Should Manufacturers Get their Drivers In Order Before Unleashing Expensive Hardware?

[Supershanks]

Agree totally but can't see it evere happening sadly. ATi and Nvidia: The hall of shame sums up things pretty well in such an enviroment you ain't going to get great drivers.

[awm]

For software beta software is generally free on the assumption that you are doing testing. If the hardware was given to you free beta drivers are acceptable, if not its like buying a car with one cylinder not working, you aren't getting what you paid for. Of course if it was marketed as fancy new hardware with beta drivers that would be OK, but companies always try to hide it and that's unacceptable.

[alsenior]

imho the vista driver situation is just dire. they had nearly 18 months since the first alpha was relesed.some times i swear hardware manufacturers cant organise a piss up in a brewery

[DougMcDonald]

I would say that all companies would try their hardest to achieve max compatiblity with the majority of systems via their drivers because something which has a large driver failing will (hopefully) be reviewed in a negative light as the reviewers will use the earlier driver set.
Since companies like ati/nvidia are in such close competition, anything which affects the review in a negative manner would allow the other company an advantage, it would be safe to say that neither company would try to do that.

You could argue that there is a timing battle as well, and by rushing out a new class of cards may give a temporary advantage to the commpany which manages it.
This may well be the case, but I would have thought that even when a company gets a card out first, there will be an amount of 'wait until the...' going on from anyone who has a reason to wait.
Additionally, few people are in a position to choose when to buy their pc (unless they have lots of self control) - personally when I have the money to do something, I often do it straight away with what's available (unless there is a MAJOR change/price drop etc)

Also with regard to pricing, you could argue that brand new hardware demands a premium price to put off all but the richest enthusiasts! and by definition, these are more likely to be the ones who will be able to solve a relatively technical problem as opposed to your everyday user.
When the prices drop, the more casual user can afford the components and by this time, any unforseen incompatibilities should have been rules out.
Punishing the enthusiast? maybe, but it does sort out problems for the majority of users.

I would also add that pretty much 100% of the software that ever comes out with 'an acceptable' level of bugs and drivers are not unaffected by this. The requirement for technical support for any program is testiment to these relatively small issues, knowledgebases and faq's are filled with things like 'if you have X hardware, make this tweak to Y' or 'To allow X to work over a network, disable Y'.
Coming from a software development background, I would certainly say that it IS impossible to test all of the incarnations of a pc's innards or unusual software installed. Although best attempts to cure this are made, small changes to the software are needed over time to best meet the needs of the technology.

Overall I would say that whilst with the best will in the world some problems will be present but these are often just accepted as these may well be inevitable.

[Clunk]

Doug,

I agree, but the setups that Ive used have been typical of what most people that buy the cards would have, and that includes boards with Nvidias own horrid 680i chipset, but I wont go there

I would say that if vista had just been released, that it would be understandable that there would be problems, but, the SAME problems occured on XP, with the same motherboards, same software and hardware.

Admittedly, the drivers are much better, but not perfect, and there are rumours of new cards, which is frankly, out of order

[shaithis]

Isn't this a case of chicken and egg?

The hardware comes first, the drivers second.......You need the hardware to test the drivers properly.

The latest round of cards highlights just how well the likes of nVidia and ATI have been doing on the driver front recently, the reason we have had a dodgy patch is a combination of completely new hardware architecture plus the additional complication of Vista. I think anyone who doesn't take this into account and just slates the manufacturers, hasn't really stopped to think about the 'whys'.

So, in arguably the most taxing times that nVidia and ATI driver creators have had to endure, they took a while to get drivers out that delivered for everyone........and then there are the large percentage of people who have had their shiny DX10 cards since they released and haven't had any issues with the drivers at all.

Personally, I think they have done remarkably well......and its not something that happens very often....How many people complaining here have gone the last 2-3 years changing gfx cards without drivers issue? Take the rough with the smooth!

[GoNz0]

its a shame we cant bring a class action against them, to force them to support there older cards, or anything more than 3 weeks old until everyone is happy, there should be a law in place to stop them releasing new stuff until they can prove what they have works ok..

they would soon shape up if we could easliy sue for the value of the card back being as though it doesen't work as advertised.

[shaithis]

its a shame we cant bring a class action against them, to force them to support there older cards, or anything more than 3 weeks old until everyone is happy, there should be a law in place to stop them releasing new stuff until they can prove what they have works ok..

they would soon shape up if we could easliy sue for the value of the card back being as though it doesen't work as advertised.

If manufacturers were made to support cards for ever, a new card would cost a fortune and progress would be massively hindered.

I personally like technological advancement.

[GoNz0]

i take it you have never owned a card thats 9 months old and has not had a driver release in that time ?

well i did and it sucks big time.. wasted £600 on 2 cards that would not work together.. 1 driver release 3 weeks after i brought them, and nothing else until 9 months later..

yeh i like advancments as well, but they should at least work..

