Nvidia Updates GeForce Experience - Accounts and Passwords Now Mandatory

LoadsaMoney · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:38

Nvidia today issues a new and sizable update to GeForce experience, what everyone dreaded slowly is now going into effect. To obtain certain features you'll need to register and login with your account name and password.

Not everything is tied towards the forced login, but if you like to use features like Ansel, ShadowPlay, Game Stream and driver updates you'll need to login with your personalized account or a Google account. The new update requires you to log in so that it can store your game preferences (and probably a lot of other undisclosed stuff if not now then later) onto the cloud.

You have the option to use your Google credentials, which will link your GeForce Experience account to your Google social presence, or you can choose to create a GeForce Experience account. Either way, you will have to log in before you can use the software. The account creation process actually happens the first time you launch the app after the update, and there doesn’t appear to be a way around it.

The update to GeForce Experience is easy to navigate and is definitely a visual improvement, but the fact that you have to log in to use the software might rub some people the wrong way. You can still get your drivers anonymously by downloading them directly from the Nvidia’s website, but you’ll miss out on all the performance optimizations and the game streaming features if you don’t use GeForce Experience.

http://www.guru3d.com/news_story/nvidia_updates_geforce_experience_accounts_and_passwords_now_mandatory.html

JediFragger · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:45

Every ****er thinks they're Google nowadays and want your data

I only want and need the driver tbh, the rest of the ******** can do one

Simon Belmont · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:47

We all knew this was coming

Aretak · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:50

Meh, I never install GFE anyway. Shadowplay is literally the only thing of value that it adds, and I have no use for that. As long as I can still download the drivers from the website they can do what they like with GFE, and thankfully they backed off from their proposed strategy last year of only making Game Ready drivers available through GFE.

Rroff · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:52

Still kind of sucky move.

bru · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:55

At least you don't have to use it, so you have the choice.

LoadsaMoney · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:55

Aretak said:
Meh, I never install GFE anyway. Shadowplay is literally the only thing of value that it adds, and I have no use for that. As long as I can still download the drivers from the website they can do what they like with GFE, and thankfully they backed off from their proposed strategy last year of only making Game Ready drivers available through GFE.

As the article says, you have to log in to get your driver updates, or you’ll miss out on all the performance optimizations.

Aretak · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:58

LoadsaMoney said:
As the article says, you have to log in to get your driver updates, or you’ll miss out on all the performance optimizations.

It says you have to log in to GFE to download drivers through GFE, but you can still get them from the website outside of that. The "performance optimizations" bit is referring to GFE's game profiles that pick settings for you, which is a completely useless feature IMO.

bru · 6 Jul 2016 at 15:58

LoadsaMoney said:
As the article says, you have to log in to get your driver updates, or you’ll miss out on all the performance optimizations.

lol you posted the opening post and it would seem you didn't read it.

You can still get your drivers anonymously by downloading them directly from the Nvidia’s website

You don't have to use GFE unless you want to.

Ayahuasca · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:00

Don't use GFE but why are nVidia making things difficult, there's zero reasoning for this.

LoadsaMoney · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:01

@bru, If you don't log in for the drivers, then you won't get the performance optimizations.

wellibob · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:05

My data often collected by these bots tends to be just two word's ;-p

Aretak · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:07

LoadsaMoney said:
@bru, If you don't log in for the drivers, then you won't get the performance optimizations.

You're not understanding what "performance optimizations" are in this context. It's a feature of GFE that automatically adjusts in-game settings for you, based on a database of what ones will achieve good performance on your card. Which again is completely useless, as I know that I and most other PC gamers would rather set the game up themselves, rather than letting Nvidia choose what compromises (if any) are made to hit a target framerate. It has absolutely nothing to do with driver level performance tweaks.

David Bisset · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:14

Indeed it's just setting up some options - and last time I tried it does a pretty bad job. Hopefully it's getting better, but there is nothing to be gained over just doing it yourself.

Edit: Heh, the video seems to agree with my previous experience - it sets up games to run badly.

LoadsaMoney · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:16

You can still get your drivers anonymously by downloading them directly from the Nvidia’s website, but you’ll miss out on all the performance optimizations

That says you won't get the Game Ready drivers to me, unless you make an account, which they did say they were going to do.

Nvidia plans to lock Game Ready drivers behind GeForce Experience registration

Sometime in mid-December, however, you’ll be able to install Game Ready drivers only via GeForce Experience—and even then only after you’ve registered a verified email address with Nvidia. The drivers you can grab on GeForce.com or via Windows Update will be limited to quarterly releases for bug fixes, new features, security updates and so on. More frequent Game Ready drivers will be GFE-only.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2993272/software-games/nvidia-plans-to-lock-game-ready-drivers-behind-geforce-experience-registration.html

Guess we'll find out if its finally started, when the next Game Ready driver arrives, as that was December gone.

bru · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:16

It would seem that we have different interpretations of "performance optimizations".

To me it means the performance optimizations that come with new drivers, not GFE change all my settings button.

Killer7xx · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:19

Never used it anyway, seems like a waste of time.

TheRealDeal · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:20

bru said:
It would seem that we have different interpretations of "performance optimizations".

To me it means the performance optimizations that come with new drivers, not GFE change all my settings button.

No i believe Loadsa was interpreting it as driver optimizations. That's what most of us would think. I would not put it past Nvidia to enforce this kind of thing in the future.

Aretak · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:24

TheRealDeal said:
No i believe Loadsa was interpreting it as driver optimizations. That's what most of us would think. I would not put it past Nvidia to enforce this kind of thing in the future.

Well, we'll find out soon enough when the next Game Ready driver arrives, and whether it's available to download from the Nvidia site or not. If they do start locking Game Ready drivers behind GFE and an account login, I'll be selling my 1070 and jumping ship to the red team.

TheRealDeal · 6 Jul 2016 at 16:30

Aretak said:
Well, we'll find out soon enough when the next Game Ready driver arrives, and whether it's available to download from the Nvidia site or not. If they do start locking Game Ready drivers behind GFE and an account login, I'll be selling my 1070 and jumping ship to the red team.

Personally i think it would be stupid of them to do so but Nvidia like to tie people into things so i would not put it past them.