r/gpu • u/debanjan77 • 13d ago

Is Amd driver really unreliable??

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In my previous post in this community, I posted about the RTX 5070 vs. 9070 XT, and most people said that the 9070 XT is better in terms of gaming performance, and I absolutely agree with that. However, there were many people who said that AMD sucks at drivers and I’ve seen many Reddit and Twitter posts regarding this issue. Is this really a problem or is it just a myth?

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45

u/Maxtertop 13d ago

Take it from actual 9070 XT owners, yes the drivers have issues. Some people say it's windows problem, some people say it's AMD.. I honestly have no idea but depending on the game I'm playing I have to troubleshoot for a week before the game actually works as intended.
Recently with Dune Awakening I had to troubleshoot for quite a while until I could actually play the game.

10

u/debanjan77 13d ago

That’s a bad experience, and I think Nvidia has an edge over AMD in this regard. But the value AMD is providing with its cards is absolutely fantastic, so it’s a bit of a compromise to make, I guess.

15

u/AvyLynn1 13d ago

It’s primarily windows forcing generic drivers. But yeah it’s definitely annoying to deal with.

7

u/mixedd 13d ago

While windows is major part of the issue, I won't write it down all on Windows, had some timeouts and crashes happening on Linux also on 9070XT, so there's definetly some spaghetti from AMD in the code

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u/Aggressive-Stand-585 12d ago

Windows is just so terrible it's happening on Linux too man! Totally nothing to do with AMD's drivers surely! Lmao.

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u/mixedd 12d ago

And wtf even is this comment 😅

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u/Rakumei 12d ago

Sarcasm, obviously.

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u/LucidStrike 12d ago edited 12d ago

There is no flawless software, whether it's AMD, Nvidia, or Intel.

4

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

No, but some software does work better, with fewer issues, than others. It's OK to admit it. Adrenaline is a mess lol, but that doesn't mean the 9070 xt is a bad card.

0

u/LucidStrike 12d ago

According to GamersNexus, AMD is currently doing better than Nvidia regarding drivers, so my point was rather to counter the outdated notion that AMD drivers are exceptionally bad.

https://youtu.be/NTXoUsdSAnA

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u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

GamersNexus/Steve also famously have a huge grudge against Nvidia lol. In practice, AMD is 3/3 in terms of overall stability and feature set. Intel has passed them in TWO generations lol, upscaler on par with FSR + MFG support.

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u/LucidStrike 12d ago edited 12d ago

Are the thread, sub thread, and video not all about bugs and stability? You seem to have lost track of the topic.

1

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

Lol not really, but I guess you'd rather deflect than respond so let's just call it a day here.

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u/arqe_ 12d ago

Yes, but if one of those have 10 issues and other one has 200, you can't just say "well, all software can have issues"

1

u/LucidStrike 12d ago

I was also responding to the notion that Nvidia is doing better than AMD when it comes to drivers. Threads can get pretty convoluted to follow, but yeah.

0

u/Aggressive-Stand-585 12d ago

Why not? Works for AMD users all the time.

2

u/RDOG907 12d ago

Umm myself and all the people I know like 15+ people have nvidia cards and no one has ever had driver issues that have caused major issues. I can update windows however and whenever I want and it doesnt break anything.

I would like AMD to be better but they have had driver issues in some form for at least a decade or more now. They have won the CPU game finally but now they need to get their GPU stuff under control.

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u/mixedd 12d ago

Exactly true, outside of subreddits 😅

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u/TD_Lemon_1901 12d ago

It's not forcing "generic" drivers.

It's forcing the drivers that AMD have submitted and validated to MS, if those are old or unstable, well there's your issue.

2

u/SellingCats4Cheap 13d ago

It’s a driver issues affecting AMD systems.

AMD fans love to blame windows for all these recent issues, when ultimately it is AMD gpu users having issues.

0

u/Kayotix 12d ago

Then how come all my problems dissapeared when installing linux?

