Petitioning for 970 Refund

Igroock said:
Yes thats clear now. Personally I would have simply given those people a suspension and combined all threads on this issue.
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I won't mention names, but every single one the main idiots has been suspended numerous times (across numerous websites too). They always come back at right around the same time (new video card from either Nvidia or AMD) and do the same shit. Thread crap.
 
someone needs to make one of those Hitler reaction videos for the 970 VRAM issue :D

I'm going to keep my Gigabyte 970 G1 Gaming card...for my current 1920 x 1200 single monitor needs it performs amazing, is cool and quiet and looks great as well...when games start utilizing more then 3.5GB of VRAM most likely a new card would be necessary anyway...the extra 512MB wouldn't have made any difference
 
polonyc2 said:
someone needs to make one of those Hitler reaction videos for the 970 VRAM issue :D

I'm going to keep my Gigabyte 970 G1 Gaming card...for my current 1920 x 1200 single monitor needs it performs amazing, is cool and quiet and looks great as well...when games start utilizing more then 3.5GB of VRAM most likely a new card would be necessary anyway...the extra 512MB wouldn't have made any difference
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The explanation

http://youtu.be/spZJrsssPA0
 
polonyc2 said:
lol
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Tgrove said:
The explanation

http://youtu.be/spZJrsssPA0
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I honestly can't decide which of the two I like better. I mean the first one is really just a guy laughing hysterically for like 90% of the video, and it's only funny because the guy who wrote the subtitles was absolute genius. On the other hand those Hitler reaction videos are so cliche now, but yet I still found this one funny.
 
polonyc2 said:
I'm going to keep my Gigabyte 970 G1 Gaming card...for my current 1920 x 1200 single monitor needs it performs amazing, is cool and quiet and looks great as well...when games start utilizing more then 3.5GB of VRAM most likely a new card would be necessary anyway...the extra 512MB wouldn't have made any difference
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You're out of luck, as that time has already come and at 1080p even. This year will probably be full of games being affected by this issue. Some of them will be "fixable" by restricting them to 3.5 GB, but then we're back to false advertising.
 
Brent_Justice said:
Continuing Kyle's thought the GeForce GTX 960 is a good example where perceived performance via specifications is deceiving. You look at the 128-bit memory bus and think "slow" or "constraining." However, our gaming performance tests reveal it is not constraining or slow and even does well at high resolutions compared to a video card with a wider memory bus. This is due to the architecture differences.

Therefore, perceived performance via specifications and theoretical benchmarks are deceiving and do not tell you the real-world performance while gaming. This is why we perform real-world gaming evaluation from actually playing the games and sharing our experiences with you. In this way, you know what gameplay performance to expect when making buying decisions.
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This was one of those cases where perceived performance hadn't caught up with the issue yet. New games and use cases with older ones have put the issue to light.

Then we are back to specifications. Of course they matter too. The amount of RAM the card has will be an important factor in future proofing your buying decision, even if it performs great in today's perceived performance testing. Had 970 buyers known it had gimped memory controller compared to the 980, maybe they would have stepped up for their SLI buying decision or have gone for the competitor's product, anticipating future games' memory requirements.

970 is a great 196 GB/s 3.5 GB card. Many would have still bought it anyway. But there is a big difference in knowing it in advance and finding it out months later. Then there is the issue that the specific memory configuration actually hinders your perceived performance. It is not only that the card is trying to act like a 3.5 GB one instead of a 4 GB one, it is that your frametimes tank once it gives up and allows the use of the full RAM.

That is why specifications DO MATTER. Had you known about the specifics of the 970 memory controller, you would have tested it for anticipated problems. You did not do that in your reviews because you had no reason to. If you had the proper specifications listed, we wouldn't be talking about this scandal now that resulted from a growing number of people having issues in real gaming.


Or consider this. You know where you guys have been with the whole CF vs SLI stuttering and perceived performance vs canned benchmarks. Imagine if you had found out that for all that time it was because AMD was lying to you about memory and GPU specifications and those were the reason CF suffers from those problems. You find out they've been lying to you and the customers and their cards having X and Y, while all the time having problem causing A and B. You call them out on it and they, along many major publications, tell you that there is nothing wrong and their cards were designed to work like just like that and show you FPS numbers how well they are doing compared to the SLI competition. "It is just as fast as it has always been! Nothing to see here, move along..." We all know what your thoughts would be in that situation.
 
