Mining on GPU, exploit or part of intended use?

Is GPU for mining co sidered part of normal intended usage?

  • Yes, it is part of normal usage

    Votes: 48 71.6%

  • No, it is an exploit nd gpu is nt designed for it

    Votes: 12 17.9%

  • It is complicated nd cnt make up my mind

    Votes: 7 10.4%
  • Total voters
    67
Even though starting your car and holding max revs for days at a time is most likely not ideal for your car, somehow doing the equivalent to a computer isnt as bad :p

Remember when you couldnt even call an OC stable until it passed AT LEAST 24 hours straight of P95? This is like that, except everyone is just testing the factory clocks.
 
I'm not a miner, but I think it's a valid use. GPUs are used for all sorts of computations, not just muh gamez.

Smoblikat said:
Even though starting your car and holding max revs for days at a time is most likely not ideal for your car, somehow doing the equivalent to a computer isnt as bad :p

Remember when you couldnt even call an OC stable until it passed AT LEAST 24 hours straight of P95? This is like that, except everyone is just testing the factory clocks.
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It's a computer. It's designed to do math that you can't do with a pencil and paper. If it fails at that task, there is something wrong with it.
 
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I went with the 2nd option although I don't feel like the word "exploit" is really a perfect match for what is going on.

I would agree that it's not normal usage, and that GPUs were not designed for it. But those two things don't make it an "exploit". The history of computing is filled with cases where computers were used for things that they were not designed to do and that were not normal at the time.

So in that sense I don't feel like there is anything "wrong" with using a card to mine. On the flip side, if you burn up a card while using it to mine, you certainly have no grounds to claim that it died during "normal usage", that it was defective, or anything like that. I also feel that if a card has primarily been used to mine, that a seller SHOULD disclose that when selling.

edit: And for the love of god... at least try to spell the stuff in the poll correctly. Are you a double-amputee typing on your phone using your forehead?
 
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GPU is designed for graphics processing, mining is not graphics processing. So I'd say it's unintended usage. I'm not sure the word "exploit" applies, though.

They have plenty of compute cards that are not called GPUs that are made specifically for compute purposes.
 
MavericK said:
GPU is designed for graphics processing, mining is not graphics processing. So I'd say it's unintended usage. I'm not sure the word "exploit" applies, though.

They have plenty of compute cards that are not called GPUs that are made specifically for compute purposes.
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Why is there an option in NVidia Control Panel called "Optimize for Compute Performance?"
 
GotNoRice said:
I went with the 2nd option although I don't feel like the word "exploit" is really a perfect match for what is going on.
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hung up on a word choice. mining is exploiting the compute functions. they were not designed for it, it was found that you could mine, now everyone wants free money....
 
JSHamlet234 said:
Why is there an option in NVidia Control Panel called "Optimize for Compute Performance?"
Click to expand...

Just because it *can* be used for compute does not mean the card was intended for mining. Again, there are compute cards designed to do nothing but compute. For a GPU it's a bonus.

I'm not arguing that you can't mine or run compute on a GPU, that would be silly. But it's clear they were not designed nor intended for mining in the first place.
 
Unrelated usage. Graphics cards are made to processing graphics, When Nvidia & AMD start advertising mining on the box , then I'll accept it as intended use.
 
Its an unintended use of the GPU, exploit is an ok word but its really more of an unintended use than an actual exploit of the GPU.
 
MavericK said:
Just because it *can* be used for compute does not mean the card was intended for mining. Again, there are compute cards designed to do nothing but compute. For a GPU it's a bonus.

I'm not arguing that you can't mine or run compute on a GPU, that would be silly. But it's clear they were not designed nor intended for mining in the first place.
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Yep, NVidia had no idea their cards would be used for mining. I would be surprised if anyone at NVidia even knows what cryptocurrency is. They're probably baffled as to why they're making so much money this year.
 
JSHamlet234 said:
Yep, NVidia had no idea their cards would be used for mining. I would be surprised if anyone at NVidia even knows what cryptocurrency is. They're probably baffled as to why they're making so much money this year.
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Did you forget the /S?

Of course Nvidia knew their cards could mine, they probably figured that out before anyone. Jensen probably has a secret lair laden with leather jackets and GPU farms.
 
JSHamlet234 said:
Yep, NVidia had no idea their cards would be used for mining. I would be surprised if anyone at NVidia even knows what cryptocurrency is. They're probably baffled as to why they're making so much money this year.
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Always easy to spot a cryptobro, the thin skin is a dead give away.

For the record, I mine at home, usually to clear the part cost. I have nothing against mining but the idea that it was/is the intended use of a gpu is laughable. I'm surprised no one has released specific compute cards that render gpu mining obsolete.
 
