Nvidia Drivers
Nvidia Drivers
I recently read and applied "older" drivers (566.36) following several articles highlighting major issues in newer versions. After using the driver listed here, I no longer experience any problems caused by current drivers. However, my concern remains: when will Nvidia fix these flaws and ensure we can rely on future updates? It feels like Nvidia is taking a risky approach. Thank you.
Check the Nvidia support page for the revised driver, if they manage to resolve the problem as before.
What? There is no mention of problems in Nvidia documents. Why should I rely on a site that misleads its audience? Should I highlight that Nvidia also claimed its 50 series is well stocked and can fulfill customer needs, even though that statement seems questionable too?
I don't recall any nVidia driver release that didn't address both major problems and still had unresolved known open issues in the release notes for over two decades. Of course, those lists leave out the extensive collection of reported bugs found on the nVidia forums. Many of these problems are logged there because developers need to register first to submit them directly to nVidia. Some issues stay open for years, while others become critical enough to be fixed in the very next update, such as the inability to wake from sleep.
I've been using Nvidia cards since the SLI of two GeForce GTX 460s, and I haven't faced the problems I'm experiencing now with my new 4090 FE, which will soon be replaced by the 5090 FE. It looks like Nvidia understands that its video cards are essentially its only competition, so they've become slow to develop and manage their products.
If you're using one of the newer 5000 series Nvidia GPUs, it's usually better to rely on the latest drivers rather than general ones. It might take several months for them to fix all the software issues with these new models, often requiring input from game developers. On my RTX 4080, the main driver-related issues I've faced recently are outdated versions. Still, I no longer use Nvidia's ShadowPlay because it kept causing texture glitches in games. OBS works fine, but I miss having Instant Replay available.
I also switched back to the Nvidia driver 566.36 for my GTX 3080 ti card on Windows 10.
My system has remained stable for over two years, but since February 2025 I've experienced repeated crashes, lockups, forced reboots, and BSODs after updating drivers.
I suspect these problems stem from Nvidia drivers 572.16, 572.83, or 576.52 (Nvidia may have made a mistake).
I’ll share more updates later to check if the system becomes more stable after reverting to 566.36.