Since no one else seems to be doing it, I’m going to start posting a discussion thread for each of the NVIDIA Game Ready Driver releases, starting with NVIDIA Driver 556.12 today. Most of this is copied from the corresponding public post on Reddit.

Game Ready Driver 556.12

Download driver here

New Feature and Fixes in Driver 556.12

Game Ready - This new Game Ready Driver provides the best gaming experience for the latest new games supporting DLSS 3.5 technology including The First Descendant. Further support for new titles leveraging NVIDIA DLSS technology includes the latest update for PAYDAY 3 which supports DLSS 3.

Fixed Gaming Bugs

• [The Last of Us Part 1] Out of memory error with 555.xx drivers [4663766]
• [Halo Infinite] Crashing during initial loading screen with 555.99 driver [4685335]
• [Valorant] In-game statistics incorrectly shows high latency with 555.xx drivers [4668309]

Fixed General Bugs

• Notebook mux switch is blocked when Overwolf application is running [3804893]

Notes

• Security Bulletin issues listed by Nvidia in the ‘NVIDIA GPU Display Driver - July 2024’ bulletin are addressed by 556.12 and later - NVIDIA Security Bulletin
• 555.85 and later NVIDIA display drivers no longer support CPUs without the POPCNT (Population Count) instruction - NVIDIA Support
• HDR RTX multi-monitor requires both driver support and NVIDIA app support, the feature may be available with the next major version of the Nvidia App - NVIDIA Forum
• NVIDIA Broadcast Hotfix for Windows 11 24H2 is available at NVIDIA Broadcast Hotfix
• Chromium Checkboard issue, Microsoft have officially released a patch to the Windows 11 stable channel as KB5039212 (OS Builds 22621.3737 / 22631.3737) and Windows 10 stable channel as KB5040427 (OS Builds 19044.4651 and 19045.4651)
• Watch Dogs 2 flickering issue fix, see ‘Troubleshooting and Workarounds’ section
• Halo Wars 2 in-game foliage issue fix, see ‘Troubleshooting and Workarounds’ section
• NVGPUCOMP64.dll and/or ‘out of VRAM’ crashes, see ‘Troubleshooting and Workarounds’ section
• Nvidia App (BETA) may impact frame rates (?CPU bound scenarios?) on some systems, this isn’t a Nvidia driver issue

Branch Information

Recent branch information only

• 560.38: r560_bugfix_main (Insider)
• 556.12: r556_09-02 (Game Ready)
• 555.99: r555_97-02 (Game Ready/Quadro/Studio)
• 555.85: r555_79-02 (Game Ready/Studio)
• 552.61: VK551_06-15 (Developer)
• 552.44: r552_19-08 (Game Ready)
• 552.22: r552_19-02 (Game Ready/Studio)
• 551.86: r550_00-192 (Game Ready/Studio)

Open Issues

• [NVENC] Quality and bitrate settings are ignored at 10-bit encoding [4697900]
• [GeForce Experience] Performance Monitoring overlay may stop refreshing GPU information [4679970]

Confirmed Additional Issues

This section covers issues officially acknowledged by Nvidia that are not in the original driver release notes:

• [GeForce RTX Series 40] graphics cards running older firmware could experience blank screens on boot with certain motherboards in UEFI mode until the OS loads - NVIDIA Support
• [HVEC/AV1 Playback] when playing back an HVEC/AV1 10-bit 4:2:0 file and scaling the viewport down to < 50%, video may appear slightly blurry [4496901]
• [GeForce Experience/NVIDIA App] if GPU utilization gets stuck at 0% inside of the GeForce Experience/NVIDIA App Performance overlay, games may display stutter [4720547] UPDATE: workaround uninstall GeForce Experience/NVIDIA app then restart system OR revert to driver 552.44 and older
• [Halo Infinite] crashing during initial loading screen on Windows 11 24H2 OS only [4685335] UPDATE: Fix/workaround in next Game Ready Driver - Reddit Discussion

Unconfirmed Additional Issues

This section contains issues not officially acknowledged by Nvidia but are reported across multiple forums:

• [GeForce RTX Series 40 GPUs] stability/TDR/black screen issues. Check for a motherboard BIOS update that states ‘compatibility updates for Lovelace’. The motherboard update is in addition to any VBIOS update
• [Microsoft Store/GamePass/Xbox Application] PC games may not have Nvidia ‘game ready driver profile’ settings applied due to the APPID not being present in the Nvidia game profile