Techreport: A note on rumors about gtx 590 issues.

[Seero]

Not only overclocking, but overvolting seems to be the new goal-post for reviewing cards, as of last week.

We will see if the reviewers stay honest and over-volt Kepler and SI out of the box on launch day, because this was never standard before.

You see, I don't like the idea of having a piece of electronics that requires more electricity than a mini stove running inside my computer, but that is me. I hope that they will soon find a solution to increase graphics before I need to replace my circuit breakers (2 pc in a room, through one circuit breaker...)

 

[Cookie Monster]

there is a beta afterburner that allows you to change the voltage.But other than that i dont think you can change it.But why in the world would anyone want to up the voltage on a 450 watt card?

So why in the world would you do the same thing on the GTX590?

 

[SlowSpyder]

Not only overclocking, but overvolting seems to be the new goal-post for reviewing cards, as of last week.

We will see if the reviewers stay honest and over-volt Kepler and SI out of the box on launch day, because this was never standard before.

Keplar and SI will be new architectures on a new process. The GTX590 is two downcloked GTX580's which are very, very similar to the GTX480 before it. All on the same 40nm process that has been around for quite some time.

Overvolting and overclocking the GTX590 on launch is a lot like overclocking and overvolting the 5970 or 6990 on launch. Which I believe AMD provides a switch for the 6990, and AMD more or less wanted users to overclock the 5970.

1.2v may very well have been too much juice. But maybe instead of blaming the reviewer we should ask how Nvidia could release a megabucks flagship product that burns up instead of having some kind of protection? Maybe we should look at the bigger picture and ask why GTX590's are burning up and Nvidia has had thousands of parts fail due to bad bumps? Maybe we should worry about a trend starting with 8xxx and 9xxx cards having to be 'baked'. The quality just doesn't seem to be there.

 

[happy medium]

Maybe we should look at the bigger picture and ask why GTX590's are burning up and Nvidia has had thousands of parts fail due to bad bumps? Maybe we should worry about a trend starting with 8xxx and 9xxx cards having to be 'baked'. The quality just doesn't seem to be there.

Mabe we should all just buy Evga cards and overclock them, and if they die get a new one. I believe the warranty covers it.

 

[Schmide]

You see, I don't like the idea of having a piece of electronics that requires more electricity than a mini stove running inside my computer, but that is me. I hope that they will soon find a solution to increase graphics before I need to replace my circuit breakers (2 pc in a room, through one circuit breaker...)

Even the smallest toaster ovens/hot plates use 1500+ watts, most systems we're talking about here are half that. Just saying.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Mabe we should all just buy Evga cards and overclock them, and if they die get a new one. I believe the warranty covers it.

If I were in the market for a GTX590, EVGA would be the only manufacturer I would consider. I think a GTX590 user may very well need a good warranty and a good customer service department.

 

[Seero]

1.2v may very well have been too much juice. But maybe instead of blaming the reviewer we should ask how Nvidia could release a megabucks flagship product that burns up instead of having some kind of protection? Maybe we should look at the bigger picture and ask why GTX590's are burning up and Nvidia has had thousands of parts fail due to bad bumps? Maybe we should worry about a trend starting with 8xxx and 9xxx cards having to be 'baked'. The quality just doesn't seem to be there.

I say now the argument is on track. When we talk about headroom, it really isn't about OC capability, but durability. Parts do age, and when that do they either require more electricity to stay stable, or instabilizes the circuit. It is natural to think that "if 590 can't take mild OC, then it probably won't last long on stock." I am not educated enough to have an answer to that.

As to baking, it works for AMD cards too. We have a baking thread flowing up and down here. It is not a trick that only works on Nvidia, but electronics in general where soldier joins gets loose after heat cycles. It isn't a worry, it is a remedy. A urban tricks that may bring died electronics back to life, at virtually no cost. And yes, oven manufacturers are not responsible for anything of that nature.

 

[Seero]

Even the smallest toaster ovens/hot plates use 1500+ watts, most systems we're talking about here are half that. Just saying.

