NVIDIA GeForce Experience – Changes How You Get Game Ready Drivers

NVIDIA held a press briefing yesterday hosted by Henry Lin, product manager for GeForce Experience, that covered some new features that are coming to the NVIDIA GeForce Experience (GFE). The tweaks to GeForce Experience include updates on Share, Stream, and how you get NVIDIA’s Game-Ready drivers.

The big news from the new changes is that NVIDIA is going to be relying predominantly on GeForce Experience to deliver Game-Ready drivers. NVIDIA says that right now 90% of GeForce video card drivers are downloaded and installed through the GeForce Experience utility. Over 300-million driver downloads have happened through GFE since it was first released in May 2013. GeForce Experience automatically notifies you of new driver releases from NVIDIA. With a single click, you can update the driver directly, without leaving your desktop. Starting in December 1st, 2015 you’ll need to install GFE and register your e-mail with GeForce Experience in order to download game-ready drivers. Once you’ve given NVIDIA your e-mail address you’ll be able to get all the latest video card drivers, product news, announcements, the ability to win early-access game codes and more. NVIDIA will also no longer be sending game-ready drivers automatically to users as not everyone might need them. NVIDIA has two classifications for gamers and will allow you to select how often you’d like your drivers to be updated in GFE.

1. Casual gamers that don’t want to be inundated with tons of driver updates
2. Enthusiast gamers that pre-load games that play games on the day that they come out.

In order to get the game ready drivers users will need to download the latest driver on the NVIDIA website and install the GeForce Experience (GFE). Once you’ve done that you need to enter your e-mail and sign up for the GeForce Experience and then opt-in for the game reader driver releases. The registration requires a verified e-mail address and does not require a password. You will be able to opt-out of the program and NVIDIA will still be posting drivers to their website, but it will be on a reduced quarterly cycle.

Basically, NVIDIA wants you to download drivers straight from GFE and those that use GFE will get earlier access to the drivers over casual gamers that might not want to bother installing GFE. This will likely upset those that don’t want to install another application on their computer, but this is the direction that NVIDIA wants to take things.

The NVIDIA GeForce Experience update that is rolling out today will also offer a huge jump in image quality for the NVIDIA GameStream experience. GameStream will now work at Ultra HD 4K resolutions at 60 FPS with 5.1 surround sound. Streaming your game from your GeForce GTX powered PC to your living room SHIELD device has never looked so good!

Twitch broadcast with NVIDIA’s GeForce Experience will now work at 1080P at 60 FPS at a maximum bitrate of 9MBps. This is a nice step up from the previous limit of 720p60!

YouTube Live will also be support 1080P at 60 FPS.

NVIDIA noted that a ton of big name game titles are coming out this holiday season and that they expect a large number of NVIDIA Game Ready drivers to be released.

NVIDIA released Game Ready drivers on the first day a big game title launches as they want to ensure that gamers have the best possible gaming experience on GeForce hardware. NVIDIA noted that they take the optional step to WHQL certify these drivers.

NVIDIA has been doing the Game Ready driver program for two years now and believe that they offer the best driver support.

The slide above shows how NVIDIA has released 14 Game Ready Drivers this year in addition to Day 1 drivers for Microsoft Windows 10 with DirectX 12 API support. Game titles like GTA V and The Witcher 3 were some of the biggest game titles in 2015 and NVIDIA was there was driver support from the start.

The most recent NVIDIA Game Ready driver was GeForce Game Ready 358.50 WHQL drivers for Start Wars Battlefront Open Beta that were released on October 7th, 2015.

NVIDIA has more changes and improvements coming to GeForce Experience in 2016.