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NVIDIA unifies desktop and laptop graphics drivers; improved performance incoming!
These laptop drivers won't be part of the same package -- 100MB downloads are big enough! -- but they will be part of the same release cycle. Along the performance increases that have been a desktop 'perk' for years, these new drivers will also enable (and standardize) features like CUDA (GPU-accelerated applications) and '3D TV Play' (output to 3D-enabled TVs).
There's a graph showing an average 30% performance increase for laptop GPUs with the new drivers -- pretty serious business! This could be just the bump mobile users need to properly play games on the move.
[via HotHardware]
Comments
8
Subscribe to comments216Apr 27th 2010 10:17AM
I thought Windows 7 and the newer Windows Update automatically sent out driver updates? Atleast it does on my machine
Sebastian AnthonyApr 27th 2010 10:54AM
Yep, it does generally, when drivers are WHQL signed.
Problem is that most laptop drivers are made by the OEM -- not NVIDIA! Usually because the chips/chipsets/etc vary between laptops.
This will all change in theory, with NVIDIA providing the drivers for everyone.
playstation_1987Apr 27th 2010 12:36PM
I'm excited to see 9400m drivers come through nvidia because I don't know how up to date apple keeps them on the MacBook Pro.
halophoenixApr 27th 2010 12:34PM
Thank goodness. I'm actually surprised there's no mention in the article of the fact that ATI has been doing this unified driver approach for years. I'm glad to hear NVidia is finally catching up - I tend to prefer their chipsets anyway.
ErebosApr 27th 2010 1:21PM
you do realize that the current stable release is 197, right??
so, it's more like at the end of the year, if not later on...
nothing for nvidia to brag about, since ATI introduced unified support last month with the Catalyst 10.3.
hazardApr 27th 2010 5:34PM
Hmm, well anyone who knows how to upgrade a driver would not be using drivers from OEMs! It's been common knowledge for prob a decade that as soon as you get a new [anything] computer it's straight to ATI or NVidia, unless you have some god awful Intel or SiS chipset. The only [real] news here is that the file size may have reduced.
Sebastian AnthonyApr 27th 2010 5:54PM
Sadly not that simple with laptop drivers...! Often the drivers from NVIDIA don't work as well as the ones from the laptop manufacturer.
whipit82May 6th 2010 10:14AM
I feel it's my duty to mention http://laptopvideo2go.com/ now -- for years they've had a community hard at work updating the desktop driver suite to work on mobile cards. I suspect they'll be really happy to finally hear this news!