WCCftech: Memory allocation problem with GTX 970 [UPDATE] PCPer: NVidia response

[NTMBK]

Has anyone actually tried measuring performance differences? Load up a memory-heavy game like modded Skyrim, attach FCAT, and see if there is any noticeable frame consistency problem (compared to the 980)?

 

[MeldarthX]

For those trying to say the top brass in Nvidia didn't know about this is fooling themselves.

This is how corporations work; They will push their item; they will make claims on their items until someone challenges them. Who signs off on this; managers and the board; which includes the CEO.

Of course they knew; and ran with it. They ran a cost analysis on which would cost them more; to label the cards correctly; at the price they'd put out. *projections would be lower sales; a lot more lower sales to compared to the projections of labeling the cards they way they did with the mis information on the rops; false advertisement; and then the fall out when it came to light; possible recalling of boxes for mislabeling*

Now if the costs of those two projectsion; if the one with the truth would of come out higher; guess what they would of gone with the truth. Now if the labeling of the cards with the mis information and false advertisment comes out higher. Guess which one they will go with. They went with misinformation; *remember this isn't the first time Nvidia's been caught doing this*

Now the kicker is on this; I know Nvidia ran the numbers; why their drivers have behaved the way they have from the beginning.....They knew the facts; the board did and ceo; If they didn't then; should they be honestly running the company?

*While I prefer AMD over Nvidia; I am pro consumer most; if AMD pulled the same thing I'd be saying the same thing*

In the UK; everyone that bought 970 would be entitled to a refund under the fair trade goods act as this is a clear case of false advertisement. Not on the bus; as technically its 256 bit bus; *but its not* technically it has 4 gigs of ram.....but really it doesn't......but its ROPs; they flat out lied there.

 

[Silverforce11]

Has anyone actually tried measuring performance differences? Load up a memory-heavy game like modded Skyrim, attach FCAT, and see if there is any noticeable frame consistency problem (compared to the 980)?

It's already been done, in video, the stutters are terrible when vram goes above 3.5gb.

It's entirely game dependent because some games actually NEED more than 3.5gb while others just allocate more than 3.5gb because they can, not that they need it.

AT's article covers that aspect very well. In games that NEED it, you are going to get stutters and bad min fps spikes.

 

[amenx]

But sometimes theres a fine line between 'too optimistic' settings that can also cause massive slowdowns. Determining whether its an actual vram issue or overly high settings may be tricky. I believe notorious cases like Skyrim where anyone can create exaggerated textures (probably beyond what the game designers had in mind) would be more likely to cause vram problems. Games that dont have high texture modding of that sort open to them may be less prone to vram issues because game designers are more careful in that regard to avoid situations leading up to that.

 

[Maximilian]

*nothing*

 

[skipsneeky2]

This news is absolute horrible,i was looking forward to a 970 this week to buy.

I could buy it still going in knowing its a 3.5gb card,buy a top of the line 290 non x for less,buy a 780 and oc it to 780ti speeds which seems easy enough or jump on a 290x.

What would you do coming from a 2gb 770?Are new games even choking before they use 3.5gb?I like minimums in the 60s when possible so i adjust settings as needed.

 

[MrK6]

[*snippity*IMG]http://i.imgur.com/HwVHPjk.png[/IMG]

[*snippity*IMG]http://i.imgur.com/3JbTyEJ.jpg[/IMG]

Oh man those are amazing.

I'm looking forward to the class action lawsuit. Dirt cheap 970's for everyone! :thumbsup:

 

[showb1z]

I could buy it still going in knowing its a 3.5gb card,buy a top of the line 290 non x for less,buy a 780 and oc it to 780ti speeds which seems easy enough or jump on a 290x.

290 was already better value before this mess. Now it's no contest. Wish they had been quicker with the price drops, I would've gotten one too.

 

[Magic Carpet]

Oh man those are amazing.

I'm looking forward to the class action lawsuit. Dirt cheap 970's for everyone! :thumbsup:

Ya. I'd take a 3.5gb card for $250

 

[NTMBK]

Honestly, even if there is a lawsuit, what do you all expect you will get from it? At most I would anticipate a download code for a free game or two, or some digital currency for a F2P game.

 

[SteveGrabowski]

Honestly, even if there is a lawsuit, what do you all expect you will get from it? At most I would anticipate a download code for a free game or two, or some digital currency for a F2P game.

$17 in 2027 is what I expect to get out of the inevitable class action lawsuit.

 

[ShintaiDK]

This news is absolute horrible,i was looking forward to a 970 this week to buy.

I could buy it still going in knowing its a 3.5gb card,buy a top of the line 290 non x for less,buy a 780 and oc it to 780ti speeds which seems easy enough or jump on a 290x.

What would you do coming from a 2gb 770?Are new games even choking before they use 3.5gb?I like minimums in the 60s when possible so i adjust settings as needed.

Remember VRAM isnt equal to VRAM due to compression techniques. So even of we imagine a fixed setting at 3.5GB on a GTX970, you still have more VRAM than a 4GB GTX770 or a 4GB 290/290X in terms of gaming.

Thats why performance is all that matters in different resolutions and settings.

 

[raghu78]

Looking forward to frametime testing in actual games from anandtech and other tech sites when VRAM usage is in between 3.5 and 4GB. this issue is more relevant for multi GPU users where the GPU power will be there and the VRAM could be hindering. Thats what will provide a better understanding of the impact of this problem. The focus on this issue will make Nvidia be more cautious in the future with their reviewers guide and specs. More importantly the tech press needs to also test games which consistently use upto 4GB VRAM (atleast in multi GPU the GPU power will be there).