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dmonkey said:
Thanks. This is exactly how I feel about this shit. People actually want refunds so they can pay $200 more for 980's LMFAO.
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Not me. I'm gone. NVIDIA is going to have to earn my trust back. I'm on Team Red now. My 290x Lightnings arrive tomorrow. AMD smartly lowered prices and with plans to go 4k later this year, these should perform even better than the former 970s I sold. Additionally, being Lightnings they should hold their value better if I get the opportunity to upgrade to 390x in Q3-4.
 
Starrbuck said:
Not me. I'm gone. NVIDIA is going to have to earn my trust back. I'm on Team Red now. My 290x Lightnings arrive tomorrow. AMD smartly lowered prices and with plans to go 4k later this year, these should perform even better than the former 970s I sold. Additionally, being Lightnings they should hold their value better if I get the opportunity to upgrade to 390x in Q3-4.
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I sold one of my 970's. I am debating on holding on to my lst 970 it until 380x comes out. It's still a great card performance wise. It's just being lied too and mislead that is really bothering me.

Grats on the 290x lightnings!!!! Buy an H55 and G10 bracket and overclock the beast. It will fit that lightning like a glove!
 
Meeho said:
Could you give us a hint if you are looking into possible 970's memory handling issues?
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We have nothing to look into. I am not sure you are clear on this, but we have already looked at limitations of the 970 using actual gaming.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 SLI 4K and NV Surround Review

We take 2-Way NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 SLI for a spin and compare it to R9 290X CF, R9 290 CF, GTX 780 SLI at 4K resolution as well as NV Surround on a triple-display setup. If you want to see how all these video cards compare in these different display configurations we've got just the thing. Find out what $700 SLI gets you.
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Bladestar said:
So, you are saying that the hardware makers (Nvidia & AMD) both say you must publish the specs they give you "as is" ?
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No.
 
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DASHlT said:
I sold one of my 970's. I am debating on holding on to my lst 970 it until 380x comes out. It's still a great card performance wise. It's just being lied too and mislead that is really bothering me.
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Same for me. And their offers of help are all but meaningless. My 970s did ok at 1440p but I did see the problem on certain games cranked up, and I certainly saw it when I had the 4k monitor, but I didn't realize what it was at the time.

The lies and deceptions, along with the poor handling of the situation, has driven me away.

DASHlT said:
Grats on the 290x lightnings!!!! Buy an H55 and G10 bracket and overclock the beast. It will fit that lightning like a glove!
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You know it! I'll look into getting those. Lightning 290x cards are $329 at Amazon right now, btw.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IZNE2ZS/
 
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DASHlT said:
I guess some people see you guys as a leader, and just expect some kind of response from you or Brent.
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But the fact is that we were NOT the leader on this story, Scott was, and good for him.

From a video card reviewer stand point, we see this as a non-issue due to the way we review. And quite frankly, that is why we review the way we do. The printed specs mean little to us. Brent and I have discussed this situation at length. This is a public relations story. My thoughts on that are already typed above. I have learned to stay well away from those and focus on hardware performance.

We are absolutely leaders in hardware evaluation. I will let the other guys be leaders in PR stories. And I have no issues with our readers being pissed about this issue and voicing their thoughts here in an adult manner. If you feel as if NVIDIA owes you retribution on this, I highly suggest you vote with your wallet, I know I would.
 
DASHlT said:
Well I for one think of this website as a leader in hardware reviewing because hell you guys actually play the games and report to us.
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How has playing the games changed in the last 4 months? The 970 still plays games the same today (maybe even better with new drivers) as it did in everyone's initial reviews.


I can see some people who want this to be a major story are getting frustrated that it's really not.
 
I've been a 80% team Green since leaving the Voodoo line once the GeForce came out.

I'm even one of those crazy Titan owners as loved the idea of a single card at the time running my 2560x1600 well. Going on almost two years with it , and the itch of wanting a new build and 4k is the only reason I'm looking at building a new rig the next few months.

I was almost 100% going Nvidia (mainly because of the heat put out by Ati cards , my last ATI/AMD card was very noticeable in the room during the summer especially) , but this 970 bit has me considering holding out to see what the next Ati offering is and weighing my options. I was ready to go 980 sli certainly.

But it's zero to do with the technical specs of the whole 970 fiasco as I wasn't even going to go that route. It's purely on how Nvidia is handling it.

