PSA: Nvidia wants to borrow your GPU, offers game codes in return

[tviceman]

PSA for anyone interested!

In short, Nvidia programmers are having difficulty reproducing the TDR bug that is going on with the 28x.xx drivers. They are willing/wanting to pay for shipping both ways of your graphics card to help them test retail cards that are still experiencing the TDR bug. They are willing to throw in codes to some games for your help.

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=213670&st=200&p=1316377&#entry1316377

 

[Will Robinson]

Wow that 15 page thread(so far)on NVDA driver problems is a real eye opener.
Nice of them to offer some game codes for people who can send in their cards for testing tho.

 

[Leyawiin]

Sent the Nvidia rep a PM. Not sure if I want to be without my card for some indefinite period though. I've been having the Firefox/Nvidia 28X.XX TDR issue for several months (and didn't know the two were related). Switched to Opera last week and it stopped completely. I don't think its related to the cards themselves anyway. I've had it happen to both my GTX 460 and GTX 560. TDR black screen on Windows 7, Firefox just freezing on XP. I think sending them user cards is a waste of time.

 

[imaheadcase]

Yah its pretty bad. Lucky for me it just happens at random, but when it does its totally annoying because only way to fix it is do uninstall, then reinstall as clean install.

It really effects video the most.

I've heard people sending in cards before to nvidia, and they would send back a better card PLUS game codes.

 

[tviceman]

The TDR problem seems to be specifically related to firefox or IE and with the 28x.xx drivers. I switched to chrome by choice about a week ago and haven't experienced a tdr since. I still sent him a PM; I have a decent notebook and wouldn't mind some free games!

 

[s44]

I got one Firefox crash since I switched from the beta to the official 285. Used to get them all the time. Odd.

 

[bryanW1995]

Wow that 15 page thread(so far)on NVDA driver problems is a real eye opener.
Nice of them to offer some game codes for people who can send in their cards for testing tho.

I haven't read the thread, but I had problems on the desktop when using firefox (five seconds or so black screen, then destop recovered with a driver error message) with my gtx 460 after installing the new drivers. However, no issues at all while gaming, and the issue went away when I installed the gtx 480 a couple of days ago. Truly more annoying than anything else, seems like common sense for them to just stop being quite so aggressive with 2d clocks/voltages.

 

[BFG10K]

This is actually outstanding customer service on nVidia’s part. :thumbsup:

I question what they’ll find with the cards though; I think a lot of the TDR problems are related to overclocking, whether from the factory or the user.

 

[Majcric]

I'll gladly send mine in for free.

 

[3DVagabond]

Does this mean that the problem doesn't occur for them in their testing? If so, which it seems is a plausible reason for doing this, what they might need is your whole computer. They have cards. Oodles of them, I would presume. If their cards aren't doing it, and cards that are sent in for RMA aren't doing it, Seems like it's some kind of common conflict.

All I can think though is, good thing AMD isn't doing this. I can hear all the haters blaming their driver crew for just sucking at their job. Saying, "This is why I never buy AMD", etc... This just goes to show that PC graphics is a very difficult product. I'll bet that it's all of the heavy driver optimizations that goes on. It used to be that you had to make stuff (apps., games) that would run on the hardware. Now, just release something, if it's buggy the HW manufacturers will have to sort it out.

 

[Majcric]

Nvidia cards that are fully reference may not be doing it, but I wonder about their vendorer partners and all the mods that are done to the standard Nvidia card.

....but still that don't sound right either.

This whole thing came along when kepler came onto the scene at least for me.

I can run a GTX 560 ti and produce this TDR error(already RMA'd to EVGA once.

Switch it out to my XFX 9800 GTX+ and everything is rock solid. No matter, what driver, what software/app, etc is applied. It will run 24/7 consistantly and not a single flaw.

 

[The J]

Sent the Nvidia rep a PM. Not sure if I want to be without my card for some indefinite period though. I've been having the Firefox/Nvidia 28X.XX TDR issue for several months (and didn't know the two were related). Switched to Opera last week and it stopped completely. I don't think its related to the cards themselves anyway. I've had it happen to both my GTX 460 and GTX 560. TDR black screen on Windows 7, Firefox just freezing on XP. I think sending them user cards is a waste of time.

I didn't think Opera had GPU acceleration yet, as of version 11.50. Would that explain why you haven't seen the problem there? I don't know much about this TDR bug.

Sent from my HTC Glacier using Tapatalk

 

[tviceman]

This is actually outstanding customer service on nVidia’s part. :thumbsup:

I question what they’ll find with the cards though; I think a lot of the TDR problems are related to overclocking, whether from the factory or the user.

I was suspecting the same thing myself, but cards that come with factory overclocks should be test-able.

 

[edplayer]

what does TDR even mean?

the link isn't working for me.

 

[Avalon]

what does TDR even mean?

the link isn't working for me.

Yeah I was wondering the same thing. I just got a GTX 460 so I was curious.

 

[nenforcer]

what does TDR even mean?

the link isn't working for me.

It's a Windows Timeout Detection and Recovery which has been around since Windows Vista in 2006.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg487368

And here's a video of it happening to a user with a Radeon HD 6950

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xro5kOwaes

Although in his case I think it's related to the amount of crap he has loading upon Windows boot and how he instantly tries to load 3DMark Vantage upon desktop bootup.

 

[toyota]

what does TDR even mean?

the link isn't working for me.

google not working either?

I had to google it myself yesterday when I saw this being talked about somewhere else. no issues like that for me though and I am using the 285.38 drivers.

 

[Genx87]

They must think it is card specific? Anyways I used to get these all the time with my 4850. The solution was to not install CCC.

 

[AdamK47]

So, this happens with IE9 as well? I primarily use IE9 and have yet to see this problem while simply browsing. My drivers are usually the latest release (beta or otherwise).

 

[Leyawiin]

I didn't think Opera had GPU acceleration yet, as of version 11.50. Would that explain why you haven't seen the problem there? I don't know much about this TDR bug.

Sent from my HTC Glacier using Tapatalk

I think the lack of GPU acceleration in Opera has something to do with it's stability in this situation. I don't care for it as much as Firefox, but its fine. I was so sick of getting TDRs that I'd rather switch browsers.

I tried IE9 as well (first time I used IE in ages). Its really not so bad now and I didn't experience any TDRs with it either. Still, Opera has better functionality (even if IE9 seemed faster).

As far as Nvidia wanting to test consumer's cards, I haven't heard from the rep yet. They may have enough samples already.

 

[DirkGently1]

The issues crop up in Chrome to so it's not just a 'Firefox' problem. It seems to be P-State related, although i'm not ruling out Flash itself being a problem. For some reason the TDR crops up when using the middle P-State, i.e when you're accelerating Flash content.

Many people have found setting 'Always use Max Performance' in the drivers stops the errors from occurring. This setting just cuts out the middle P-State. Worth a try if you find nothing else is working.

 

[JTsyo]

It's a Windows Timeout Detection and Recovery which has been around since Windows Vista in 2006.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg487368

And here's a video of it happening to a user with a Radeon HD 6950

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xro5kOwaes

Although in his case I think it's related to the amount of crap he has loading upon Windows boot and how he instantly tries to load 3DMark Vantage upon desktop bootup.

Only time I've seen that with my GTX260 is during TF2. Happens pretty regularly.