Users with notebooks equipped with NVIDIA graphics processing units (GPUs) now have the added flexibility of downloading upgradeable graphics drivers directly from NVIDIA.com so they can immediately take advantage of new features, improved application compatibility, and performance optimizations.
The first graphics driver release from NVIDIA will extend the NVIDIA CUDA architecture to notebook GPUs, enabling the growing number of consumers moving to a notebook-only lifestyle to immediately experience the wide range of CUDA-based applications-from GPU-accelerated game physics to GPU-accelerated video conversion.
"Epic and NVIDIA invest an incredible amount of time and energy into ensuring that customers get an amazing experience with our software out-of-the-box," said Mark Rein, vice president of Epic Games. "The only way to ensure that this value-add is realized by customers is for them to have access to timely driver updates. I congratulate NVIDIA for being the first to offer their customers a choice for notebook driver updates."
"NVIDIA is committed to giving the rapidly growing number of customers using notebook GPUs the same performance optimizations and innovative graphics features that desktop customers have grown accustomed to," said Dwight Diercks, vice president of software engineering at NVIDIA. "To accomplish this, we have worked diligently over the past year to modularize our driver architecture and develop a unified driver install package that will not only work with notebooks from all manufacturers but also maintain all of their specific model customizations such as hotkeys and suspend and resume functionality."
Starting today, customers with GeForce 8 and 9-series GPUs or Quadro NVS-equipped notebooks can download a BETA version of the drivers from www.nvidia.com . Customers will be able to download a WHQL-certified version supporting all GeForce 7, 8, and 9 series and Quadro NVS series notebook GPUs early next year.