[Ars] Should we be required to create an account to get drivers?

[tential]

I still don't see how this locks people in

Also it's not really a search to find the drivers on AMDs site. 2 clicks to download. Hover over "drivers + support" -> click OS -> download.

Its a bit more involved on nvidia's site.

Isn't this just another test to show no matter what nvidia does its consumers will continue to buy nvidia?

The enthusiast community is mad about this. Want to guess if the 1080ti has worse or better sales than the 980ti? Or nvidia as a whole?

 

[Azix]

This isn't a big enough deal to affect sales. Most people still think nvidia is better and things won't change till that changes. People will buy them even if they are weaker. They ARE currently weaker outside the 980ti and people will still buy them

For most people it won't matter. I mean when you go to download drivers from their site, the GFE app is the easiest to get. The driver is buried under options. Won't matter, just a head scratcher. If they decide to go further then maybe.

 

[Nebor]

lol @ people saying it might effect sales. The last ATI card I had was a 9800 Pro. I haven't even considered buying an ATI card since then. Nvidia is dominating the market and has been for a long time. That's why they can afford to punk their customers with this GFE account deal.

 

[Ranulf]

Lots of programs have installers, launchers and what not. What's the big deal about having a tiny piece of software that lets you update your drivers? You are blowing that out of proportion. The email thing is the odd add on. Why does Nvidia need your email, unless this is part of their warranty system.

Email is 99% for marketing. They all want in on the metrics from places like Steam, often so they don't have to pay steam for their marketing info. Nvidia can start throwing in more AAA games for free if they want to go this route.

For me, its just one more annoying program hoop I have to jump through. If I want it, I can install it. Requiring it for just drivers is insane. There are systems where I am not going to want that nonsense installed.

Also, perhaps the lots of tiny pieces of software issue is from days of yore where you really couldn't or didn't want 5-10 little things running in the background to interfere with your system and game play. Today, most people can afford to run several things in the background with a game given quad+ cores and 8-16GB of ram. Yet we are now seeing games that really favor 8+ GB of ram to run smoothly and requiring quad cores.

I run the least amount of software I need while gaming, to maximize performance. It comes from experience, going back to editing config.sys and autoexe.bat files. These days its just trying to make sure some scanner program or communication program isn't hogging bandwidth, sending popups knocking me out of a game or killing system performance.

 

[tential]

This isn't a big enough deal to affect sales. Most people still think nvidia is better and things won't change till that changes. People will buy them even if they are weaker. They ARE currently weaker outside the 980ti and people will still buy them

For most people it won't matter. I mean when you go to download drivers from their site, the GFE app is the easiest to get. The driver is buried under options. Won't matter, just a head scratcher. If they decide to go further then maybe.

That's kind of my point. If you won't stop buy nvidia (not you particularly but even look at the post below yours for example) then nvidia will do whatever they want.

For nvidia, it is more convenient to upload drivers to gfe only. Less website maintenance, quicker for the vast amount of people using gfe to just click 1 button vs digging through the website, less chances to download the wrong driver, etc.

It's just the pros of catering to the enthusiast community outweigh the small cost in time to have some one constantly create new pages for every single new nvidia driver that comes out (which there are quite a number of them).

Amd doesn't do frequent driver updates so really, this whole system makes less sense for them currently.

 

[bystander36]

Email is 99% for marketing. They all want in on the metrics from places like Steam, often so they don't have to pay steam for their marketing info. Nvidia can start throwing in more AAA games for free if they want to go this route.

For me, its just one more annoying program hoop I have to jump through. If I want it, I can install it. Requiring it for just drivers is insane. There are systems where I am not going to want that nonsense installed.

Also, perhaps the lots of tiny pieces of software issue is from days of yore where you really couldn't or didn't want 5-10 little things running in the background to interfere with your system and game play. Today, most people can afford to run several things in the background with a game given quad+ cores and 8-16GB of ram. Yet we are now seeing games that really favor 8+ GB of ram to run smoothly and requiring quad cores.

I run the least amount of software I need while gaming, to maximize performance. It comes from experience, going back to editing config.sys and autoexe.bat files. These days its just trying to make sure some scanner program or communication program isn't hogging bandwidth, sending popups knocking me out of a game or killing system performance.

If the email is just about marketing, I certainly am no fan of that. I get more than enough marketing. I've already agreed that I don't like that part.

I think you are right in what is causing some people to freak out. It's a frame of mind learned from the early days of computing. I used to have multiple config.sys files on my system for different tasks, as we definitely had to conserve resources. But we are beyond that now. I have GFE installed, but I barely know it is there. It's a very low key bit of software if you adjust the settings.

