Worst Graphics Card Ever? GT 1030 DDR4 Benchmarked

I do remember those, and actually traded an older ATI 7000 for a 9200SE - maybe gained 3fps in most games back then, haha.
Don't miss that one at all!
There was also a bastardized 9600, I don’t remember what it was as we didn’t carry it. Man back then you HAD to be in the know or you’d get screwed over bad.
 
Ok I hate Nv as much as the next geek....

Still at first glance I did ask myself, "Self is it not Galax that makes this card. It seems to me the issue here is a Chinese OEM that has chosen to put crap ram on a card."

Then I thought, "no no self this is a company that has the balls to swing its GPP dick around with OEMS... they could write contracts requiring OEMS use min quality RAM and any other non-nv part." (not to mention the chip obviously supports ddr4. lol)

NV seems quite capable of confusing their own brands. Perhaps they need a new GPP 2.0 program to protect their own brands from their own brands.

EDIT doing some looking around... ya shame on you NV, as you can find plenty of other OEMS selling this shit. lol
 
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They should have named it the GT 1004...

"Is your new GPU as slow as all the review sites made it out to be?"

"10-4, good buddy"
 
Do we not regularly chastise people for not looking at what they are buying? Not here, though. The box specifies it uses SDDR4 instead of GDDR5. It is literally listed in the specs and on the box. They aren't hiding it..
Newsflash: most people don't know what SDDR4 means and they don't know if it's better or worse than GDDR5, particularly the average person buying a budget card who may be getting into PC gaming for the first time.

The name is the same, yet the performance is wildly different. This should be criminal. According to the video even the retailers didn't know the difference as their buyers are often not computer geeks. They were upset when they learned they were unknowingly ripping their customers off.

This is the same Nvidia that supposedly thinks consumers can't tell the difference between AMD and Nvidia branding despite their name being emblazoned on the box and one is red and the other is green.
 
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Oh god, according to that video they're selling the DDR4 version of the 1030 for only 10$ less? Holy crap. That is absolutely despicable. Just despicable. The normal consumer won't be able to tell because the price difference isn't major enough for anyone to get suspicious or look more closely. Like they'll just see a slightly lower priced 1030 on Amazon and go "oh I needed one anyway, not a bad deal". Nvidia gets to offload their leftover crap for much more than it's worth.

I think that might settle it. If I get a GPU upgrade any time soon, I might just sideline my RoG Swift (or switch it into ULMB mode permanently) and go completely to AMD. Nvidia has just really lost me lately. Forced login on Geforce experience to just use Shadowplay, Shadowplay constantly crashing anyway, crappy business practices. This is just no good. I shouldn't be supporting this kind of company.
 
I don't have a problem with low end adapters that serve basically the purpose of giving you two display outputs. I use them for certain things. What I see as a problem is that they continue to change cards and use the same name? Why do this? Just give it a different name, like the GT1020 or something.
 
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I don't have a problem with low end adapters that server basically the purpose of giving you two display outputs. I use them for certain things. What I see as a problem is that they continue to change cards and use the same name? Why do this? Just give it a different name, like the GT1020 or something.

Good point. NV started on the other end of the extreme with they separated the Titan from the consumer line but seemed to have no qualms about including this in their 'gaming' line. You're point about using it for additional display outputs makes perfect sense. That's truly where the strengths are for this. If NV had stayed committed to that logic no one would've complained about taking a display adapter and saying it didn't perform as gaming cards.

To paraphrase Robin Williams regarding something else, 'It's like partial circumcision, once you start you really have to commit'.
 
they should really be forced to give anything with different hardware a different model number
 
Oh god, according to that video they're selling the DDR4 version of the 1030 for only 10$ less? Holy crap. That is absolutely despicable. Just despicable. The normal consumer won't be able to tell because the price difference isn't major enough for anyone to get suspicious or look more closely. Like they'll just see a slightly lower priced 1030 on Amazon and go "oh I needed one anyway, not a bad deal". Nvidia gets to offload their leftover crap for much more than it's worth.

I think that might settle it. If I get a GPU upgrade any time soon, I might just sideline my RoG Swift (or switch it into ULMB mode permanently) and go completely to AMD. Nvidia has just really lost me lately. Forced login on Geforce experience to just use Shadowplay, Shadowplay constantly crashing anyway, crappy business practices. This is just no good. I shouldn't be supporting this kind of company.


they're bringing back the old days of gpu's where you could be X card with 256mb of ram, pay 10 dollars more get the same card with 512mb of ram or pay 10 more and get it with 1GB of ram.. obviously the 1GB card is the worst one to buy 99% of the time but the average consumer didn't know that.. now it's just in reverse, lol.
 