Please excuse my ignorance on household electronics.

http://www.gizmology.net/stove.htm

 

[thilanliyan]

As to baking, it works for AMD cards too. We have a baking thread flowing up and down here. It is not a trick that only works on Nvidia, but electronics in general where soldier joins gets loose after heat cycles. It isn't a worry, it is a remedy. A urban tricks that may bring died electronics back to life, at virtually no cost. And yes, oven manufacturers are not responsible for anything of that nature.

The point was not that it only works on nVidia cards. The point was that if you look at the threads of people baking their cards, it's usually an nVidia card (especially 8xxx and 9xxx cards). Hence, that COULD lead to the conclusion that nVidia cards "fail" quicker than the ATI counterparts (ie. not as high quality)...or it could mean maybe there are a lot more 8xxx/9xxx cards in the wild and so you will see more people with failed cards...who knows.

I think only the nV/ATI engineers can say how much of a safety margin is built into the cards, and the quality of some of the components they are using.

 

[Schmide]

Please excuse my ignorance on household electronics.

http://www.gizmology.net/stove.htm

If you don't mind waiting

1000ml*(100c-15c)/(375w*0.239c/ws*60s) = 15.8 min

vs

1000ml*(100c-15c)/(1500w*0.239c/ws*60s) = 3.9 min

to boil a liter of water?

 

[Bearach]

I think everyone needs to calm down. We have both "sides" arguing over a possible issue, one saying there is all these failures and another saying it's exaggerated.

There's no need to keep it all going, we know that some people have had failures and the reason could be theirs or even the card itself.

With nVIDIA releasing drivers that limit or stop over-volting it does suggest that there may be an issue with over-volting the card but I'm not going to say yikes! It will blow up all the time.

I usually don't over-volt my components, I prefer to have a quiet, and as low powered machine for my needs. So as you can guess, this card isn't for me, nor is the 6990.

Though I will admit, I would definitely drool over both of them . (Can I get warranty for that?)

Lets all just wait for this to settle and see what is found. Not keep doing cheap little hits at one another?

Cheesy TV movie moment!

"We all have something in common, we love computing, we love the whole thing of a computer coming to life, the tweaking... the getting the system to purr as it were! Lets all get along!"

I do think that it's right that people are warned of the possibility of their 590 failing... But that is a risk always when over-volting, overclocking and it's why I hate when people state it as a buying point.

Also? The flipping of the 6990's switch? Why so much drama over that too? You flip that switch to overclock the card, you're also going to try and clock past the 880Mhz it instantly allows.

You bought the card at 830MHz, not 880MHz so 880MHz is not stock as I see it, but that's just my interpretation.

It's the same as overclocking any other card, you do normally void your warranty.

If EVGA made a 6990 they would cover it with their warranty I'm sure, it is overclocking the card.

So here we have both AMD and nVIDIA's halo products and both getting unfair flak possibly... Maybe others can see what I'm saying?

I'm impressed with the engineering to some level, but I'm not impressed with these cards as an actual viable card for me...

So lets meet each other halfway? Not all 590's are failing, some can even be overclocked.

And...

The 6990's switch, is just a overclocking feature, if you overclocked a competing card you'd be breaking your warranty too(in most cases).

 

[hdfxst]

So why in the world would you do the same thing on the GTX590?

i wouldn't with a 590 either.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

Not only overclocking, but overvolting seems to be the new goal-post for reviewing cards, as of last week.

We will see if the reviewers stay honest and over-volt Kepler and SI out of the box on launch day, because this was never standard before.

With Fermi it has become the norm to overvolt a bit to achieve much higher stable clocks. It was actually pushed with a 460 and every part since then. The 590 is clocked down so much lower at 607mhz, and uses 580 GPU's, so it technically should hit 772mhz with enough voltage applied to it. Not to mention that this is an enthusiast card which should be made of higher quality components that should be able to withstand a reasonable overclock.

AMD GPU's havent been so clock-restrained that they need to be over-volted to reach the maximum overclock the card would do at any given time. The cards are already around 850-950mhz at stock settings. There's not much further for them to go.

Nvidia's strategy of huge die's at lower clocks vs AMD's smaller die's at high clocks is really not paying off at all for the green team.

