Device manager has existed since at least Windows 98, maybe in 95. The GUI for the device manager still allowed you to update, identify, and uninstall drivers. It's been a standard in Windows for decades to manage drivers there but you could also install the specific GPU driver applications from the manufacturer but wasn't strictly required. Now since Windows 10, Windows just ships with a few GPU drivers and uses the one it detects on boot until it can run Windows Update and grab the latest.

But overall, I was talking about any device driver. Not just GPUs.