There's a handful of reasons you should and shouldn't upgrade, so here's a handy chart! Reasons to Upgrade Now You can't go back from one major version to another - i.e. "Downgrading" or "Rolling Back" means going back to a version within the same previous major version, such as 17.4.6 to 17.4.5. Instructions for both are similar, but "Upgrading" is a bigger deal and often irreversible. "Upgrading" means major version number changes, such as 15 to 16, or 16 to 17.
"Updating" means minor updates or patches, such as 16.2.6 to 16.2.7, which added Ampere driver support.
On slower Computers, go to Project Settings and set the Timeline resolution to 1080p (instead of 4k) before using “Optimized media”.
DaVinci Resolve works smooth with ProRes, DNxHR, braw, red, arri files and many more. H264 is NOT an “editing format” so it is best to convert those files into DNxHR for example. DaVinci Resolve (Studio) doesn’t like “GOP” (Group of Pictures) formats, and that is fine. Yes, DaVinci Resolve Studio “supports” some h264 codecs.