I'm a 40+ sys engineer that has worked with multiple corporations on both the client and vendor side and fully expect corporations to play cover their ass and don't even have an issue with Nvidia dragging their feet when the story initially hit. It's the way corporations are.

But how they are handling and treating their customers (and vendors) is what has me thinking of voting with my wallet in the future against Nvidia. I know my little purchases aren't going to make or break Nvidia , but from them offering to directly help with refunds to editing that out , tweets that are insulting to a knowledgeable customer base , and even how to me they are leaving their vendors waving in the wind , it's a company I just am not sure I want to support.

If they had come out after the cat was truly out of the bag , said sorry , we did screw up , give us a week to come up with a couple options as we stand behind our product being great still, but want you all to be happy also , it would've been x1000 better.

Something like offering a % off some sort of step up program where Nvidia works with the vendors for those who want to go to a 980 even at a reduced price, just something. The long run PR gains I think would have reaped them financial rewards even long term.

Now though , I'm looking at figuring out some way to pump the heat out of the room from Crossfire AMD offerings for my next build.

Just really seems like Nvidia is really a bit too arrogant at their position in the market and I'd rather not support such a company.
 
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PRIME1 said:
How has playing the games changed in the last 4 months? The 970 still plays games the same today (maybe even better with new drivers) as it did in everyone's initial reviews.

I can see some people who want this to be a major story are getting frustrated that it's really not.
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http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1041396505&postcount=89

Explains the problems I had with DSR and other games.



It really is. Anything after 3.5gb causes horrible frame time issues using FCAT, Nvidia's own program is showing the issue.

Sometimes I blamed SLI and Drivers as the issue I had with stuttering. I now know it was more then just drivers.

Again using this: http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1041396505&postcount=89 Proves what I was seeing as well.
 
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Look, it was the numbers from reviews of the 970 and 980 such as [H] that elected to go with the more expensive 980 rather than the cheaper 970. Go ahead and laugh, but if everything that [H] threw at the 980 card (including very recent stuff) and the card barely went below 60fps at 1080p, then I'm happy. Did I overspend? Probably. Will I have the card for a few years? Definitely.
 
Kyle nailed it. At the end of the day, all that matters is the real world performance, not the spec sheet. I am a 970 owner myself, and I made my purchase decision after reading [H] review, and I have no regrets because I made my decision after seeing the reviewed performance which proved that the card caters to my needs.

Those factors remained the same, the performance remains the same, and nothing's change despite the spec turning out to be different. I am not sitting here thinking damn, there's actually lesser ROP in the chip, I better get a refund. Nope, because I did not purchase the card due to it's number of ROP.

Anyway that's just my 2 cents.
 
Hornet said:
Kyle nailed it. At the end of the day, all that matters is the real world performance, not the spec sheet. I am a 970 owner myself, and I made my purchase decision after reading [H] review, and I have no regrets because I made my decision after seeing the reviewed performance which proved that the card caters to my needs.

Those factors remained the same, the performance remains the same, and nothing's change despite the spec turning out to be different. I am not sitting here thinking damn, there's actually lesser ROP in the chip, I better get a refund. Nope, because I did not purchase the card due to it's number of ROP.

Anyway that's just my 2 cents.
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You could have at least addressed multiple counter arguments and examples. People aren't upset just because a number on a paper is different, they are upset because their game experience is suffering and they've just found out why.
 
DASHlT said:
I guess some people see you guys as a leader, and just expect some kind of response from you or Brent
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I just think a bunch of people on this site rely on Kyle/Brent's opinion instead of using their own brain...look at the Rage (id Software game) release...once Kyle said it sucked a whole bunch of people jumped on the hate bandwagon...all the technical/performance facts are now out on the 'new' 970...nothing has really changed performance wise for the under 4k crowd...I don't like that Nvidia lied about the specs but I prefer that over lying about the performance...I was thinking about a refund from Amazon but decided that it would only be hurting my current gaming performance (going back to a GTX 580) and is not worth it
 
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Meeho said:
You could have at least addressed multiple counter arguments and examples. People aren't upset just because a number on a paper is different, they are upset because their game experience is suffering and they've just found out why.
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I understand that, but we've already saw those limitations in high res benchmarks including this site's review. You're right, now we know why those limitations were there, but IMO that doesn't really change anything as our purchase decisions were based on real world performance.

