It has been a topic of discussion a couple of times already in the past year. AMD Radeon Desktop GPUs get very regular updates, however, the APUs, OEM products and Laptop APUs rarely get updated. And with the current state of gaming, that was annoying a lot of people.
In the past, AMD already promised to do better, and as far as I can remember it we've seen a driver update in May just before the Summer, but then again thereafter things stagnated. That has upset a number of people and on Reddit, like so often, things became a bit more explosive. A reason that laptops equipped with Ryzen Mobile have gotten so so far behind with driver updates is that the OEM or laptop manufacturer must approve and release these updates themselves. AMD says it can not release the updates themselves because of the specific hardware of each system, which could cause potential problems and unpleasant user experiences. The company responds to the criticism in a Reddit post and promises to improve the update policy together with the OEMs.
Feedback is a critical part of how AMD delivers great products. You have made it clear we have room for improvement on graphics driver updates for AMD Ryzen Mobile processor-based notebooks, both for APU-only platforms and discrete GPU notebook designs. It is important to understand that our graphics drivers are typically tailored for specific OEM platforms, so releasing generic APU graphics drivers across all AMD Ryzen mobile processor-based mobile systems could result in less-than-ideal user experiences. So what can AMD do?
We are committing to work with our OEMs to increase the release frequency of AMD Ryzen Mobile processor graphics drivers. Starting in 2019, we will target enabling OEMs to deliver a twice-annual update of graphics drivers specifically for all AMD Ryzen Mobile processor-based systems. Because the release is ultimately up to the OEMs, this may vary from platform to platform, but we want to put out a clear goal for us and our OEM partners. Those updates should be available for download on the respective OEM websites.
In addition, AMD will continue to evaluate ways in which we can offer validated graphics drivers for AMD Ryzen Mobile processor-based notebooks aligned to the latest AMD software updates, and will provide updates as soon as we are able. Thank you to the community of AMD users who voice their opinions on this issue.
AMD promises that OEMs will issue more driver updates for Ryzen Mobile