It appears to me that GFE could be planned to replace the Nvidia control panel in time. They seem to have started with an optional piece of software, so they could work out any problems. Now it's going to replace their website. Once that part is going well, I could see them merge the Control panel into the software. At which point it's not even an extra bit of software.

 

[Creig]

So what comes next? You'll have to "like" their Facebook page before you can download a new driver?

 

[Genx87]

So what comes next? You'll have to "like" their Facebook page before you can download a new driver?

Yes, this is exactly the plan!

 

[Teizo]

Yes, this is exactly the plan!

Don't forget Twitter. We'll soon have to have a Twitter account as well.

 

[Genx87]

Don't forget Twitter. We'll soon have to have a Twitter account as well.

Yup, Twitter is a must. But that is step 3 after asking for an email address for game day drivers and having to like Nvidia on facebook.

 

[iiiankiii]

So what comes next? You'll have to "like" their Facebook page before you can download a new driver?

Of course. But, not before
1. snap chatting a **** pix with your Geforce equipped PC
2. making a vine video
3. instagraming a selfie with your Geforce equipped PC
4. uploading a rap song to sound cloud
5. updating your Tinder profile to say you like long walks on the beach, reading novels, and the "Geforce Experience"

 

[tential]

If the email is just about marketing, I certainly am no fan of that. I get more than enough marketing. I've already agreed that I don't like that part.

I think you are right in what is causing some people to freak out. It's a frame of mind learned from the early days of computing. I used to have multiple config.sys files on my system for different tasks, as we definitely had to conserve resources. But we are beyond that now. I have GFE installed, but I barely know it is there. It's a very low key bit of software if you adjust the settings.

It appears to me that GFE could be planned to replace the Nvidia control panel in time. They seem to have started with an optional piece of software, so they could work out any problems. Now it's going to replace their website. Once that part is going well, I could see them merge the Control panel into the software. At which point it's not even an extra bit of software.

Look how much people hated steam at first? The steam hate when it was mandatory for the new cs was unreal and rightfully so steam was atrocious. Now people use steam as a selling point of pc gaming....

So I won't be surprised when 5 years from now the same enthusiasts are very happy with gfe just like many are happy with steam now.

 

[Techhog]

Look how much people hated steam at first? The steam hate when it was mandatory for the new cs was unreal and rightfully so steam was atrocious. Now people use steam as a selling point of pc gaming....

So I won't be surprised when 5 years from now the same enthusiasts are very happy with gfe just like many are happy with steam now.

The difference is that Steam offers a lot of useful functionality now, and it's way better than your typical DRM. Generally, no DRM >>> Steam >>>>>>> Origin >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> everything else. It's a less of evils kind of thing.

This, however? Forcing it provides no benefit, the only benefit of using it at all is convenience, and it doesn't serve as an alternative to something worse like intrusive or limiting DRM. You can't equate them, no matter how desperately you want to. They are completely different things with completely different issues. The only similarity is the need for client. It's like saying that people are okay with web browsers in order to access the internet, so they should be fine with forcing GFE.

 

[amenx]

Not a deal breaker for me. Can easily register with throwaway address. Forced GFE is a bigger annoyance for me, but even that I'm sure a way will be found to rip it out from driver packages.

 

[Ranulf]

Look how much people hated steam at first? The steam hate when it was mandatory for the new cs was unreal and rightfully so steam was atrocious. Now people use steam as a selling point of pc gaming....

So I won't be surprised when 5 years from now the same enthusiasts are very happy with gfe just like many are happy with steam now.

No, it is nothing like Steam. It is a program required to install drivers for their hardware and requires an email. Drivers to make your hardware run... and heaven forbid I want to run older drivers for a specific game. That has never been a requirement, no siree bub.

I tolerate Steam these days because it generally runs well and here is the key point, the games are often cheap compared to the retail box days and go on sale fairly often. I'd prefer DRM free and I favor places like GOG for games because of that.

 

[Mezzanine]

Talk about a mountain out of a molehill, it takes like 2 minutes to make an account and at least you will be getting decent drivers unlike AMD's offerings.

 

[tential]

No, it is nothing like Steam. It is a program required to install drivers for their hardware and requires an email. Drivers to make your hardware run... and heaven forbid I want to run older drivers for a specific game. That has never been a requirement, no siree bub.

I tolerate Steam these days because it generally runs well and here is the key point, the games are often cheap compared to the retail box days and go on sale fairly often. I'd prefer DRM free and I favor places like GOG for games because of that.

"I tolerate GFE these days because it generally runs well and the drivers are better than the alternative drivers. I would prefer to just download them manually, and I favor places like torrents for my drivers because of that."

You'll be saying that 5 years from now, while other users won't even remember a time where it was different....

GFE is starting off in a far better place than Steam is.... GFE is starting at where Steam is actually. Steam started at -10/10. And that's an understatement to how BAD steam was day 1. ZERO features worked.