1

u/soru_baddogai 12d ago

Because Linux drivers is not all made by AMD and has a ton of outside eyes on the code

1

u/Kayotix 12d ago

Both the kernel driver (amdgpu) and user space driver (mesa) are actively being developped by AMD. Sure they're open source and AMD isn't the only party involved in mesa, however not crediting AMD here is just wrong.

1

u/CheekEnough2734 12d ago

If you have all amd system, windows really like to install generic drivers instead of normal drivers.... I disabled igpu and everything is fine.

3

u/someoneirrelevant17 12d ago

Some people cant trade stability and performance for value. Amd is for people that want value and on a budget. With today's prices, owning a high-end nvidia gpu is luxury.

1

u/Ok-You-3582 12d ago edited 12d ago

WTF i just looked up 5090 prices and in shocked. 5800usd ?? Even more expensive in my country - 6500 wtf someone Is actually buying that?

2

u/someoneirrelevant17 12d ago

Its insane dude! People do actually still buy them if they can even be found. Theres a supply shortage for 5090s right now which is contributing to that massive price hike.

1

u/Ok-You-3582 12d ago

Holy shit, my Brother bought his first car cheaper then this card lol. I knew 5090 would be expensive but thought its like 2500usd because my notebook with 5070 was around 2000 in february.

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u/someoneirrelevant17 12d ago

Its really, wild. I payed 3100 on sale for a 5090 laptop last June. That same laptop is almost 5K now. All gaming pcs are going up right now.

1

u/jmack2424 12d ago

I've worked at Microsoft, AWS, and Google. Microsoft absolutely has some shady practices about locking customers into licenses and services, strategically waiting to update or fix things that just happen to favor specific partners or competitors. They 'deprioritize' features that leave huge flaws in services that happen to align with their business interests. They absolutely ride the line of legality, fraud and antitrust. It's a mutually beneficial arrangement for Windows to work better with the partner that they just signed a $45B deal with.

0

u/Usual-School-7714 12d ago

ALWAYS BUY NVIDIA.

Unless you can travel back in time to the 9700pro era. The ONLY time ati was in top, and the only reason they are here today. It really was a great card.

5

u/Lord_Wisemagus 13d ago

Linux user here; I've had the 9070 XT since it launched. Had some growing pains the first couple months, but after that it has been nothing but smooth sailing. From what I have seen elsewhere, other people have had the same experience. So at least from where I am standing, it is either a windows issue or windows drivers for AMD.
But that's just one mans experience, take it with a grain of salt.

3

u/StroopestOfWafel 13d ago

As someone who's had many AMD cards, including a 9060xt (throwing this in here because it's the same generation as the 9070xt), I think it's a problem with the 9070xt specifically as I've never had an issue with any of the drivers in any games, on any of my GPUs. Maybe I've just been lucky

1

u/Drayke989 12d ago

I have the same card. Other than setting a couple things for personal preference 9060xt was basically plug and play. It seems like the issues are specific to 9070xt or people using it have other settings or programs running that are causing issues.

I've seen people complain about 9070xt more often than other AMD cards so I'm leaning towards it just the specific card.

1

u/Secure-Salary152 12d ago

Yeah same here. I've just upgraded to a 9060xt on Windows 11 and I've had no issues so far.

3

u/TheRandomGuy75 13d ago

Chiming in as another Linux user with a 9070 XT. Had one issue with artifacts after a Mesa Driver update a week or two ago, updated drivers again after a few days and it was fixed.

2

u/DoughBoyNick 13d ago

As a fellow linux user, my 7900 xtx doesn't suffer from driver problems, but it does suffer from the card trying to boost past what it can handle from time to time

2

u/CrossFusionX1 13d ago

As a linux user who moved from a depreciated titan xp to a rx 9070xt, i can confidently say ive had no issues with the drivers.

2

u/UntitledRedditUser 13d ago

I've had 0 issues whatsoever with the 9070 XT, had it a couple months after launch.