Not saying people shouldn't be disappointed of course. But perhaps this could be a lesson for us to stop paying attention to the specs, or figures like 8GB vs 4GB and all these debates we've seen in the past. This has shown us that having impressive spec doesn't mean anything. Today it could be lack of ROP, tomorrow it could be something else

What matters at the end of the day, is it's real world performance.
 
polonyc2 said:
I just think a bunch of people on this site rely on Kyle/Brent's opinion instead of using their own brain...look at the Rage (id Software game) release...once Kyle said it sucked a whole bunch of people jumped on the hate bandwagon...all the technical/performance facts are now out on the 'new' 970...nothing has really changed performance wise for the under 4k crowd...I don't like that Nvidia lied about the specs but I prefer that over lying about the performance...I was thinking about a refund from Amazon but decided that it would only be hurting my current gaming performance (going back to a GTX 580) and is not worth it
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Fuckin' Kyle and his Jedi mind tricks. That fucker used the force on me and made me hate Rage. I wish Obi Wan was here to kick his ass.
 
polonyc2 said:
all the technical/performance facts are now out on the 'new' 970...nothing has really changed performance wise for the under 4k crowd...
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Based on multiple people's reports and testing, that is not true.




Hornet said:
I understand that, but we've already saw those limitations in high res benchmarks including this site's review. You're right, now we know why those limitations were there, but IMO that doesn't really change anything as our purchase decisions were based on real world performance.
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Yes, but had they known from the beginning about the true specs and resulting possible issues, they could have changed their buying decision. The problem is that games are coming out today, or mods for older games, that are making it a real world performance issue that was not seen when the cards were reviewed.

Not saying people shouldn't be disappointed of course. But perhaps this could be a lesson for us to stop paying attention to the specs, or figures like 8GB vs 4GB and all these debates we've seen in the past. This has shown us that having impressive spec doesn't mean anything. Today it could be lack of ROP, tomorrow it could be something else

What matters at the end of the day, is it's real world performance.
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If anything, the lesson is that disclosing true specs matters a lot. Take the GTX 960 for example. It is a relatively narrow bus 2 GB card. It performs well in real world tests and everyone's happy. But, we all know it is a relatively narrow bus 2 GB card and that it is possible it will be limited in upcoming games, or current mods(!), that require large amounts of RAM for e.g. texture data. When we see performance issues resulting from that, no one will be surprised or feel cheated. The card's performance was known and its specs and resulting potential limitations as well.

Now, imagine if it was advertised as a higher bus, more RAM card. You look at the specs, you look at real world performance, check out the competition and higher end cards, and decide that this is definitely the card for you. Future proof enough for your needs. Some time passes and suddenly you experience stuttering and performance issues while playing your new games and modded old ones, and have no clue what is going on. Then, you find out it is actually a lesser specced card and those differences are causing your problems. You would feel cheated and angry, because had you gone for a competitors product or to the next model up, or had the card that was advertised and you thought you bought, you would be playing them just fine as you had expected. Yet, the fact still remains that it is still that same card with that same excellent real world performance that you've read about in HardOCP's review and on all the other sites you've checked. It is very much true that that hasn't changed. But...
 
DSR and/or texture mods can go over 3.5GB at 1080P so if people can stop posting the "performance didn't change for 1080p" nonsense posts that'd be great.

Really a bigger factor for me is nVidia's absolutely terrible handling of the situation. Lies on top of lies. I have dignity, hell even at work I'll forgo millions in savings if I cannot trust the supplier. If we learn a supplier is out of spec we don't pay them, return the product, make them replace it on their dime, and do a supplier quality audit to ensure it never happens again. To me I look at the whole picture and it's hard to imagine the gimped VRAM wasn't known through design reviews through multiple levels of management. It's hard to imagine how this wasn't a deliberate and unethical decision for over a year.

I would bet a large percentage of the folks would of went 290x if they knew this was a 3.5GB card.

Also it would of been nice if review sites spotted this off the bat but I think expecting a review site to find a fault in the last 12.5% of the VRAM AND somehow come to the conclusion that "oh nVidia lied about the last 1/8th of the VRAM bandwidth and most of the other card's specs" is a bit ambitious. I put a lot of confidence in [H] reviews and I've only witnessed high integrity. I was a little bothered about some of these conspiracy posts.
 
