AMD clarifies its clarification regarding the controversial RDNA 1 and 2 driver note – the company will continue to support game optimization regardless

After a tumultuous weekend full of updates and clarifications, AMD has done it published entire website to assuage user backlash and reaffirm its commitment to continued support for RDNA 1 and RDNA 2-based drives, following the flurry of confusion surrounding the recent decision to put Radeon RX 5000 and 6000 cards in “maintenance mode.” This comes after AMD had to deny that RX 7900 cards would lose USB-C power in the future, even though the disk change log said otherwise.

Just last week, AMD released a recent driver update for its graphics cards, and it didn’t go smoothly. The wrong drivers were loaded first, and even after they were fixed, several glaring errors in the release notes required clarification. AMD was forced to correct claims about its RX 7900 cards, but clarified at the time that the RX 5000 and 6000 graphics cards were indeed entering “maintenance mode,” even though some RX 6000 cards are only about four years elderly.

Now, however, AMD has either backed off on that decision or someone higher up the food chain has made a recent decision, as gaming optimizations are back on the menu for RDNA 1 and RDNA 2 GPUs.

“We have heard your feedback and want to clear up the confusion surrounding the release of AMD Software Driver: Adrenalin Edition 25.10.2,” AMD said in a statement. It was then confirmed that there are separate drivers for the RX 7000 and 9000 and RX 5000 and 6000 GPUs, but there would be no major differences in the support for these GPUs.

“Your Radeon RX 5000 and RX 6000 series GPUs will continue to receive support for new game releases, game stability and optimizations, and security and bug fixes,” AMD said.

Using the recent driver separation approach is reported to make things easier for AMD’s driver team while also preventing anything designed for newer GPUs from damaging older graphics chips.

“Our goal is simple: to provide every Radeon gamer with the best experience possible. By separating code paths, our engineers can move faster with new features for RDNA 3 and RDNA 4, while keeping RDNA 1 and RDNA 2 stable and optimized for current and future games,” AMD said.

This public statement confirms the response Tom’s Hardware received from AMD delayed last week.

“New features, bug fixes and game optimizations will continue to be delivered in line with market needs in the Maintenance Mode industry,” an AMD spokesperson said Tom’s equipment last week.

This likely puts an end to any idea that older AMD cards will get the latest scaling support, despite what modders have already proven is possible. Early AMD cards notoriously and significantly lagged behind Nvidia when it came to supporting scaling and ray tracing. Given how much more attention recent generations of AMD hardware and recent games have placed on these technologies, it may make sense for AMD to focus its efforts for these recent features on the future and recent past.

Either way, it’s good to know that gaming optimizations will remain for older cards, even if they don’t get the same shiny recent features as the latest designs.

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