As I understand it, chip size x clockspeed x voltage is a rough way to estimate power draw. On Fermi the chipsize becomes a bigger part of the equation and when variables occur (overclocking and/or adding voltage), that number gets to be a whole lot bigger.

In short, Fermi needs to be overvolted to achieve an enthusiast level clockspeed increase, while Barts/Cayman/Antilles can do their max without the added voltage.

 

[TerabyteX]

Well, I prefer a card that doesn't require OC. In fact, since when OC is an requirement? What happens to the plug and play idea?

Enthusiast is about tweaking and extracting every once of performance available. If you like to buy stuff and leave it at default, then you aren't an enthusiast. AFAIK, the GTX 590 belongs to enthusiast as nobody would pay $700.00 for a videocard, except an enthusiast

I am not saying the extra headroom is bad, nor I am saying 6990 is a bad card. To be honest, I will prefer HD6990 over GTX590 (or any single core card if it is an option, SLI/CF is still not ready IMO.) That is different from saying 590 is faulty, just not as good if overclock is my cup of tea. But to this topic, don't you agree that the incidents have be over exaggerated by forums?

Well, that's your POV and I understand, but I could also say that some are trying to downplay those incidents. I think that's a matter of perspective.

Look, at stock, both cards are head to head. One can OC, one not until AIB partners come up with something. It is clear that HD6990 > GTX590 by a bit, but this is when Nvidia's small little candy comes to play. CUDA, PhysX, and 3D vision support. Yes it is old, but it never gets old. We can talking about 2 cards selling at around the same price. Each has something special. May I ask what is wrong?

AMD and nVidia have their unique something which will appeal the public different. I care about PhysX, but not enough to use nVidia as a primary videocard, I don't care about CUDA as the software that I use also comes with OpenCL/APP compatability. I don't care about 3D even if it comes from nVidia or AMD, but what's wrong is like I said previously, an enthusiast SKU that can't be tweaked like enthusiasts usually do.

As I understand it, chip size x clockspeed x voltage is a rough way to estimate power draw. On Fermi the chipsize becomes a bigger part of the equation and when variables occur (overclocking and/or adding voltage), that number gets to be a whole lot bigger.

In short, Fermi needs to be overvolted to achieve an enthusiast level clockspeed increase, while Barts/Cayman/Antilles can do their max without the added voltage.

I also think that AMD's GPUs have higher transistor density compared to nVidia solutions, that's why we see each generation of GPU getting twice of everything, but not twice the die size even at the same manufacturing process (Except the HD 6970 which isn't twice the HD 5870)

 

[OCGuy]

Enthusiast is about tweaking and extracting every once of performance available. If you like to buy stuff and leave it at default, then you aren't an enthusiast. AFAIK, the GTX 590 belongs to enthusiast as nobody would pay $700.00 for a videocard, except an enthusiast

That is pure opinion, sorry.

I SLI'd GTX280s at a cost of around $1100. Never touched the voltage. I would consider myself an enthusiast.

Putting the most expensive GPUs out of warranty is just plain dumb. The returns for overclocking GPUs are usually very small. This is especially true when you take into account that going from 150FPS to 210FPS is effectively doing nothing.

 

[Idontcare]

With Fermi it has become the norm to overvolt a bit to achieve much higher stable clocks. It was actually pushed with a 460 and every part since then. The 590 is clocked down so much lower at 607mhz, and uses 580 GPU's, so it technically should hit 772mhz with enough voltage applied to it. Not to mention that this is an enthusiast card which should be made of higher quality components that should be able to withstand a reasonable overclock.

AMD GPU's havent been so clock-restrained that they need to be over-volted to reach the maximum overclock the card would do at any given time. The cards are already around 850-950mhz at stock settings. There's not much further for them to go.

Nvidia's strategy of huge die's at lower clocks vs AMD's smaller die's at high clocks is really not paying off at all for the green team.

As I understand it, chip size x clockspeed x voltage is a rough way to estimate power draw. On Fermi the chipsize becomes a bigger part of the equation and when variables occur (overclocking and/or adding voltage), that number gets to be a whole lot bigger.

In short, Fermi needs to be overvolted to achieve an enthusiast level clockspeed increase, while Barts/Cayman/Antilles can do their max without the added voltage.