Public relations snafus don't result in mass returns in the EU. The actual specs don't match what was sold. Period. This is the biggest consumer-protection issue in computing so far this year.

Also, what's clear is the EU takes care of customers while the US doesn't give a shit. So we have GPU manufacturers allowing returns in the EU but not here. What else is new? If that's not worthy of a story on my favorite hardware site, then I guess I don't know what is.

Most people will decide to keep their cards, but the option for a return should be there. This site should be helping to apply the pressure as it has on a number of consumer-protection issues since I've been here.
 
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Dayaks said:
I would bet a large percentage of the folks would of went 290x if they knew this was a 3.5GB card
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totally disagree...people would have still gotten the 970 even if advettised as a 3.5GB card or at worst they would have just waited for the next-gen cards from them

at the very least I'm hoping Nvidia gives customers a free game of their choice...I'll take Evolve for free :D
 
Dayaks said:
I would bet a large percentage of the folks would of went 290x if they knew this was a 3.5GB card.
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No, because the benchmarks haven't changed. The performance, features and efficiency of the 970 vs the 290x have not changed. There is a reason AMD is dropping the price of the 290x to near $200. No one is buying it, because there are better products on the market.

Buy a video card based on playing games, not based on made up drama.
 
Then I suggest you start a website and fire up the keyboard. Certainly you are welcome to your own opinion. :) I have been clear on my opinion here.
 
PRIME1 said:
No, because the benchmarks haven't changed. The performance, features and efficiency of the 970 vs the 290x have not changed. There is a reason AMD is dropping the price of the 290x to near $200. No one is buying it, because there are better products on the market.

Buy a video card based on playing games, not based on made up drama.
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Actually the benchmarks have changed. There are many out now that show it stutters severely past 3.5GB with frame time data. Most review sites didn't look for this situation because it's not something they foresaw nVidia doing. Look at GoldenTiger's posts. FPS looks playable but frametimes show the real picture.
 
§kynet;1041397668 said:
I respectfully and strongly disagree. People have clearly shown that when pushing memory usage to 4GB the 970 has a serious problem, at this point there is no disputing this. So at the very least you guys could test using the same scenario and find out either way if it's valid. Quite a few other review sites have tested the card and found the same issue, this is valuable, even vital info for potential buyers.

Two things. One, it is possible to bring out the stutter in current games. Two, going forward it is a no brainer to predict that games are going to consume more and more memory/resources.

This is NOT just a PR problem it is an actual hardware problem. Not only did Nvidia supply the wrong specs, because of the nature of how the hardware turned out to be, it introduces a significant limitation that people did not know about! How this can be glossed over, or how this can be considered a non issue escapes me.

Sigh, this is not only a PR story.
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I agree with you on every point and do not own a 970, I seem to remember the amd fcat with crossfire getting covered very well round thee parts. To me at least this is an fcat above 3.5 issue with a pr horror story on the side. I wish Brent would do some fcat testing for the people affected but sounds like the snowball in hell anlogy applies here.
 
spaceace420 said:
I agree with you on every point and do not own a 970, I seem to remember the amd fcat with crossfire getting covered very well round thee parts. To me at least this is an fcat above 3.5 issue with a pr horror story on the side. I wish Brent would do some fcat testing for the people affected but sounds like the snowball in hell anlogy applies here.
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So basically you want H to go out of their way to regurgitate information already available on other sites? Just to prove that if a game uses more than 3.5 but less than 4GB of VRAM, the performance is bad, when in fact that has already been established for some games?
 
PRIME1 said:
No, because the benchmarks haven't changed. The performance, features and efficiency of the 970 vs the 290x have not changed.
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It is well known you are a blind supporter of Nvidia and anything said, no matter how much backed up with proof and arguments, will be lost on you, but at least address raised counter arguments to this statement you are blindly repeating over and over, no matter how much the discussion on this topic progresses and moves past it. Otherwise it is just trolling.



ocellaris said:
So basically you want H to go out of their way to regurgitate information already available on other sites? Just to prove that if a game uses more than 3.5 but less than 4GB of VRAM, the performance is bad, when in fact that has already been established for some games?
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For better or worse, people value some sources more than others. Proper investigation of this issue by HardOCP would go a long way towards giving it more weight and helping the consumers and the industry going forward, or even dismissing it as a real problem. But, given their stance on the subject, maybe it is better that they don't do it, anyway.
 
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