 

[Teizo]

Talk about a mountain out of a molehill, it takes like 2 minutes to make an account and at least you will be getting decent drivers unlike AMD's offerings.

I don't mind the account or giving the email. I've already done it. You don't have to sign in except when you want the driver update. What needs to happen though is to make GFE more enthusiast friendly (incorporate line by line game profiles vs the slider like in the NVCP), and make it so it doesn't bork up your overclock from Afterburner along with allowing you to direct the installer to a location of your choice so you can use DDU to do a totally clean install.

Do those three things and even though I don't like the notion of this and it makes me wonder what their end game is (that is what is so wrong with the current set up?), at least it will be easier to live with. Otherwise, if AMD's Zen processor turns out to be good and Radeon delivers equally then it more be more easily enticing to go buy AMD/Radeon hardware again.

 

[tidy]

The difference is that Steam offers a lot of useful functionality now...

No, it's exactly the same thing. I could just as well argue that GFE offers a lot of useful functionality, and for many people it does.

...and it's way better than your typical DRM.

Only if you want it's features. Otherwise it's one of the most invasive forms of DRM conceivable. You have to sign up to a service with your email, install 500MB of client, run it and it's 3 processes in 100MB of RAM every time you launch the game (or have it start with windows), close it manually afterwards (even origin has the decency to provide a close-with-game setting), have it download 100MB updates on a regular basis, be screwed around with verification emails every time you install it on a different system (or reformat the same one), etc. Just imagine if securom or something did all that. If you find steam's other features valuable, then this is a fair tradeoff. But if you don't, then Steam is nothing but an extremely bloated piece of DRM. It, just like GFE, should be optional.

No, it is nothing like Steam. It is a program required to install drivers for their hardware and requires an email.

How do you sign into Steam?

Drivers to make your hardware run... and heaven forbid I want to run older drivers for a specific game.

Yeah, just like heaven forbid I should want to run an older version of one of my Steamworks games because the latest patch has broken it on my PC. Steam forces you to install the latest version, because Valve knows best.

Although I am loath to agree with Tential, he's right in this one instance. Steam is a perfect analogy for what is happening here. If the morons at Nvidia go ahead with this ridiculous plan, then it won't be long before everyone just bends over, falling again for the "friendly DRM" trojan horse.

 

[Creig]

Talk about a mountain out of a molehill, it takes like 2 minutes to make an account and at least you will be getting decent drivers unlike AMD's offerings.

In single card systems, AMD drivers are just as good as Nvidia drivers. I can't comment about SLI/CrossFire as I'm not that much of a masochist to try it.

 

[SirPauly]

It bothers me as much as it bothers me to sign in at a forum to post. I do like the investments in the tool though and continues to build on the nV ecosystem with more reasons to go nVidia.

 

[SirPauly]

What needs to happen though is to make GFE more enthusiast friendly (incorporate line by line game profiles vs the slider like in the NVCP), and make it so it doesn't bork up your overclock from Afterburner along with allowing you to direct the installer to a location of your choice so you can use DDU to do a totally clean install.

From a tweaker point-of-view; as long as things are compatible to nVinspector -- I'm all for tools to simplify and enhance the gaming experience for PC gamers. I would like to see the NVCP incorporated into the GeForce Experience tool.

 

[SantaAna12]

Hellno!

I told Razer what I thought of them trying to get me to register to adjust DPI settings.

PFFFFFFFT!

I ended up giving my $ to Zowie. Better mouse anyways.

Shear the sheep, not me.

If you are interested in privacy--and you should be--say HELLNO NVIDIA!

 

[SirPauly]

Frankly, don't understand the extremism against and the rally cry for privacy on forums, when one has to give e-mails and data to sign up on forums.

 

[tential]

Frankly, don't understand the extremism against and the rally cry for privacy on forums, when one has to give e-mails and data to sign up on forums.

Enthusiasts are almost always against change at first. That's kind of my point with the steam thing. Enthusiasts hated steam at first for all of the reasons listed in the thread (it also didn't work.....) but now people quote steam sales as a reason to pc game.

People will be upset with gfe, then they'll use gfe over the next 7 months, then when pascal and arctic Islands release, they won't even remember gfe was an issue. They'll buy pascal.

A lot of gamers even use spotify and Pandora, which also takes your info.

It's a small minority of people that care, and nvidia will not take the time to care about those people. Considering enthusiasts do influence a decent portion of the market, they could get people to buy amd and punish nvidia and maybe nvidia would change. But the problem is, despite all the complaining, enthusiasts still will get nvidia over amd in 80%+ of cases even if gfe required a thumbprint scan....

So meh, can't care when i know people will complain, and won't actually do anything.