The traditional equation, applicable to CMOS on 90nm nodes and larger, is P = C * f * V^2
where C is capacitance of the chip (the thing that scales with die-size) and f is the frequency.

CMOS on nodes 65nm and newer have been shown to actually scale power consumption to the cube of the voltage. So we should be using: P = C * f * V^3

But yes, swapping "C" for "die-size" is reasonable from a fundamental basis given where "C" comes from. Not to mention it is a wonderful example of a practical Fermi Approximation in action.

 

[insurgent]

That is pure opinion, sorry.

I SLI'd GTX280s at a cost of around $1100. Never touched the voltage. I would consider myself an enthusiast.

Putting the most expensive GPUs out of warranty is just plain dumb. The returns for overclocking GPUs are usually very small. This is especially true when you take into account that going from 150FPS to 210FPS is effectively doing nothing.

http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/enthusiast
"A person who enjoys using computers and electronic equipment. Enthusiasts like technology and are willing to learn more of the ins and outs of a product than the average consumer, who just wants to use it. An enthusiast is more like a "prosumer."

-by that definition you're not an enthusiast and are no different from someone who buys a Mac.

Enthusiasts, in the context of this community, usually overclocks, but that's just semantics, who cares since there are so many differing opinions. But overclocking these cards are not dumb, just because you don't agree doesn't mean it's dumb. I don't climb mountains or do extreme sports, but I don't call people who do dumb, and they're actually risking their lives. They push the limits and show what we can achieve.

 

[badb0y]

You don't have to OC to be an enthusiast but usually most enthusiasts do overclock.

 

[Dark Shroud]

That is pure opinion, sorry.

I SLI'd GTX280s at a cost of around $1100. Never touched the voltage. I would consider myself an enthusiast.

Putting the most expensive GPUs out of warranty is just plain dumb. The returns for overclocking GPUs are usually very small. This is especially true when you take into account that going from 150FPS to 210FPS is effectively doing nothing.

http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/enthusiast
"A person who enjoys using computers and electronic equipment. Enthusiasts like technology and are willing to learn more of the ins and outs of a product than the average consumer, who just wants to use it. An enthusiast is more like a "prosumer."

-by that definition you're not an enthusiast and are no different from someone who buys a Mac.

Enthusiasts, in the context of this community, usually overclocks, but that's just semantics, who cares since there are so many differing opinions. But overclocking these cards are not dumb, just because you don't agree doesn't mean it's dumb. I don't climb mountains or do extreme sports, but I don't call people who do dumb, and they're actually risking their lives. They push the limits and show what we can achieve.

So basically the HD 6990 & GTX 590 are the enthusiasts' enthusiasts card.

 

[insurgent]

That's what I said, most enthusiasts overclock. Not everyone who buys/eats caviar is a food connoisseur, and buying the most expensive video card doesn't make you an enthusiast. My point, it's not what you buy but what you do with it.

 

[Keysplayr]

I rarely overclock. I do have my i7 860 up to 3.4 GHz though. That is without messing with any voltages. Not comfortable with that stuff. And the GTX590 IMHO really doesn't need to be overclocked. Others may disagree, and maybe it's just that I can't be bothered with o/c'ing most of the time.
To each his own but the ones who don't never need worry about their warranty.

 

[AtenRa]

If Enthusiasts are people who Overclock, then all the hardware is made for enthusiasts because I have Overclocked not only high end hardware but low end hardware like Intels Core i3 540 or NV GTS450, AMDs HD5850, AMDs Phenom II X2 etc etc.

GTX590 or HD6990 are just hardware for the $699 market segment and both enthusiast/Overclockers or not will use them. Just my opinion

 

[BFG10K]

I’m an enthusiast but I don’t overclock. I’d also never use an SLI or CF based solution, unless maybe if they implemented an exceptional form of anti-aliasing not available on single cards.

 

[GaiaHunter]

I'm not sure if all enthusiasts are all overclockers but probably all overclockers are enthusiasts.

The price segment is irrelevant to this discussion.

When you buy a GPU (and a CPU) stock performance is important but so is, and has been for a while, overclocking potential.

 

[1h4x4s3x]

Changed the thread title