I don't get it. Nvidia CAN make great products when they choose to, yet they keep shooting themselves in the foot with dishonest business practices every few months. :bored:

Why can't they just run an HONEST business and still continue to make money? Come on Nvidia....you're better than this.

The only possible reason outside of pure scumbag behaviour that I can come up with is yield problems?
 
Its really as simple as knowing GTX good, GT bad. There's been a GT930, GT 730, and GT630, that I know of, and probably plenty more, and they've all been garbage for gaming.

That said, I have a fanless GT630 in my HTPC and have had no problems with it, for what it does.

I mostly agree. Took me a little time back in the day(GT250 or some such) to learn the differences. I was really confused coming from my 9800GT into the new naming schemes and at the time not really reading much online but I do remember holding 2 boxes side by side at the local BB store and even the specs listed didn't match up in language. Wasn't until a few years later when I got my GTX560TI's I started to get a clue.

I did take a chance on a BB exclusive for the last card for my core2quad system. It was an factory OC'd Gigabyte GT640 that could be powered off the PCIe bus rather than a dedicated cable. Paid around $70-80 I think. Cool card for the time. Solid for 720p gaming and not bad at 1080p. On that note, I'd say not all GT's were bad for gaming.
 
The only purpose for stuff like this is to increase margins.

You know, I'm not so sure. Hasn't the bottom been falling out of their market from the currency miners? Maybe they bet big and made a lot of 1030s, then none of them were moving. Now, to sell them all (instead of dump them in a landfill), they need to build cards - but there isn't enough GDDR5 available before the price point saturates. So, they make a slightly lower price point and use DDR4. It does seem like somewhat predatory branding, but would this setup work at all without the blurred lines?
 
There is no question that this is entirely deliberately misleading.

But car companies do the exact same thing when you think about it...
 
But car companies do the exact same thing when you think about it...

How? You know a V6 mustang is not a V8 mustang, but nvidia is counting on the fact that you don't know the difference between DDR4 and GDDR5
 
they're bringing back the old days of gpu's where you could be X card with 256mb of ram, pay 10 dollars more get the same card with 512mb of ram or pay 10 more and get it with 1GB of ram.. obviously the 1GB card is the worst one to buy 99% of the time but the average consumer didn't know that.. now it's just in reverse, lol.

It's even worse. It's way worse. At least with 1GB of ram you're not losing anything. You just very probably have more ram than you need, outside of very special edge cases. In this case, you're getting downgraded to an absolute trash GPU with outdated crap tech that is frankly nothing but a scam. It's absurd. The way the entire thing is structured is literally a scam.
 
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How? You know a V6 mustang is not a V8 mustang, but nvidia is counting on the fact that you don't know the difference between DDR4 and GDDR5

So ignorance when it comes to video cards is a problem, but not when it comes to cars? And how do we "know a V6 mustang is not a V8 mustang"? Because you do? Poor reasoning.

If Ford started offering the GT package with a v6 tomorrow and you purchased one without reading the specs, you would be the idiot. I feel the same way here. The item has a spec sheet and you have to know what you are buying. Simple as that.
 
Nvidia has been steadily becoming more greedy over the years- they've got to solidify their business, perhaps? From a financial perspective it makes complete sense so long as it doesn't bite them in the ass too hard. From a computer enthusiast perspective, I hope they get bent, and face disruptive competition, because I'm tired of financially supporting Nvidia. I've already stopped buying anything published/developed by EA for years now.
 
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So ignorance when it comes to video cards is a problem, but not when it comes to cars? And how do we "know a V6 mustang is not a V8 mustang"? Because you do? Poor reasoning.

If Ford started offering the GT package with a v6 tomorrow and you purchased one without reading the specs, you would be the idiot. I feel the same way here. The item has a spec sheet and you have to know what you are buying. Simple as that.

The bigger issue is how car manufacturers can get away with lying on their "spec sheets" about fuel efficiency (and likely many other things too) and face minor blowback.
 
I have a 920 or 930 or something GT laying around as a backup card. Crappiest GPU I've ever run, it lags on Aero at 1080p ffs. I don't know how you could make a card that slow if you tried, I bet if I could get my X800XT going it would be faster >_>
 
Look at this one (https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814137318). There's no mention of DDR4 in the name of the item. The model is apparently 2GD4. Now look at the box...

14-137-318-V04.jpg
If I saw that on a shelf, short of reading all the text on the back I don't think I could tell that from a regular 1030. DDR4 isn't even on the front of the box or on the model number. Sure not deceptive at all... Its definitely the consumers fault if they buy this without reading all the tech specs on the back. If I didn't hear news that there was a DDR4 version, I think I might have been fooled by this awful box. It's one thing to have it labeled on the front or in the item number in which case you could argue people should know better. But hiding it on the back in small text? Hooray for NVIDA GPP and their commitment to "transparency" and avoiding confusing the consumer.
 
