Gamer Alert: Serious Nvidia Flaw Plagues Graphics Driver

[Derangel]

Here's the thing, if there were massive failures, we'd see nVidia talk about taking a financial hit due to increased RMA costs which never surfaced. If they claim it was test escapes then that may be it and if it was, then that is certainly their fault but at least there was RMA as an option.

Companies can hide that stuff in their finances if they need to. However, since these expensive products are not their super high margin and high sales volume products (not to mention limited launch supply in general) even if the failure rate was an astronomical 10% given the low volume (comparatively) it wouldn't be THAT big of a mark on their finances. Of course if it was that high they'd have other things to worry about. Still, with multiple people getting 2+ bad cards during the RMA process I bet on the failure rate being notably higher than normal.

 

[5150Joker]

Companies can hide that stuff in their finances if they need to. However, since these expensive products are not their super high margin and high sales volume products (not to mention limited launch supply in general) even if the failure rate was an astronomical 10% given the low volume (comparatively) it wouldn't be THAT big of a mark on their finances. Of course if it was that high they'd have other things to worry about. Still, with multiple people getting 2+ bad cards during the RMA process I bet on the failure rate being notably higher than normal.

A higher than average defect rate would likely be reflected in their finances as they can't hide stuff from their stockholders, that would be a crime. Who knows how many 2070/2080/2080 Ti cards they sold during that period? It could well be in the 100s of thousands sold and I doubt very much they had an insane defect rate.

 

[honegod]

if the first 1500 cards produced had a 80% SI rate they could have sold them all, and resold them when they were returned.
how many virtual cards could be created to inhabit shipping time.
of course real cards to fill in as produced were needed, but the new cards didn't have to function to work to expand the virtual space.
virtual cards but real money.
hopefully used to fix the difficulty.
I assume that everybody who paid eventually got a functional one ?

 

[GoldenTiger]

I assume that everybody who paid eventually got a functional one ?

Yes.

 

[cybereality]

I was one that had to RMA a 2080 Ti due to crashing.

The process was mostly pleasant. Nvidia advanced shipped and paid for shipping both ways. I was only down a few days (well, I have a backup rig, so it was okay).

No, not the end of the world. But, I spent about 2 weeks troubleshooting because I wasn't sure if the card was actually broken, and this was the worst PC building experience I've ever had.

Can't even list all the things I tried, including buying a new PSU and rebuilding part of the rig. It was a huge hassle, but, again, you deal with what you are dealt.

 

[reaper12]

A higher than average defect rate would likely be reflected in their finances as they can't hide stuff from their stockholders, that would be a crime. Who knows how many 2070/2080/2080 Ti cards they sold during that period? It could well be in the 100s of thousands sold and I doubt very much they had an insane defect rate.

There definitely was a higher than average RMA rate. That was confirmed here by Kyle, at around 20%. As long as Nvidia managed to repair most of them and send them back out then there wouldn't be much of a hit at all in their finances. Also the majority of the problems seemed to affect the 2080Ti cards, which wouldn't be sold in the same volumes as their mainstream cards. If there was a 20% return rate on the 1060, for example, that would have impacted on their finances.

 

[Armenius]

There definitely was a higher than average RMA rate. That was confirmed here by Kyle, at around 20%. As long as Nvidia managed to repair most of them and send them back out then there wouldn't be much of a hit at all in their finances. Also the majority of the problems seemed to affect the 2080Ti cards, which wouldn't be sold in the same volumes as their mainstream cards. If there was a 20% return rate on the 1060, for example, that would have impacted on their finances.

If I remember correctly Kyle got his information from one AIB, which is not representative of the plurality of cards sold. You can't say with certainty that it was higher than average across the board without getting the number directly from the horse's mouth.