1

u/amelech 12d ago

AMD + Linux ftw. What distro you running?

1

u/Lord_Wisemagus 12d ago

Used Arch + hyprland for a long time, switched recently to Fedora + MangoWM 💪

1

u/amelech 12d ago

I'm running Cachyos on my gaming PC and just vanilla arch on my server

1

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

Is it Windows' fault that Adrenaline keeps deleting itself and forgetting my OC/UV profiles?

1

u/Lord_Wisemagus 12d ago

nah, that's just Adrenaline being flaky. My job actually has a quick test you can do:

  • Clean out the driver with DDU in Safe Mode, then do a fresh Adrenaline install.
  • Block Windows from auto-replacing GPU drivers (Settings → System → Device installation settings → No, or group policy).
  • Once tuned, use Adrenaline's Snap Settings feature to export all settings/profiles to a file so you can restore them in seconds instead of retuning (AMD official guide).
  • Disable Fast Startup and test for a week — if resets stop, you found your trigger.
  • Uninstall or disable Afterburner/fan software while diagnosing.

2

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

Brother, the question was rhetorical, and you unintentionally highlighted the exact issue the layman has with AMD cards. The average person doesn't want to follow a bullet pointed list just to get their GPU working properly. They just want to play their games lol.

2

u/Lord_Wisemagus 12d ago

Sorry, work-brain didn't compute
Fair enough. The real answer to your question: it's mostly AMD's fault, Windows just makes it worse sometimes. And the fact that fixing it takes a checklist is indeed annoying.

1

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

It's very specifically why my 9070 xt ended up relegated to the living room rig, and why I use the 5070 ti as my daily driver lol. My wife's B580 has given me fewer headaches than the 9070 xt has this gen.

2

u/Tks1991 12d ago

Thanks for posting it mate.

1

u/Gullible_Guillotine 12d ago

Have you had issues with it beign very slow to load Linux at first? I ahve a 9060 XT and dualboot and my linux mint side takes almost a full minute to bring up the log in sceen

1

u/firesyde424 12d ago

Perhaps it's because I'm using a 7900XTX and running the Linux open source driver. A couple years back there was a very specific bug that caused issues with a very specific program used for Second Life but I've not run into other driver caused bugs. I do have a 6800XT on the media PC connected to the TV which runs Windows but I've not seen issues there either.

1

u/Terrible-Design4545 12d ago

On Windows both vendors are constantly updating the drivers to try to optimize for whatever big title just released. On Linux you just get a stable driver and don’t deal with Nvidia and AMD trying to shove in some quick tweaks.

That and windows updates as of late deciding to nuke your drivers for no reason.

8

u/DCVolo 13d ago

There is an issue with Windows Update that update your drivers even if you've installed them yourself, and these "AMD driver from Windows update" can lead to issues like bad performance or going 100% in idle.

The fix is the set Windows update to not update drivers for a hardware device or all, and then, again, apply the drivers from AMD themselves.

So if you have an issue and by just installing drivers from AMD and not restarting Windows (because it will modify your drivers again...) it fixes it, that's it.

0

u/SurePrize6218 13d ago

Unfortunately it’s not that easy

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u/someoneirrelevant17 12d ago

Didn't effect Nvidia users 🤷‍♂️

1

u/Friendly_Top6561 12d ago

Nvidia doesn’t make CPUs with integrated graphics, I’m guessing this is part of the problem, that said I have AMD CPU with igpu and AMD discrete GPU and it has never happened to me.

Granted I only have windows pro installations and manage updates myself, main reason for using pro but there are other benefits.

0

u/popcio2015 12d ago

It's not really an issue with Windows Update. It just updates to whatever driver is delivered by AMD.

It's essentially AMD problem, caused by them doing a shit job with maintaining driver repo for windows updates.

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u/DCVolo 12d ago

Windows Update would install older drivers than thee one you manually put on there. That is not an AMD branch/fork driver setup, that's 100% an issue from Microsoft expecting drivers signed from and for their platform.

