970's having performance issues using 4GB Vram - Nvidia investigating

eyetrip · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:45

Went looking for my last post commenting on 970 sli performance before this all started...

eyetrip said:
Me, I'm not entirely happy with SLI 970's right now.

Plenty of stutter in the games I play - BF4, DA:I, E: D

Plenty of texture flickering in DA:I

SLI voltage bug makes overclocking more awkward than it needs be.

Think I picked the worst time to move back to nvidia, but hopefully they have an awesome driver update coming soon...

At least I don't get loads of crashes

Am glad you guys have given me the option to return.

Shoza · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:46

Keeping my 970 card from OCUK - runs flawlessly at 1080p in everything I play.

Bonjour · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:47

Are Nvidia going to shoulder any of the financial cost?

It's all very well Peter@nvidia saying if you're not happy return the cards, but most of the financial burden related to this appears to be falling on manufacturers and e-tailers.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Squink · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:49

Gibbo said:
Not many so far to be honest, most customers even in the know love their 970's and for good reason.

Even if not many are returned I think people will be most appreciative of the option to do so (even if they decide against it) and OCUK will gain a deserved boost to their reputation for this.

If the low uptake continues it'll be down to the lack of perceived competition from AMD, rather than because people are pleased with nVidia. If there's something else that's come out of this thread it's the learning that even full 4gb cards are effectively heading towards redundancy for upcoming games if you play above 1080p. That leaves people either having to get an 8gb 290x or wait and hope new cards come in 8gb flavour soon.

Loque · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:49

What worries me, and is my decision for wanting to return my 970's is that this whole debacle will inevitably hurt the 970's resale value in the future, and how are these cards going to handle games in 12-18 months time? Pretty much every game that comes out is going to require somewhere close to 4GB of VRAM, which is going to hurt gaming on a 970.

PayneUK · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:50

Bonjour said:
Are Nvidia going to shoulder any of the financial cost?

It's all very well Peter@nvidia saying if you're not happy return the cards, but most of the financial burden related to this appears to be falling on manufacturers and e-tailers.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

You don't appear to be wrong YET, everyone is still waiting for NVidia to say one way or another officially.

I'm guessing they are searching for any other option available, be that driver, fob off, or a hole in the ground to stick their head in. Refunds/recalls will be there absolutely last option.

Twirlywoos · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:50

Wizzfizz said:
Expect a lot of cards back on the 27th then

I'll keep an eye on the clearance section then

Nocky24 · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:50

Could really do with an official response from Nvidia to this soon. It's making them look ~~bad~~ worse

~>Dg<~ · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:51

if you at 1080 you are fine. nothing much will test them for a good few years at that res.

the few that do are buggy ports from the same buggy companies that always make buggy games.

Geekazoid · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:51

my MSI Gaming 970 is having the same issue when i push the V-Ram stutter hell... How do i go about resolving this?

Legend · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:52

Gibbo said:
Please bear in mind the following:
• There is no issue with the 970 product, this is by design from NVIDIA in the 970 GPU
• There is approx. £150 delta in the price of the 970 vs. the 980
• There is only a 3% performance delta of the 970 vs. the 980

...the relative performance difference varies from 1% in Shadows of Mordor, to 3% in Battlefield 4 or Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. The performance differences between a 970 and 980 in the above examples remain a constant 15-19%, regardless of memory usage.

yet you ALSO say...

Gibbo said:
I've ragged enough 970 and 980's to know the 980 is a far more powerful card.

I've clocked the hell out of a 970 and only then it tends to offer similar/same performance to a stock 980 at 1080P, but once you clock the 980 it pulls well ahead of a 970.

In SLI this becomes even more apparent and 970's can only do upto tri-SLI, only 980's can do quad SLI.

So the performance of the 980 is a lot more, even at 1080P.

So you've PROPER confused me now with this!! :confused:

VincentHanna · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:55

The performance differences between a 970 and 980 in the above examples remain a constant 15-19%, regardless of memory usage.

First quote would indicate a 980 is up to 20% better..

Curlyriff · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:56

why cant you just reply normally ? replying with insults.

That was a normal reply and no direct insult t yourself after what you have written.

You do not seem to see common sense or logic to the situation though and then go out your way to be dismayed that they are not willing to give you something on top of what you have brought.

It is nothing to do with OCUK and you are not going to get something for free when you are keeping the product that you are saying is the issue. If you have a problem send it back and start again. If it works for you fine.

Dervious · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:56

I`ve been considering a switch to NVIDIA recently, despite the terrible experience that I had with my GTX460(s).

https://forums.geforce.com/default/...ermi-based-card-thats-locking-up-blackscreen/

The GTX970 seemed like the card to go for, but reports of coil whine put me off a bit. Now there's this problem which puts me off a lot.

Oh well, I'll stick with my 7950 and wait to see what AMD come up with next.

Mei · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:57

jwilliamson47 said:
Dying Light is a good example, it runs horribly on my 970s and the framedrops/stutter is beyond a joke. However, other press I've spoke to with AMD cards are experiencing even more issues.

I can see 8gb cards being the next big step up as games are already starting to push that 4GB barrier. That's why I would be careful upgrading to a 980 4GB incase the framebuffer becomes an issue.

what kind of issues? ive played it almost 2 days straight on a 290 and had no stuttering issues, i had 1 crash but i cant say that wasnt a twitch app caused that, ive also seen it played on a 780 at the same time and it didnt seem bad either, the cpu is always at 100% tho lol

Legend · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:57

VincentHanna said:
First quote would indicate a 980 is up to 20% better..

Yes, but the second would suggest the 980 slays the 970. Maybe it's just the way he's worded it, but I find it a bit confusing and contradictory. One quote suggesting the 980 isn't worth upgrading from the 970 for, and the second suggesting the 980 would be a major upgrade. I don't know, perhaps he can clarify.

Cooper · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:58

..unless Asus offer to let 970 Strix owners upgrade to 980 Strix's for £50 a card (yeah riiiight!!!

)

My sexy twins are going nowhere:

jwilliamson47 · 29 Jan 2015 at 13:59

Mei said:
what kind of issues? ive played it almost 2 days straight on a 290 and had no stuttering issues, i had 1 crash but i cant say that wasnt a twitch app caused that, ive also seen it played on a 780 at the same time and it didnt seem bad either, the cpu is always at 100% tho lol

Really? oh that's pretty good then. I've heard of a few problems in terms of frame drops but at least it's working nicely for you

OryxBeisa · 29 Jan 2015 at 14:00

Shoza said:
Keeping my 970 card from OCUK - runs flawlessly at 1080p in everything I play.

Same, I have no need for more than 1920x1080 so I don't think I'm really affected, assuming there even is a noticeable issue. Looking at youtube videos, I see a lot of people reporting zero issues, apart from awful framerates from running everything at 4x DSR maxed out.

jwilliamson47 · 29 Jan 2015 at 14:00

Think I could manage 2 triple slot 290x in my setup? or stick to 2 slot ones...