NVIDIA issued a number of knowledgebase updates, and a number of things are going end of life. Nvidia is working on the 390 series drivers, and from the looks of it will be halting 32-bit support drivers. Whether this is just the professional series or also the consumer end-user drivers is a little unclear. But I assume both.
After Release 390, NVIDIA will no longer release drivers for 32-bit operating systems for any GPU architecture. Later driver release versions will not operate, nor install, on 32-bit operating systems. Driver enhancements, driver optimizations, and operating system features in driver versions after Release 390 will not be incorporated back into Release 390 or earlier versions. This impacts the following operating systems:
- Microsoft Windows 7
- Microsoft Windows 8/8.1
- Microsoft Windows 10
- Linux
- FreeBSD
NVIDIA intends to support critical driver security fixes until January 2019. The latest build version is 388, so 390 is coming up rather sooner than later. Now might be a good time (if you are still on a 32-bit OS) to update/upgrade to 64-bit. On the Steam statistics page you’ll notice that about 2 percent of the players on the platform still have a 32bit OS. Canonical no longer makes 32bit versions available from Ubuntu 17.10. MacOS has already completely switched to 64 bit long ago.
There’s more though as after Release 390, NVIDIA will no longer support the following NVS products (NVS 315 NVS 310). Not a biggy though. Finally, in a 3rd update, Nvidia mentions the end of support for Select NVIDIA Quad-buffered Stereo Features. Beginning with Driver Release 396, NVIDIA Professional Drivers for Windows will no longer support the following quad-buffered stereo features:
- 3D DLP and Tridelity stereo display modes User interface and NVAPI access will be removed.
- NVAPI-based DirectX Stereo on Windows 10
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- The following APIs will be deprecated:
- NvAPI_D3D1x_CreateSwapChain ()
- NvAPI_D3D9_CreateSwapChain ()
Swapchains created via these APIs will return the error code “NVAPI_NOT_SUPPORTED,” when using Windows 10.
- When an application using the unsupported NVAPI is recompiled, the NVAPI functions will be linked (i.e., the NVAPI interface level will remain the same) but will return the error code, “NVAPI_NOT_SUPPORTED.”
- To continue using quad-buffered stereo, developers must switch to the Microsoft native (DXGI) stereo APIs.
- The following APIs will be deprecated:
- 3D Vision Pro option on the Dell M6700 laptop running Windows 10 Anniversary Update and newer
Release 390 will be available in December 2017. The NVIDIA support team will continue to address critical bug and security issues in Release 390 until December 2020. Thereafter, critical security fixes will be provided until December 2021. Future driver enhancements, driver optimizations, and OS features (i.e., from future OS releases) in driver releases after Release 390 will not be incorporated.
Thanks SH SOTN foir the news-submit.
