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

Mei · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:20

james.miller said:
How would you reasonably prove that in game? I don't think you can - lowering the ram speed is naturally going to have a negative effect on ingame performance. Unless the increase in stuttering was measurably worse which I doubt it would be.

You would need to isolate the vram which is what kais benchmark was written for. Is there any other way?

you could test if the 970's use more system ram than with 980's thats a start and i duno just try what ever you can,
i didnt say i had all the answers, but you cant show one benchmark and say its proof of anything, even if you know every little bit of code in that tool, which we for sure dont

james.miller · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:31

Kai's benchmark was just am example, ENB said he wrote his own benchmark that produced the same results.

I'm not suggesting we come up with the answers - I don't know any more than you do, but there has to be a reason why the system ram speed has a direct effect on vram benchmarks and there must be a reason why anything in that last 500mb can be found in system ram too.

Mei · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:34

because its confused by nvidia's config? and just defaults to system memory?
they got to show it actually does this in games for it to mean anything to me

Bailey · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:36

Wartris said:
After everything that Overclockers have done as a whole (even more so because of Bailey and Gibbo), it's been a outright pleasure to do the review

Wartris

Excellent thank you very much

Bailey

SHOGUNXSHINOBI · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:44

ICEx21 said:
Hi Legend,

I took the 970 sli route and within in a week I was noticing problems in games, stupidly I listened to suggestions from the forum which just said "the current set of drivers are bad" so I waited. Worst decision ever.
I found problems in games like SoM, BF4 and Dragon Age Inquisition, while not having any problems with my 290.

If you're at 1440p go 980 or AMD, I can't speak for everyone but I certainly regretted 970 sli at that resolution.

Yep sounds about right, did the same, got rid of my 290 tri x's and boarded the hype train with every one else at the time.

easyrider said:
After I have seen the support from OCUK I have decided to take on the store that sounds like scabs.

LOL

panda_uk said:
@SHOGUNXSHINOBI @ DMF1986
Did you speak to them over the phone as I got fobbed off this morning with them trying to talk to me via email. Still not had any response from them as yet.

yes over the phone, and hassle free.

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 14:51

africanos23 said:
Got banned for 2 days for that lame video, anyways I'm back.

Im trigger happy today and thinking of grabbing those custom GTX980s before I send my GTX970s back, but some rumours are brewing of the R9-380X releasing by the end of this month and being 40% faster.

Is there any ETA Gibbo or are we still looking at Q2-Q3 ?

We are being told June, but nothing is ever concrete.

Squink · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:22

africanos23 said:
Is there any ETA Gibbo or are we still looking at Q2-Q3 ?

Gibbo was adamant that it would be april (I think it was) at the earliest. Information he'd gained direct from AMD. I don't know enough about the GPU production cycle but it strikes me that AMD would want their new cards out asap and they wouldn't be able to magically bring the date forward a couple of months, as much as they and we might like them to.

EDIT - June it was, then

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:25

mulpsmebeauty said:
Gibbo was adamant that it would be april (I think it was) at the earliest. Information he'd gained direct from AMD. I don't know enough about the GPU production cycle but it strikes me that AMD would want their new cards out asap and they wouldn't be able to magically bring the date forward a couple of months, as much as they and we might like them to.

EDIT - June it was, then

June is what I am hearing, but AMD could launch in March or September, a product launch is whenever they decide it to be, right now board partners have a good idea which is June, but final decision is AMD's and they've not yet decided so could be earlier or later. June makes sense as that means they would tie in the launch with Computex and show case it at the same time.

Squink · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:29

Gibbo said:
June makes sense as that means they would tie in the launch with Computex and show case it at the same time.

Would they sit on an old card lineup for an extra 4 or 5 months when they are getting a battering from their main rival? Doesn't make a lot of sense unless they've got a couple of hundred thousand unsold 290s in a warehouse.

Kaapstad · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:32

Gibbo said:
June is what I am hearing, but AMD could launch in March or September, a product launch is whenever they decide it to be, right now board partners have a good idea which is June, but final decision is AMD's and they've not yet decided so could be earlier or later. June makes sense as that means they would tie in the launch with Computex and show case it at the same time.

How are 290X sales at the moment as this could be a factor in when AMD decide to launch their next cards.

I suspect at the moment 290X sales have increased quite a bit lately.

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:34

mulpsmebeauty said:
Would they sit on an old card lineup for an extra 4 or 5 months when they are getting a battering from their main rival? Doesn't make a lot of sense unless they've got a couple of hundred thousand unsold 290s in a warehouse.

Yes, old inventory needs to be cleared before new comes out. AMD cannot reduce 290 any more, its already at bottom price so they just need to wait until inventories are cleared through which they will as stock is selling reasonably well.

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:35

Kaapstad said:
How are 290X sales at the moment as this could be a factor in when AMD decide to launch their next cards.

I suspect at the moment 290X sales have increased quite a bit lately.

290 in general is doing rather well, 295 X2 doing well too.

Kaapstad · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:43

Gibbo said:
290 in general is doing rather well, 295 X2 doing well too.

I think at the moment NVidia are making a terrible marketing mistake.

If they were to launch the Maxwell Titan now, they would have an unbeatable card for which they could charge a lot and sell loads.

If they wait until summer the card will likely be up against AMDs next gen card with very little in performance to split them.

Harlequin · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:45

seems other than `jungle` and ocuk , ther est are not honouring returns - the company similar to ran for example (but they reject RMA`s when the manufacturer accepts them - trading standards should go have a look at the way they run things)

africanos23 · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:48

Harlequin said:
seems other than `jungle` and ocuk , ther est are not honouring returns - the company similar to ran for example (but they reject RMA`s when the manufacturer accepts them - trading standards should go have a look at the way they run things)

As long as we have Lord GibboN (had to rhyme with Lord GabeN

) I'm a very happy customer here at OCUK (I'm from Cyprus btw) , I could care less about price shopping and other retailers. They are the ones that are going to lose more customers if not accepting returns.

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:56

Kaapstad said:
I think at the moment NVidia are making a terrible marketing mistake.

If they were to launch the Maxwell Titan now, they would have an unbeatable card for which they could charge a lot and sell loads.

If they wait until summer the card will likely be up against AMDs next gen card with very little in performance to split them.

In fairness a Titan II won't effect 290X 8GB sales, one is £300, the other is £1000...............

jwilliamson47 · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:57

Gibbo said:
In fairness a Titan II won't effect 290X 8GB sales, one is £300, the other is £1000...............

Plus even if the 380x came out next week, (no chance).. I can pretty much guarantee they will be 4GB cards.

Gibbo · 3 Feb 2015 at 15:58

jwilliamson47 said:
Plus even if the 380x came out next week, (no chance).. I can pretty much guarantee they will be 4GB cards.

If AMD were smart, they would release 4GB and 8GB varients, not everyone wants to the pay the extra an 8GB card is as for many 4GB is ample for 1440P and below.

provost · 3 Feb 2015 at 16:01

Gibbo said:
In fairness a Titan II won't effect 290X 8GB sales, one is £300, the other is £1000...............

Any idea what the price point for AMD's cards may be? I know you are just providing a best educated guess, nothing cast in stone.

jwilliamson47 · 3 Feb 2015 at 16:02

Gibbo said:
If AMD were smart, they would release 4GB and 8GB varients, not everyone wants to the pay the extra an 8GB card is as for many 4GB is ample for 1440P and below.

Agreed. The 8GB framebuffer will have a price premium for sometime. A lot of enthusiasts can forget how many people are still running 1080p screens

They will probably release the card with 4GB, and then let board partners do 8GB aftermarket ones later on.