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I would not call it intended usage, but it is far from an exploit. Most video cards were meant to be video cards and not compute cards. Using a video card as a mining card is most likely not intended, (miners would not need to flash cards if they were), but you can bet that both Nv and AMD knew that many of them would be used that way. Does it break EULA? I don't know.
 
Nobody gives a shit if you overclock your system memory or CPU, but if you OC your GPU memory for some reason people get boo boo faced.

Using a "GPU" for industrial compute work is ok as long as you buy a workstation card, but if you buy a gamer card that might be used for gaming and happen to do compute work on it the same boo boo faced people show up.

Nobody would care if cards were readily available, but I sense that this has more to do with gamers who didn't try hard enough in Q4'20 when cards weren't THAT hard to get if you played the game a little bit.

Plus, there is this stigma for no rational reason that running a card at a normalized temp and fan speed is somehow WORSE for the GPU than running it at varying speeds and temperatures (some extreme) as would happen while gaming. I would much rather buy a used mining card than a heavily used gaming card because the reality is that most mining cards are better cared for by people who are trying to maximize profits. And they do that by minimizing the temperatures and power draw.
 
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Normal intended usage would be gaming mostly. Some video encoding.

Mining I guess is compute and GPUs are and were being used for compute, but mining wasn't a purpose the designers had in mind I would think. So I vote no
 
Aireoth said:
what are you on about? OP's bad grammer and spelling aside, its just a question about intended use of GPUs.

This is why cryptobros are a bit of a joke, you are all so thin skinned. If your making that much money, why does it matter if people on the net are complaining?

At the end of the day if you own it it is yours to do what you like with. Was mining an intended use, no, does that make it illegal, no. Once you own it, you can cram it up your ass as Specter stated, its yours to do as you wish.
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I got into it in another thread just before this one and had a few drinks in the meantime 🥃 (y).
 
Good grief, Ray Tracing after the RT cores does BVH traversal and ray-triangle intersection testing is then COMPUTE operations. The GPU is designed for Compute, Video, Shaders, Audio. To lay a claim it is only or mostly designed for gaming when the exact same die is used in professional cards for those things does not add up. It was designed definitely for Compute because that is where games are at, AI and tons of other stuff. Mining is a Compute operation which works well with GPUs that have a lot of math capability and bandwidth.
 
kirbyrj said:
I got into it in another thread just before this one and had a few drinks in the meantime 🥃 (y).
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well someone got upset over my post, which kinda proves the point.

People making money should have thicker skin, its completely understandable why a segment that is the primary reason a product exists today is upset they cannot get said product for its original use. Doesn't mean either side is right or wrong, but understanding is in short supply these days. Its my side/your side world.
 
Have current generation gpus collectively spent more hours mining or gaming? I'll say mining. Therefore, the argument can be made that mining is actually the normal use for gpus.
 
Not an exploit. It's basically just a colossal waste of electricity, hardware with the added bonus of causing waste, chip shortages, and coal pollution.
 
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I hate mining. However, it's not an exploit nor is it in anyway non-intended use. Graphics cards haven't been designed solely for graphics only computing in years. Hell, graphics cards are designed with compute in mind first and graphics processing second and it's been that way for a while.

For some perspective I was running Folding@Home GPU work units on a GeForce 8800GT and that was around 13 years ago.

The idea that using GPUs for anything other than graphics processing is exploiting or unintended behavior is absurd.
 
I'm not a huge fan of mining (in instances without a cleaner power source like nuclear, solar, gas...) but I don't consider using GPUs for purposes other than gaming a problem.
I'm all for repurposing whatever is available for whatever the owner wants.
Things like artificial speed caps by neutering GPUs mining performance is wrong in my book.
Heck, I have a small apartment and if not for central heating/furnace I might consider GPU mining a way to heat up my room in winter. I should be able to do that.
 
I'm very confused how anyone can call it an "exploit"

that's like saying running any open source software is exploiting your hardware. What a wild and ridiculous thought.
 
It's definitely not part of "normal use", but at the same time, it's not an "exploit".

Disregarding any moral judgement on usage... I can buy a brand new F-150 Lightning and drive it at legal speeds and use it periodically to haul stuff. Or I can take it mudding, tweak the injection, and run it 24/7 every day of the week. It's my GPU: if I want to use it to shovel dirt in my yard, that's my prerogative. But If I was looking for a used F-150, I know which usage pattern to look out for.

