from other sources for Win10.
Which brings us to why they back pedaled on the "last windows" concept and Win10 now has a EOL scheduled. It's also why IMHO Windows 11 is being released with much higher "security features" and a "new & improved" store. While Google might of made locking windows down a requirement for allowing their Android apps in the M$ store, I'm pretty sure that M$ wants, hell needs, to lock down the OS to give their apps a fighting chance in the marketplace.
The way I see it is M$ was so late to the party nothing they do, even supporting Steam on it is going to make people use the store to any great extent. And if they do figure out a way to totally lock down the OS and disallow programs, the backlash will be massive. Users are just too used to how we've always used the OS. The extremely strict requirements this creates to run Win11 isn't going to help it any either.

So another version of Windows to fulfill M$'s needs that will eventually be seen as another infamous "odd numbered" release fail. IMHO there's a very good reason why Apple never merged iOS and their desktop OS. They had the brains to see how difficult that would be (like merging PvP & PvE in most MMORPGs), and more importantly didn't have a problem with their mobile market share. There's a good chance that Windows 12 will be a complete reversal of the trend since Win8. If not M$ might see a massive shift towards alternatives, like Linux distros.

 

[cliffordcooley]

If not M$ might see a massive shift towards alternatives, like Linux distros.

I'm trying to convince myself that is what I need to do.

 

[Gezzer]

I'm trying to convince myself that is what I need to do.

I'm so close.

Two things holding me back. I use my computers for gaming and while Linux has made leaps and bounds I'm still tied to a Windows box to get the most out of my gaming.

Secondly every distro I've used is all over the map feature wise. Unlike windows which has the feature sets pretty firmly baked into the OS, something that worked a month ago in any given distro can be horribly broken in the next release.
Perfect example. I've tried a few different distros over the years and my current fav is Mint. I have a an old game box I converted into a HTPC (i7 875K 16Gb RAM, GTX980) that's pretty much overkill for it's use. I mostly use it for streaming movies and Spotify.
It works great for Spotify, connected to my stereo. I don't think I've used a CD in the last 4-5 years. Thing is I use it with a touch screen for ease of use and I've yet to get Mint on any other distro to allow me to log in using the touch screen.
Touch works fine once the distro desktop loads in, but before that touch just doesn't work at all. Where as I've been able to log in using touch with both Win7 and 10 from day one.

If a distro ever figures out how to overcome these two draw backs in a meaningful way, I'm all in. Until then I'll just fool around with a new distro every now and then until eventually something breaks on it, and I'm back with windows.