Nvidia is ending support in its latest drivers for GPUs from the GTX 900 and GTX 1000 series. GPUs will still work normally for the time being.
In its latest driver update for Windows systems, Nvidia is ending support for GPUs from the GTX 900 and GTX 1000 series. These graphics cards, built on the Maxwell and Pascal architectures respectively, are thus coming to the end of their relevance. The graphics cards will continue to work for the time being, as long as the current driver does not cause any problems.
The lack of updates will become more problematic for new applications. It is also unclear whether future Windows updates will cause problems for the GPUs. Anyone with a slightly older system with GPUs from the series under the hood is definitely facing problems in the long term.
Stopping support is a popular way today to label hardware as outdated. Users who are still satisfied with the performance of their hardware are forced to upgrade due to a lack of software support. The old components thus inevitably turn into e-waste.
Turing
Pascal was introduced in the spring of 2016. Nvidia has therefore supported the micro-architecture for just under ten years. Support lasted longer for Maxwell. The most recent architecture that is still actively receiving driver updates is Turing from 2019.
Whether the end of GPU support will have a major impact is doubtful. Hardware in which Pascal and Maxwell GPUs are usually present will most likely not have a TPM 2.0 module on board. This means that they cannot get an update from Windows 10 to Windows 11 and Microsoft has officially stopped supporting such systems.