We effectively need a "odometer" for GPUs and/or a better way to check "wear"
 
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Considering there's many other applications outside of gaming that utilize and are optimized for GPU usage (video encoding/transcoding functions in Premier, Plex, VLC, etc.) and other distributed computing applications similar to mining (F@H), mining is just another valid form of utilizing the GPU. To disagree with that and say that GPUs shouldn't be used for mining, is to say that you shouldn't use the GPU for any of those other applications outside of gaming, and that is incredibly wasteful and inefficient. Which is why I disagree with Nvidia's manufacturing of mining-only CMP cards, as those cards could be used for gaming in addition to those other computational functions, creating more e-waste and less availablity of GPUs on the market for gamers to use, esp. after a crypto crash when miners are offloading GPUs and gamers could be getting deals on them and using them for their "intended" purpose.
 
T4rd said:
Considering there's many other applications outside of gaming that utilize and are optimized for GPU usage (video encoding/transcoding functions in Premier, Plex, VLC, etc.) and other distributed computing applications similar to mining (F@H), mining is just another valid form of utilizing the GPU. To disagree with that and say that GPUs shouldn't be used for mining, is to say that you shouldn't use the GPU for any of those other applications outside of gaming, and that is incredibly wasteful and inefficient. Which is why I disagree with Nvidia's manufacturing of mining-only CMP cards, as those cards could be used for gaming in addition to those other computational functions, creating more e-waste and less availablity of GPUs on the market for gamers to use, esp. after a crypto crash when miners are offloading GPUs and gamers could be getting deals on them and using them for their "intended" purpose.
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Let's be realistic here. CMP cards have nothing to do with gamers. It's artificially segmenting product lines to make more money.
 
I don't think it's the intended usage, but I also don't think mining itself is technically an exploit. Flashing modified firmware or using a customized driver version so you can mine after nVidia starts selling cards with a limiter kind of is, it's like installing Homebrew Channel on a Wii so you can do things other than game on it. I agree with the language nVidia is adding to the EULA that forbids datacenter use of GeForce cards.

My take on this is, mining is compute. Compute is a professional workload. The way the market usually works is that people who are using these cards for compute and workstation use rather than gaming pay more for insane amounts of RAM and dies that are binned differently. Gamers don't have to compete with people building supercomputers or render farms for the same limited pool of graphics cards this way, and that maintains the balance of gaming cards being fairly cheap and Quadros being thousands of dollars.

Consumer GPUs being used for mining screws up that balance. The miners are screwing nVidia out of their cut that they should get from someone using their cards for professional use, and at the same time they're pricing gamers out of a product line that was intended for gamers and forcing them towards paying Quadro prices, which defeats the whole purpose of having a separate gaming line to begin with. Unfortunately, those Quadro prices reflect the real value of a device that can be used for that kind of compute without restriction, and without artificial limitations, there is no room left to sell a product to gamers anymore. The GeForce is based on the dies that were binned for gaming rather than workstation use. If nVidia can't stop mining on GeForce cards, they might as well retire the GeForce line entirely and say no one is getting a high-end math co-processor with fast RAM from them for less than $3000. If every card they sell is going to go to professional use, then they have a right to demand professional prices for every last one.

In other words, I would call this a market failure. You probably don't want this, because it means PC gaming as a high-end thing is effectively over, and the market goes back to the status quo ante of the early/mid 1990s before the Voodoo cards launched. While there were a few expensive video cards for PCs before the Voodoo, they were mostly things people bought to be able to drive multiple monitors or run high resolutions up to that point. It means professional-grade 3D acceleration is now out of the hands of the average PC user, and is only available on consoles (which are themselves locked-down computers sold at a lower price exclusively for gaming purposes) or cloud services from then on. Very much like the old situation where you had to go through SGI to get your hands on that kind of stuff. Maybe some motherboard manufacturers manage to strike a deal to get a GPU integrated on the motherboard like a laptop, and that becomes a selling point.

Note that PC games might still exist, but they would be inferior to a console experience at that point, and would have to be tailored for whatever kind of integrated graphics came with your machine. Again, a lot like a modern rendition of pre-1994.
 
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If you were to cook an egg on your gpu, I would say that's outside the realm of 'intended use'. If you are using it for anything that can be achieved in any operating system, or even through the bios that would be its intended use.
 
I think the issue is that what we call "GPUs" now are not actually GPUs anymore. They have evolved into GPGPUs but no one likes to write or say GPGPUs so GPUs sticks.
 
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Modern video cards have been able to do general purpose computing for quite a while now. Mining is general purpose, and video cards have monstrous computational performance. Being good at mining is a side effect of how they operate, so using them in such a manner is neither exploit nor intended.
 
opencl vulcan and cuda have all been around longer than mining.
mining on a GPU uses those open compute standards that were designed for GPGPU work.

the most common use of exploit does NOT fit here.
ex-ploit
a software tool designed to take advantage of a FLAW in a computer system, typically for malicious purposes such as installing malware.

so it stands to reason that, you can create an exploit to mine, HOWEVER mining is NOT an exploit.
 
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