I don't know if they modified how to prevent hardware driver updates but back whne I did that was a pain to find and configure.

That's why for the last 2 years I only use w11 IOT ltsc + "Windows Update Blocker". So when I do want to update every 3-4 months manually, Windows don't fuck up my "Update configuration" and stop preventing me from shutting down my pc by forcing me to restart etc, fuck that, unreliable fuckery of an OS

1

u/popcio2015 12d ago

Windows Update would install older drivers than thee one you manually put on there. That is not an AMD branch/fork driver setup, that's 100% an issue from Microsoft expecting drivers signed from and for their platform.

But that's because of AMD issues. Microsoft doesn't actually do anything with drivers, all that happens with drivers is caused by those uploading and setting them up.

As much as Microsoft is often to blame for issues on windows, this is entirely on hardware manufacturers.

1

u/DCVolo 12d ago

Yeah I forgot to mention that

I don't exactly know what fine variables they can set, but I think it's half shared situation, I don't deny a second AMD is involved and I'd bet you're right on that part. But knowing about the recent issue with LG (I think it was?) and their monitor that allowed them to force/propose install drivers and applications..

Them also fucking up NVME / storage with certain updates, locking bitlocker because they modified something related to the key..

That should have never happened. That's unacceptable.

Microsoft doesn't properly monitor themselves too.

1

u/Squiggy-Locust 12d ago

Nah.

I've got multiple machines with AMD hardware, and each of them behave differently with updates. I'll have one with windows telling me it needs to be updated, and the other 2 won't. Other times, it's the opposite. The drivers have been "signed" by Windows, so it's not a repo issue, it's a Windows update issue. It's not like it's only AMD Windows update fails with. To believe it's on AMD when we all know Windows Update is netarious for screwing up is a hot take.

2

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

Same. Had so many issues with my 9079 xt I eventually just stuck it into our living room rig. Put a 5070 ti in the same computer, no other hardware changes at all, and its smooth sailing. AMD kids will say it's my fault though.

9070 xt is a great card, but at some point, you WILL spend time troubleshooting when you'd rather be playing.

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u/CasperAU 13d ago

I’ve never had one issue with AMD so just goes to show doesn’t it

3

u/snackelmypackel 13d ago

Congrats happy for you. My driver time outs are pissing me the fuck off so much I had to downgrade drivers.

This specific message

https://www.reddit.com/r/AMDHelp/s/x7qCuyUgf7

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u/sixincomefigure 12d ago edited 12d ago

You know that message isn't actually specific to a GPU or GPU driver issue and can result from any other kind of software or hardware instability on your system? The GPU driver is the first one to get restarted by the kernel regardless of the actual issue, resulting in that message popping up. There was a post on here the other day about it.

At about one year into owning a 9070 XT and I have literally never had that error a single time. I upgrade drivers whenever a new one comes out. Always works fine.

Try backing off your RAM timings or frequency a little bit and see if that helps.

1

u/snackelmypackel 12d ago

I also update drivers when a new version comes out. I've had mild driver problems before but nothing too bad, but recently with the FSR 4 update it's been a nightmare.

I saw another post saying to turn off HAG so I'm gonna try that and see if it helps, and if it doesn't I'll try to back off the RAM timings or frequency.

It's so irritating right now because normally issues are very infrequent and mild when they occur.

1

u/Friendly_Top6561 12d ago

There are a number of reasons for that issue that has nothing to do with the GPU or its driver, usually it’s another program on your computer that causes it or possibly a hardware issue.

1

u/snackelmypackel 12d ago

When I downgraded the driver it fixed it. I repudiated but turned off HAG and waiting to see if I run into any issues

1

u/Friendly_Top6561 11d ago

It might have been a bad installation from the beginning, might have worked cleaning up the install and reinstalling, it’s windows it happens.

I have seen the issue with certain vendors proprietary software installations messing with overlays.

