'It's been particularly bad since Blackwell': Nvidia's new GPU driver has another nasty bug and gamers are rapidly losing patience

Date:
Tue, 01 Sep 2026 20:00:00 +0000

Description:
Gamers aren't happy about the quality of Nvidia's drivers of late, and a new bug has prompted some fresh venting.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Nvidia's latest graphics driver has a frustrating bug Version 616.56 is causing distracting screen flickers and color corruption A patch is coming, and there are potential workarounds but gamers are getting fed up with the prevalence of bugs in GeForce drivers Nvidia 's latest graphics driver is causing chaos for some GeForce GPU owners in the form of a glitch that makes the screen flicker.

Wccftech spotted the bug with Nvidia's Game Ready Driver version 616.56, and as flagged by Renan Maniero on X, Team Green has said it's testing a fix for the issue (as revealed on the GeForce forums). The screen is reportedly flickering white or black and exhibiting other brief flashes of color corruption, and this is happening in certain games ( The Last of Us and Minecraft are mentioned, among others) or on the Windows desktop. It's also occurring in web browser sessions and while playing YouTube videos, based on Reddit reports of which there are plenty. Latest Videos From TechRadar Watch full video here:

There's no shortage of gamers losing their temper with Nvidia, too, and blasting Team Green for the quality of its graphics drivers. Many are venting with an observation that GeForce drivers just haven't been the same since the launch of the RTX 5000 series.

For example, this Redditor says: "It's been particularly bad since Blackwell [RTX 5000] release. Just on Blackwell alone, between the whole DisplayPort
2.1 not working with HDR , screen flickering, and black screens on the
initial release, it's been a complete mess." You may like Windows 10 loses support for Nvidia GPUs soon: here's what you need to know Redditor explains how Windows 11 can end up stripping out your GPU driver Microsoft's investigating reports of games crashing after Windows 11 update

Another gamer complains : "It is pretty shocking seeing this from a trillionaire company on a stable build. Nothing about this driver is stable."

Yet another Redditor grumbles : "It's crazy how things are now. You used to
be able to update each time or be one driver behind at worst. Now I'm half a year outdated and thinking I'll just leave it." Get daily insight,
inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. Analysis: more drivers, more problems? There are possible workarounds though Even older GeForce graphics cards are affected here (Image credit: Future) This seems like quite a widespread issue and one that affects modern Nvidia graphics cards all the
way back to RTX 2000 models.

If you're getting frustrated by this bug random screen flickering gets
pretty old, pretty fast, if it's happening regularly Maniero also shared an apparent potential workaround on X that you can try while waiting for the official fix.

Seemingly, this is a bug that mostly affects monitors in 8-bit mode, and if you switch to 10-bit color (assuming your display supports this), the problem may disappear. Maniero also suggests that you try turning on Windows Auto Color Management (ACM). What to read next This RTX 5090 issue might be the most concerning we've seen thus far New tool protects Nvidia RTX 5090 GPUs from melting their power cables Steam Machine's constant red warning light is due to a bug in the BIOS

Other folks on Reddit have shared various possible remedies, including switching from DisplayPort to an HDMI connector instead, and disabling Multi-Plane Overlay (MPO) in Windows 11 , as one Redditor suggested . Nvidia provides a Registry file for turning off MPO (and enabling it again), but as ever with anything in this area of Windows, proceed at your own risk. (Although this method should be much safer than trying to edit the Registry directly yourself).

Your other choice is simply to roll back driver 616.56 to an earlier version, and there's no shortage of gamers who've done exactly that and report that
the problem vanishes.

Hopefully Nvidia's official flicker-begone patch will be coming soon enough
in the form of a hotfix, because this is an unduly annoying gremlin in the GeForce works that needs to be sorted out promptly. Follow TechRadar on
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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/computing/gpu/its-been-particularly-bad-since-blackw ell-nvidias-new-gpu-driver-has-another-nasty-bug-and-gamers-are-rapidly-losing -patience


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