 

[Pneumothorax]

Remember VRAM isnt equal to VRAM due to compression techniques. So even of we imagine a fixed setting at 3.5GB on a GTX970, you still have more VRAM than a 4GB GTX770 or a 4GB 290/290X in terms of gaming.

Thats why performance is all that matters in different resolutions and settings.

Uhmm, If that's true, than why isn't the 960 performing about the same as the rest of the 2gb group in games? If Nvidia's compression was enough to make up for lack of vram, the 960 would be performing as well if not better than it's 3gb competition... I think Nvidia's compression seems to help more for bandwidth.

 

[skipsneeky2]

290 was already better value before this mess. Now it's no contest. Wish they had been quicker with the price drops, I would've gotten one too.

Pisses me off cause i picked the 770 over 7970 cause of pure performance in Oct,2013.Bad choice on my part and this time i was under the impression i couldn't go wrong cause all the cards have 4gb.:awe:

So here we are and it looks like i'm pretty much in the same situation as with the 770,many of my games are gonna run better on the 970 over a 290/290x of course. I hate being a mid range buyer.

I wouldn't know if a single 970 could offer enough performance at 1080p while games use 3.5gb or less or what.Is this more a issue for sli users?1440p users?

 

[Enigmoid]

Its extremely naive to think Nvidia knew nothing about this sort of thing. The drivers and design indicate this was known by the engineering department and I find it hard to believe Nvidia does not have some sort of final review of all marketing by an engineering panel to double check for correctness.

Nvidia goofed up on its 64 ROP claim; only 56 ROPs are present. Yet one has to wonder about the meaning of this when only 52 pixels per clock can actually be rasturized, and the shader deficit between the 980 and 970 means that the ROP/SMM ratio are pretty much on par.

Except for the vram (3.5 + 0.5 GB) the 970 is a pretty much evenly cut down 980. The lesser bandwidth and ROP count is compensated by the lesser number of shaders. The performance ratio relative to the 980 is pretty much unaffected due to this.

People arguing this need to take a step back. You did not buy a 970 for its ROP count. You bought it for its performance. Otherwise why on earth did you buy a 256 bit card when there are 512 bit cards on the market? Because it showed that it performed well enough with a 256 bit bus, much like the 970 performs well enough with 56 ROPs.

Ultimately this is a case of false advertising. I would hope nvidia offers some sort of rebate (or a couple of free games) but nvidia will not give a full refund.

The main problem is the vram. 3.5 GB usable will limit games though again it depends on how the game is designed. As mentioned above, the vram balance is roughly on par with the decrease in shading power (980 is 20% more powerful with 14% more vram). Vram however, will limit performance in games where the 970 has sufficient performance, or the game is especially vram heavy.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Uhmm, If that's true, than why isn't the 960 performing about the same as the rest of the 2gb group in games? If Nvidia's compression was enough to make up for lack of vram, the 960 would be performing as well if not better than it's 3gb competition... I think Nvidia's compression seems to help more for bandwidth.

Apples and oranges.

I assume you compare to 384bit 3GB cards. AMD did essentially the same with Tonga. 2GB 256bit with better compression. But its not a 50% improvement on either. The reviews clearly tells you the benefit.

 

[DiogoDX]

Congratulations to the Nvidia market department that succeeded in deceiving the whole market and the press and sell 1 million cards.:thumbsup:

 

[AnandThenMan]

Compression techniques have nothing to do with this issue at all and certainly don't make up for the memory allocation compromise the 970 has. We don't see Nvidia saying yes the specs we gave out were wrong but it's okay because of compression. At best the card will run into the memory wall slightly later.

 

[Pneumothorax]

Apples and oranges.

I assume you compare to 384bit 3GB cards. AMD did essentially the same with Tonga. 2GB 256bit with better compression. But its not a 50% improvement on either. The reviews clearly tells you the benefit.

Those 2 graphs you put all talk about being able to get away with smaller bandwidth for similar performance, but no slides showing how '2gb is as good as 3gb due to our memory compression'.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Uhmm, If that's true, than why isn't the 960 performing about the same as the rest of the 2gb group in games? If Nvidia's compression was enough to make up for lack of vram, the 960 would be performing as well if not better than it's 3gb competition... I think Nvidia's compression seems to help more for bandwidth.

Not when the chip lacks grunt to start.

 

[dacostafilipe]

Remember VRAM isnt equal to VRAM due to compression techniques. So even of we imagine a fixed setting at 3.5GB on a GTX970, you still have more VRAM than a 4GB GTX770 or a 4GB 290/290X in terms of gaming.

Absolutely not!

The compression happens when transfering data, not in the VRAM itself.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Absolutely not!

The compression happens when transfering data, not in the VRAM itself.

Are you saying the data is stored uncompressed in VRAM and that the GDDR5 chips compresses it for you when you transfer?

 

[ShintaiDK]

Those 2 graphs you put all talk about being able to get away with smaller bandwidth for similar performance, but no slides showing how '2gb is as good as 3gb due to our memory compression'.

Who made the claim that 2GB is as good as 3GB?

 

[SlowSpyder]

Are you saying the data is stored uncompressed in VRAM and that the GDDR5 chips compresses it for you when you transfer?

Compression techniques or not, it doesn't matter. Either way people have less usable capacity than they thought they were paying for. Whether the card had a true 4GB of vram or 3.5GB of usable vram, the compression is the same in both cases, in one case you have less vram available. Not a big deal had Nvidia been up front with how the card works, but they weren't and I think customers have a right to be unhappy about it.