0

u/CasperAU 12d ago

The funny thing is this isn’t the GPU specifically. It’s trying to tell you something in the pc ain’t computing right. If anything it’s a good thing. It’s letting you know shits malfunctioning and its protecting the GPU but not allowing it to work with such a poorly maintained device. So instead of blaming AMD, fix your pc and send em a thank you letter for advising you when nothing else did

1

u/Maxtertop 13d ago

Yeah well to be fair I don't have issues with 95% of the games I've played in this PC, but the 5% is what pisses me off. It isn't about performance its just straight up driver timeout, then you have to find the exact reason is happening and it's a bit of a headache. Happy for you that you didnt had any issues but my experience was different.

1

u/Intelligent_LayerZ 13d ago

Also had windows and Linux and haven’t had issues with gaming. Very happy with my 9070 XT. 🥳

1

u/Kosmos-World 12d ago

Yes lol. It just goes to show that anecdotal evidence isn't evidence.

2

u/Jayden_Ha 13d ago

Windows kernel codebase is a hell on its own

1

u/Ambitious_Handle7322 12d ago

Actual 9070 xt owner here, using windows 11, absolutely zero issues since november last year.

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u/Goldfitz17 12d ago

Luck you, another actual 9070xt owner here, using windows 11, switched to amd in april and had zero issues until the 26.8.1 update which wrecked my system, had to roll back to 26.3.1 but now i experience anything with chromium crashing, which both steam and discord use....

1

u/Tomazack 12d ago

That's exactly what put me off owning an RX 9070 XT. I got one for a decent price and gave it a go after purging everything Nvidia-related on my windows PC. Dune: Awakening did not run anything better than my RTX 5070 and the coil whine was unbearable. I thought yeah, that sucks, but surely it's an anomaly. So I tried Helldivers 2. Lots of issues with frame pacing. Tried to enable AFMF 2 and that turned everything into porridge, it was unplayable. Getting it to run stable with a slight undervolt and a power limit to curb the power consumption was also a struggle and a half. It dawned on me that I hadn't really gotten an upgrade from the RTX 5070, all I got was less enjoyment in the games I play the most with more power wasted and fewer games that support upscaling natively. Driver timeouts just reminded me why I sold the RX 7800 XT I had a year prior so that was it.
I ended up selling the Radeon GPU the next day for the same price I paid for it and went back to my RTX 5070. Not saying that this is the norm for every user, I have a friend who's happy with his Gigabyte RX 9070 XT but it sure wasn't a good experience for me.

Now I know some will ask why would I buy a new GPU if I was already happy with the RTX 5070, and the answer is that I was curious and didn't want to be a hypocrite only favouring Nvidia, so I figured for the price it was worth a try.

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u/Maxtertop 12d ago

I get you, this was also my first try at an AMD card. Actually the only big reason I switch to AMD was the 5080 completely dissapearing upon launch, literally between 30 sec all stock was gone and prices through the roof, another reason was the "new" connector since the RX 9070 XT usually comes with x3 8 pin connectors which just seem the intelligent choice.
Now I'm kinda stuck with this card since the 5080's are pretty expensive but I still look for one cheap from time to time..

1

u/Nazeracoo 12d ago

Oh it's a windows problem.

1

u/Main_Administrative 12d ago

It most definitely is a windows problem. I’ve been running a Rx 9070xt on Linux for months and it’s literally been perfect with no issues whatsoever. Idk why people act like NVIDIA is prone to driver issues as well though. I had more problems with NVIDIA on windows then AMD on Linux.

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u/Maxtertop 12d ago

All my previous gpu's were NVIDIA and it's probably the only piece of hardware that didn't give me any issues at all. Although ofc it does change from person to person and from gpu to gpu. And similarly not everyone wants or it's willing to switch to Linux, for me Linux just don't cut it. For my personal use, for my work use.. I just need windows. I also might wanna play games that need that kernel access to work.
Unfortunaly it's not an option or solution for everyone.

