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Black screen and system stability woes have been raging since some time now – not just with the RTX50 series, but on some 40-series and 30-series graphics cards. Nvidia acknowledged the problem over a week after the 572.16 release of the driver, but no fix has been found.
Manuel, a Nvidia employee, posted the latest statement about the issue in the GeForce Driver Feedback thread. Manuel says that they are still investigating if the issues will require a VBIOS flash or a driver update for the RTX cards.
It appears that the problems began when Nvidia launched its latest 570 driver branch. The issues range from minor stuttering, crashes and blue screens to full-blown Blue Screens of Death. While the RTX50 series seems to be the most affected, some 40- and 30 series owners are also reporting similar issues after updating.
Some have been able to temporarily fix the problem by limiting the display refresh rate to 60Hz. This is a sad solution for these monstrous graphics cards. Other users have reported that downgrading PCIe 4.0 also helped.
The jury is still out on the cause. However, it’s likely a combination between shoddy drivers and possible firmware bugs in the RTX 50 silicon. Some have speculated that the PCIe 5.0 version could be to blame, which would require a VBIOS upgrade from Nvidia.
This is not ideal, considering the current price and availability situation for these GPUs. The struggle to find the cards continues.
It’s not the only problem with the new lineup. Team Green has had some problems with Blackwell, ranging from melted power connectors to GPUs that shipped with fewer ROPs than advertised.