[this_is_gav]

Can't see how manufacturers could get most of their issues out of the way before release. Think of how many combinations of applications, settings and hardware there are!

I'm happy to be a guinea pig if I'm an early adopter - I can't see they have any other way in most cases, and I know what I'm becoming if I grab something near it's launch.

Still, there's no excuses for the way ATi and nV have launched their recent cards (possibly the 8500 and 8600 excluded). Basic functionality and performance across most of the board shouldn't be too much to ask. Neither of the 2 have acceptable drivers for these 2 product lines yet in my opinion.

I don't mind a few quirks though, and expect performance to increase as driver revisions go on. Just so long as things work decently out of the box.

Then there's always Creative, who seem to have a decent driver shipped with their products, and then continue to break them as revisions go on and new OS's are released.

[dangel]

My 8600GTS is anything but bug-free

[Clunk]

Isn't this a case of chicken and egg?

The hardware comes first, the drivers second.......You need the hardware to test the drivers properly.

The latest round of cards highlights just how well the likes of nVidia and ATI have been doing on the driver front recently, the reason we have had a dodgy patch is a combination of completely new hardware architecture plus the additional complication of Vista. I think anyone who doesn't take this into account and just slates the manufacturers, hasn't really stopped to think about the 'whys'.

So, in arguably the most taxing times that nVidia and ATI driver creators have had to endure, they took a while to get drivers out that delivered for everyone........and then there are the large percentage of people who have had their shiny DX10 cards since they released and haven't had any issues with the drivers at all.

Personally, I think they have done remarkably well......and its not something that happens very often....How many people complaining here have gone the last 2-3 years changing gfx cards without drivers issue? Take the rough with the smooth!

When did the 8800 series cards arrive? last november was it? 7 months ago, and the partly working drivers for XP, still only materialised a month or so ago.

In the 6 months that it has taken them to work (just on the desktop in windows XP even), the cards have been pretty much unusable for a hell of a lot of people, and I certainly wouldnt say that they had "done remarkably well", its Windows XP, its been out for 6 or more years, the cards have been on the market for 6 months, is that acceptable? NO!, NO it isnt, and far from it!

As for the Vista problems, I am slightly more sympathetic, as it is a newer O/S, but saying that, it isnt like it was a shock to them, they have had the alphas, the betas, and the release candidates, and now Vista itself has been out for a few months (3 is it now?). Maybe this was the hold up for the XP drivers?

I honestly cant see why they cant beta test future cards on broad spectrum of people? Sell the cards to beta testers at half price or less, make the test cards look different so that their resale value isnt much, maybe time disable them? (can this be done?) and when beta testing is complete, give the tester a retail card for half price or less. Its just an idea, and I dont really expect they would consider it, but I suspect that there are a lot of people that would love to do it.

[shaithis]

I think the nVidia problem has been that they seemed to pool most of their resources into creating the Vista drivers first for the 8x00 series. Which makes sense as they are DX10 cards.

Once in a blue moon a situation like we have had for the last 6 months will happen but its a very extreme oddity. I think people are just a little upset as they are used to everything working regardless of whether they early-adopt or not......I think some people forget what purchasing (and then getting to work) hardware was like 5-10 years ago......I also think that the pressure placed on the manufacturers by end-users to get these products out plays a major part in this. How many posts have you read in the last year berating nVidia and ATI for missing deadlines?


Your idea does sound good, although I fear that the testers wouldn't take the hardware too seriously if it was cheap and "beta" and the manufacturers wouldn't be so fast to sort issues out as their only customers are "beta testers".

[this_is_gav]

I think the nVidia problem has been that they seemed to pool most of their resources into creating the Vista drivers first for the 8x00 series. Which makes sense as they are DX10 cards.

The problem is, on Vista half the features were missing, even up to a couple of months ago, and the 8800's performance is lacking compared to the HD2900.

[Toobad]

The new Radeon HD 2400 and 2600 cards go on sale this weekend. According to Beyond3D the much vaunted UVD aspect of the card simply will not work in Vista64. Yet these cards are advertised as suitable for Vista! Doesn't the Sale of Goods Act famously state that "all goods must be fit for purpose and of merchantable quality"? I guess the battle of the balance sheet forces companies to operate at a level they can get away with but in the end they have to realise it is customers who make paydays possible.

Would you be happy to buy a car if the salesman told you the manufacturer hadn't quite perfected the technique of connecting the steering to the wheels? Apparently if you add a 'd' and make 'car' into 'card', the whole thing becomes totally acceptable to us geek types.

[this_is_gav]

Strange, as Beyond3D did some DX10 tests in Vista64. Obviously just a driver niggle somewhere.