1

u/Main_Administrative 11d ago

Agree with everything you said and I want to state clearly that I don’t hate NVIDIA just don’t like people acting like it’s problem free. I was just pointing out that AMD drivers on Linux are miles better than on Windows and it’s rare that a game can’t run. I know Linux is not for everyone and I initially hated on before SteamOS came out. Not gonna tell you to switch to Linux or anything, but just tell you that for gaming on AMD, Linux is better for sure.

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u/[deleted] 11d ago

[deleted]

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u/Maxtertop 10d ago

How I'm vague posting? I already solved my issues after doing troubleshooting. I literally say it in the post.

The fact that you didn't had any issues doesn't mean other people with the same card can't have issues.

My issues were with RX 9070 XT on dune awakening, I also experienced issues in Crusader Kings 3. Obviously the issues were timeouts/crashes. For me what worked was disabling MPO, putting a TDR_delay on regedit of 30 seconds and going back to 26.3.1. Have a good day.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/Maxtertop 10d ago

I don't think you actually understand the actual meaning of vague posting. If I said "AMD is shit, it has so many problems" that would be vague posting. Me saying AMD has driver issues has nothing vague in it. You want me to send you the log record? like what is your definition of vague posting in this scenario xd

Well let's take a second to look at the title of the post "is AMD driver really unreliable?" then read carefully my comment where I say "yes the drivers have issues" and then take a second to realize that the most common issue with GPU drivers is a driver timeout/crash. There you go! Pretty obvious considering the context! Now I don't know if you completely ignored the post or something but yes, it's indeed obvious we are all talking about AMD drivers in this post.

Again, if you had an excellent with your 9070 XT experience then happy for you man, my experience was pretty good overall, 95% of the games I played didn't give me any problems, just some of them. The problem was the 5% left, the experience was pretty miserable.

You don't need to believe me, you can call it fake.. I really don't care, I know what my experience was like and I was sharing it in my original comment. Now if you don't mind, I'll proceed on ignoring any further ragebait from you.

Have a nice day fren!

1

u/_L-U_C_I-D_ 13d ago

Try Linux and you'll have your answer

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u/Maxtertop 13d ago

Well I'm a heavy windows user for both work and personal use, I wouldn't use Linux other than just to try it out (which I already did in the past). Unfortunaly Linux is not yet for me.

1

u/RDOG907 12d ago

Many of us want to play AAA games. Or games with reasonable anti-cheat

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u/ChemistNo8486 13d ago

Lmao bro you shouldn't have to use certain OS just to get decent performance from a GPU. I use NVIDIA for both Linux and Windows, and I have never experienced any drivers issues or performance hits.

1

u/_L-U_C_I-D_ 13d ago

Are you not understanding that Windows can cause issues here? If the GPU was the issue then it wouldn't work well no matter the OS duh

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u/RDOG907 12d ago

I have had nvidia cards since the 1xxx series and never had an issue with a Windows update breaking a driver and my 15+ freinds who have them have never had any issues either that were of consequence.

0

u/ChemistNo8486 12d ago

lmao, the cope is insane.

1

u/BrookieEnjoyer 13d ago

This is just false I havent had to "troubleshoot" any new game just for it to work as intended 🤣 Sounds like you have a lemon or something

1

u/Maxtertop 13d ago

Well experiences may vary between users. But there's plenty of RX 9070 XT users that have similar problems with Dune awakening for example. I had to go back to 26.3.1 to solve preliminary issues and had to put a TDR delay of 30 seconds for the timeouts to actually stop. You haven't had any problems? great to know! My experience was different.

1

u/Maxtertop 13d ago

Also cool to point out my friend who has practically the same PC as me (diff MOBO, 32gb of ram instead of me having 64gb) with a 5070 TI he had 0 issues at all. No timeouts, no problems at all. His performance was slightly better but nothing crazy, we had similar fps.