So two days ago I was working on the Gears of War 4 article and had to re-install the latest Crimson drivers a couple of times. It suddenly hit me, Raptr, the Gaming Evolved APP from AMD was missing from the installation options. I paid no real attention to it as I never install them anyway.

Raptr was the Gaming Evolved APP that allows for stuff like monitoring and game optimizations, as well as video recording and overlays. Now during the driver installation I took no further notice to it, but today realized hey, .. why the heck is it actually missing from the installation package in the first place? Well, AMD stopped supporting it, it is that simple. Starting at the Radeon Crimson 16.10.1 driver and on-wards it will no longer be an installed option. And my bet is that 99% of you guys actually have no problem with that fact whatsoever. I played with the software in the past a couple of times, and much like GeForce Experience, I find it to be an annoyance.

I was talking about Raptr roughly six months ago with Terry Makedon from the AMD driver team when he was in Amsterdam, and asked why on earth they still are adding and supporting the software. As imho the game optimizations should be placed in software at the driver UI level, and not an external application. At that time the generic consensus really was the fact that Raptr offers overlay and video capture options, and that is an extra added benefit to the end users. Fact remains simple, not a lot of people really appreciated Raptr and my bet is that not many will really miss it either. I noticed that Keith May of Wccftech caught on this fact as well and asked AMD about it with the following response:

Starting September 12th 2016, AMD is no longer bundling the 'AMD Gaming Evolved App' by Raptr with builds of Radeon Software. The application will still work. AMD will cease to undertake any compatibility testing, install support or general technical support for this application, nor will it be available through Radeon Software or its installer. Previous builds of Radeon Software that include the 'AMD Gaming Evolved App' dated before September 12th 2016 will remain intact and will not be affected.

So that confirms it - AMD is no longer officailly supporting the software, it has been removed rather silently. You can however still download and use it via Raptr’s website, and Gaming Evolved has always mirrored Raptr’s app. With Raptr out of the game a new question rises though, we wonder what AMD has planned for the Crimson driver suite, which has seriously shaped up quite well in the past month or six. 

Winter is coming and AMD always cooks up a nice December driver.