Support NeoGAF

[Wolzard]

RDNA 1 and RDNA 2 graphics cards will continue to receive driver updates for critical security fixes and bug resolutions. To focus on optimizing and delivering new and improved technologies for its latest GPUs, AMD is placing the Radeon RX 5000 and RX 6000 series (RDNA 1 and RDNA 2) into maintenance mode with the AMD Software Adrenalin Edition 25.10.2 release. Future driver updates with targeted game optimizations will be focused on RDNA 3 and RDNA 4 GPUs.

AMD RDNA 1 & 2 GPU Driver Support Moved To "Maintenance" Mode, Game Optimizations & New Tech For RDNA 3, 4 & Beyond

AMD has ditched both RDNA 1 and RDNA 2 graphics cards when it comes to game optimizations and new features, but will receive critical updates

wccftech.com

 

[Wolzard]

Imagine someone who bought an RX 6750 GRE, released in 2023, only to see their graphics card receive support for a mere 2 years.

 

[Gaiff]

Imagine someone who bought an RX 6750 GRE, released in 2023, only to see their graphics card receive support for a mere 2 years.

Sucks for that one guy who bought it.

 

[Xyphie]

Imagine someone who bought an RX 6750 GRE, released in 2023, only to see their graphics card receive support for a mere 2 years.

Their highest volume GPU today is likely still RDNA2-based (Zen4/5 IOD GPU).

 

[winjer]

This is such a stupid move by AMD. Not only these these cards are still recent, but there are a ton of APUs released with RDNA2 on the market being sold today.
Nvidia ended official support for the GTX900 and GTX1000 series last month. But they still fully support the RTX2000 series, which released on the same year as RDNA1.

 

[Wolzard]

This is such a stupid move by AMD. Not only these these cards are still recent, but there are a ton of APUs released with RDNA2 on the market being sold today.
Nvidia ended official support for the GTX900 and GTX1000 series last month. But they still fully support the RTX2000 series, which released on the same year as RDNA1.

And the RTX 2000 series received support for DLSS4, RTX Super Resolution, RTX HDR, Ray Reconstruction, etc.

 

[crazyriddler]

These kinds of anti-consumer decisions will cause consumers to switch to the competition and buy Nvidia... oh wait!

 

[rnlval]

Their highest volume GPU today is likely still RDNA2-based (Zen4/5 IOD GPU).

2 CU RDNA 2 IGP on IOD is just for office PCs.

 

[Buggy Loop]

Wow, that's a really bad move on them. Support is primordial for them to keep the very small base they have happy. It only adds doubt for buying AMD cards if support is so flimsy.

 

[rnlval]

And the RTX 2000 series received support for DLSS4, RTX Super Resolution, RTX HDR, Ray Reconstruction, etc.

https://www.nvidia.com/content/dam/en-zz/Solutions/geforce/news/dlss4-multi-frame-generation-ai-innovations/nvidia-dlss-4-feature-chart-breakdown.jpg

Turing supports DLSS 4's 3 of 5 features i.e. DLSS ray reconstruction, DLSS super resolution, and DLAA.

AMD needs FSR4 (DPa4) INT8 on RDNA 2. RDNA 3 can have FSR4 WMMA INT8.

 

[delishcaek]

The 6800 and 6950 are faster than a 9060XT ffs, the 6750XT isn't far off either... ditching support for these cards is utterly retarded.

Guess every RDNA2 owner will upgrade to an Nvidia card in the future.

 

[P:axMagellanic]

Morons, long driver support, and the vram to take advantage of that support set them apart from the competition.

 

[CLW]

 

[Trogdor1123]

do drivers really need to be updated that much? This probably sounds silly but does it matter as much as people say? I know that updating does help in some things but often causes issues. I still consider myself new to pc gaming (been around a year) but my experience with driver updates has been to wait as long as possible rather than go right away.

 

[StereoVsn]

Aren't Steam Deck and Xbox ROG Ally (vanilla) RDNA 2 as well?

 

[Bry0]

Yknow what? I think fsr4 for RDNA 3 is coming soon.

 

[Crayon]

Aren't Steam Deck and Xbox ROG Ally (vanilla) RDNA 2 as well?

Yeah. Though it seems "maintenance" mode keeps it running fine? I'm not sure what those with rdna2 are missing here. Was it the possibility of new features coming?

 

[StereoVsn]

Yeah. Though it seems "maintenance" mode keeps it running fine? I'm not sure what those with rdna2 are missing here. Was it the possibility of new features coming?

Support for newer games, optimization updates, etc…

Basically it's likely only security updates will happen going forward.

Also, Xbox ROG Ally just released this month…. That kind of sucks.

 

[Comandr]

Also, Xbox ROG Ally just released this month…. That kind of sucks.

I'm not disagreeing with you at all here. With that said, RDNA2 is only being used on the lower end versions of most of these devices. I figure the kind of person that's buying the low end version probably isn't getting it for cutting edge gaming, and probably won't care that much for whatever new features AMD could pursue.

Honestly we just need to wipe the slate clean with UDNA and unified, scalable feature sets. Entire product categories being locked out of certain features sucks. FSR4 on handhelds is such a fucking game changer it's not even funny. Thank goodness you can jerry rig it into most games. I would really really like to see AMD officially release it for older cards. Its obviously possible, even with a bit of a performance hit.

It does feel in poor taste to release a product and then the chip manufacturer immediately pulls support for it. This couldn't have been a last minute decision. They would have been thinking of this for a while now and just... didn't say anything. It's a mess all the way around.

 

[kevboard]

good idea AMD... it's not like there are enough reasons not to buy your cards already...

Nvidia still supports 10 year old cards btw.

 

[Crayon]

Support for newer games, optimization updates, etc…

Basically it's likely only security updates will happen going forward.

Also, Xbox ROG Ally just released this month…. That kind of sucks.

Yah they would have known. Idk if this is really going to affect stuff all that much.

 

[Nikodemos]

Well, that's unfortunate. Especially since they kept selling RDNA 2 cards for a long while (IIRC 7000 series cards were rather scarce for a relatively long period of time), and RDNA 2 iGPUs are present in a lot of current SoCs.

I get that RDNA 1 was an undercooked panic release, after the failure of Vega (and the ensuing corporate drama), and RDNA 2 itself is a hack job with hastily-slapped on (underperforming) RT cores. I get that RDNA 3 has RT/machine learning functions that actually work most of the time, instead of occasionally (RDNA 2). I get that having a unified set of drivers which (broadly-speaking) apply to all architectures, instead of having to do (time-/money-consuming) per-arch optimizations is considerably more efficient.

But it's still bad optics, and AMD will definitely catch flak over this decision. I hope they'll backpedal (at least partially, for RDNA 2), like they eventually did with Ryzen 5000 support on x370 chipsets.

 

[Zathalus]

9 years should be minimum. Nvidia still supports Turing for example.

 

[rnlval]

Yknow what? I think fsr4 for RDNA 3 is coming soon.

FSR4 WMMA INT8 wouldn't work on RDNA 2. The leaked FSR4.0.2 INT8 doesn't need WMMA.

 

[FalconPunch]

Big error by amd. They should have only announced this for RDNA 1. For 2, they should have kept it on the main drive branch but slowly reduced the amount of game optimizations it received. Only focusing on big games really.

Now they just created a big pr nightmare for themselves.