NVIDIA Waves Goodbye to Maxwell, Pascal, & Volta GPUs, Including the Legendary 1080 Ti, in GeForce 590 Drivers

The gaming community was abuzz with NVIDIA’s latest update, as the company released its inaugural GeForce 590 drivers. This marks a significant shift in support for several older GPU models, while paving the way for future advancements.

With the launch of the 590 drivers, NVIDIA has officially ended game-ready driver support for its Maxwell, Pascal, and Volta GPUs, including the popular GTX 1080 Ti.

NVIDIA Ends Support for Older GPU Architectures

NVIDIA had previously indicated that driver updates would cease for GeForce GPUs based on the Maxwell, Pascal, and Volta architectures after the 580 driver series. This transition has now been confirmed with the release of the 590 branch. The new drivers will support GPUs starting from the GeForce 16 series, encompassing architectures such as Turing, Ampere, Ada Lovelace, and the recently introduced Blackwell.

However, users of these older GPUs need not worry entirely. While game-ready driver support is discontinued, these models will still receive essential security updates and patches as part of the legacy support branch. But for those still utilizing pre-GeForce 16/20 series hardware, it’s essential to note the cessation of game-ready driver updates.

NVIDIA 590+ Driver Branch GPU Support

As the 590 driver branch takes center stage, NVIDIA has outlined the comprehensive list of GeForce Desktop and Mobile GPUs now supported. For desktop GPUs, the list includes models from the latest Blackwell architecture to previous generations like Ampere and Turing.

NVIDIA 590+ Driver Branch GPU Support (Desktop):

NVIDIA 590+ Driver Branch GPU Support (Mobile)

The GeForce 16 series holds the distinction of being the last “GTX” line to receive game-ready driver support. As NVIDIA looks to the future, the focus will remain on Turing, Ampere, Ada Lovelace, and Blackwell architectures for continued GRD support.