This card really looks like a "how do we use up this extra crap ram and quality control failures for performance we have at our contract manufacturer?"

Consumers are stuck on higher number in the name means better, and companies know that and manipulate it. I am thankful that I have enough history of playing in electronics and computers to know to research wonderful sites like [H] for performance reviews before buying hardware. I wish this type of process was more common in all areas of consumer goods because it would eventually force companies to stop manipulating because it wouldnt work so well.
 
The only possible reason outside of pure scumbag behaviour that I can come up with is yield problems?
Maybe something to do with the 300k returned chips.. this is how you clear out inventory.
'oh, same card for 10 bucks less!' Bought.
You probably are not going to notice a single digit change (DDR4>DDR5) when you're a noob flicking through amazon. I wouldn't be surprised if sellers 'accidentally' use the DDR5 sales text too.

This is like Lamborghini who have a Aventador which is exclusively V12, just like their past product lines (only one engine/the top mainstream model), then making one that's $1000 less and making it an IL6 (V12s are typically two IL6s in a V) but failing to mention that anywhere but the small print inside the model code.
Your average joe bloggs non-car guy who wants a fancy looking lambo, may not see that or read the specs.

95% of people don't read specs. This card is designed to gouge them and it's certainly not the first time Nvidia has done this, AMD has once or twice too but not as deviously as this.
 
100% this. This is a basement-entry-level card so it's going to sell to newer buyers on a shoestring budget, and this seems to purely be meant to deceive those who don't know better. It'd be like Totoya selling the Camry, but then putting out a new version in the middle of a model year that's had the engine replaced with a weed-whacker motor, and not indicating it's any different from the regular version unless you read through the owner's manual.

Its not just that, would PCWorld or whoever else sells the average consumer a 'Gaming PC' mention it only has GDDR4 on its pre-built PC specs? This card seems to me to be the kind of thing high street stores put in a PC more than something a consumer would buy themselves.
 
Yeah luckily in your special world, AMD has never rebranded , lied or mislead anyone....

They have.. but they have never used a same exact model number for two cards at massively different performance levels.

Now the OEMs have done this with AMD stuff.. but they do that with pretty much all hardware that they special order... like the RX580 cards that were really just renamed RX480 cards. Besides that, most hardware stuck in OEM systems generally just have lower default clocks than retail cards.
 
This is a shit thing to do and I can't believe anyone would defend nVidia
Not only does the average consumer not know anything about GDDR versions, but I can fucking guarantee you that the average PCWorld employee wouldn't have a fucking clue either and mis sell the card to customers
 
Hardware Unboxed has benchmarked what they are calling the "Scam" NVIDIA GT 1030. For those who don't know, NVIDIA quietly released a variant of the GT 1030 graphics card that has 2GB DDR4 memory instead of GDDR5, both off which have the same name. How bad is it? Check out the video to find out.

Spoiler: It's really... REALLY bad.

Yeah, it does suck hard but I wouldn't call it a scam as they do clearly identify specs on the box. I however find it disappointing that price is the same as GDDR5 version, usually for models with crappier VRAM you pay less like to casual workstation or HTPC setup. These cost apparently same as GDDR5 which is odd to say the least...
 
what are these? like super reject parts?

They aren't rejects, just different technologies with different strong points in their performance. The memories are designed for different things.

You don't see a lot of comparisons between DDR4 and GDDR5, and you can probably guess why when you see the performance numbers. Most of Nvidia's decision is likely based on cost, as bit-per-bit GDDR5 is 2x-3x the price of DDR4.

Costdowns are pretty common, but they usually are on the same technology, as that removes the need for a new controller. It is also not common to release a technology change with the same part number. That was a bonehead move.
 
Nvidia doing scumbag anti consumer moves, not shocked in the least. Justa s bad as AMD's cut down RX 560. This is why we need more GPU options than just AMD and Nvidia.
 
Nvidia is a horrible company, and if you defend this you're a horrible person.
 
What about if people just want a cheap HTPC card that has HDMI 2.0b (can do 60Hz @4K, etc) and hardware decoding of HEVC/H.265/x265? Does it really matter what kind of ram the card uses as long as it brings the price down? Anything less than a Sandy Bridge CPU will often struggle trying to software decode 4K HEVC/H.265/x265, so buying a card like this can extend the life of an older Core2 or first generation i5/i7 HTPC significantly.

I do feel that it would be better off sold as a GT 1020 or something like that instead.
 
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