NVIDIA Releases 358.50 Game Ready Drivers For Star Wars Battlefront
by Ryan Smith on October 7, 2015 7:30 AM EST
Due for wide release tomorrow is the Star Wars Battlefront Beta, a technical test for the game being run ahead of the game's full launch in November. As is often the case for major game releases, NVIDIA is pushing out another Game Ready WHQL driver release for Battlefront, this time with version 358.50.
The big news in this release is of course improved support for the Battlefront beta. However as this is also the first driver release from the R358 branch, 358.50 also contains several other improvements. On the API side of matters, R358 adds support for the OpenGL ARB’s previously announced 2015 ARB extensions, as well as support for OpenGL ES 3.2. Furthermore NVIDIA has made some improvements to GameWorks VR, further knocking out bugs and improving VR SLI support.
Meanwhile on the Windows 10 front, this driver release finally resolves the issues utilizing SLI and the NVENC encoder at the same time, meaning ShadowPlay and GameStream now work with SLI setups. Support for stereo rendering under DirectX 12 with an SLI setup has also been added, making this the first time we’ve seen stereo rendering under DirectX 12 addressed. On the other hand Fermi owners hoping to find WDDM 2.0 support in this driver release will be disappointed, as a quick check finds that Fermi cards continue to use the WDDM 1.3 path under Windows 10.
Finally, NVIDIA’s release notes make an unusual mention of “Added controls for forcing the use of the integrated graphics processor or the NVIDIA GPU on Optimus notebooks.” Though at this point we’re a bit unsure why this note is in here since NVIDIA has offered Optimus GPU selection controls for some time now.
As usual, you can grab the drivers for all current desktop and mobile NVIDIA GPUs over at NVIDIA’s driver download page.
Source: NVIDIA
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MrSpadge - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link
Considering the other new features and fixes it's certainly not just for a beta game release.D. Lister - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link
@MrSpadgeI suppose that's true, if one was on Win10 with SLI. Rest of the stuff, like the OGL ( http://www.anandtech.com/show/9506/opengl-siggraph... ) and the GWVR thing ( https://developer.nvidia.com/virtual-reality-devel... ) doesn't have any immediate application that may be holding the hardware back.
It just makes me wonder whether the frequency of updates has increased because technology requires it, or because marketing demands it.
bug77 - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link
I think they're just on the "release often" train. As soon a feature is ready, put it in the hands of the user.Plus, there are under the hood changes between major releases (like 350 using a different build process/driver structure, presumably to accommodate Wayland on Linux at some point, or 355 adding WDDM 2.0).
It does have the drawback of having to update often, but if you opt to not install every single release (there was a time I didn't skip a single beta), your life becomes much more simple.
BugblatterIII - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link
Yeah, and that gun they're putting to your head to update is a complete violation of your human rights!Seriously I reckon you'd always moan that there were too many or too few updates; there's no pleasing some people.
D. Lister - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link
@BugblatterIII"Yeah, and that gun they're putting to your head to update is a complete violation of your human rights!"
Exactly! lol
"Seriously I reckon you'd always moan that there were too many or too few updates;"
Oh yes, ALWAYS. I go into EVERY driver release article's comment section and complain about too many releases, and in every other article that is NOT about GPU drivers, I complain about there being too few. That's what I do! You must be very new here, otherwise you wouldn't have felt the urge to point it out to me.
"there's no pleasing some people."
Pffft, as if you had even tried.
toyotabedzrock - Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - link
I think he is annoyed that the promise of simple background profile updates seems to have not worked as intended.You have to wonder why each game seems to need a new code path in the drivers. Are they disabling a bunch of functionality when the game is running to cut down on command parsing time or are they using some low level routines that replace what the game designers are sending via dx api.
Chaser - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link
Lets face it, Nvidia is on it. They are an lean and efficient GPU designer. Each release of a new major title and they have a certified driver out for it.I have no ill will for AMD and hope for their success as competition benefits us all.
Mahigan - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link
AMD had a Star Wars battlefront driver a week ago bud.Mahigan - Thursday, October 8, 2015 - link
You might also want to peruse the various forum threads and reddit posts. NVIDIA have had so many issues with their Windows 10 drivers as of late.NVIDIA used to have an edge over AMD in the driver dept, now it would seem that neither company has an edge over the other in that dept.
DAOWAce - Sunday, October 11, 2015 - link
Meanwhile the drivers don't actually include an SLI profile for the game; that comes from installing GeForce Experience.Asinine.