NVIDIA - Anti-Competitive, Anti-Consumer, Anti-Technology

I enjoy his videos. One of the reasons I like them is because he will trash a company if they deserve it, just like HardOCP has always done. I wish you did more Youtube Kyle, you and Tech Jesus (Steve Burke) have those in the lab type vids I like to watch because I will do the same crap just for fun and home or work.

Edit - and yes NVIDIA does suck and is anti-consumer in my opinion. They have awesome tech and are very innovative, but I had a G92 GPU and I had a friend that thought she bought a GeForce 4... which was a GeForce "4" MX. I hated to break the news to her. NVIDIA has no shame.
 
I remember Richard Huddy from AMD calling them out on really specific crap they were doing with Gameworks that I figured had to have some truth to it, otherwise it would be slander if it wasn't. I've always found that when one side makes a really damning accusation and the opposition doesn't have a clear debunking, it never looks good for the opposition.
 
I can't watch the video at work, but judging by the title, I probably agree with the man.

My last several GPU's have been Nvidia, not by choice, but because the competition had nothing fast enough for me.

I can't wait for some real competition here, maybe even from Intel in 2020? (As much as I consider Intel to have many of the same business practice flaws as Nvidia.)
 
Anti-consumer... Maybe a bit, but to their credit, their products generally work, perform well, and are well supported (give or take the odd case over the years).

Anti-competitive? They have no competition period in any of the spaces the compete in. What do they have to do to not get this label? Hand over all their IP to the competition? Give AMD or Intel some money for R&D? Throw them a free design? I think it's on the other companies to make themselves competitive. Since their acquisition of 3DFX (which is in the distant past) I really don't see much that immediately springs out this way. Sure they have this or that "program" like TWIMTBP or however you want to acronymify that, but so do their competitors.

Anti-technology? They have the pinnacle of just about everything in their field. Just because they haven't released a new gaming GPU, doesn't mean they're just sitting there doing nothing. They'll release it when there's a reason to. They're a business. I'm sure there are daily meetings about strategies for releases. For all anyone knows, they've got even the following iteration all taped out. Meanwhile they're also in general computing, AI, automotive, mobile. What else do they need to develop?

They aren't always my favorite company. They've pissed me off a bit here or there. (especially in the bundled software departmen... experience... something something...) I also like to cheer on the underdog on occasion, but really... People just like to bash I think.
 
Anti-consumer... Maybe a bit, but to their credit, their products generally work, perform well, and are well supported (give or take the odd case over the years).

Anti-competitive? They have no competition period in any of the spaces the compete in. What do they have to do to not get this label? Hand over all their IP to the competition? Give AMD or Intel some money for R&D? Throw them a free design? I think it's on the other companies to make themselves competitive. Since their acquisition of 3DFX (which is in the distant past) I really don't see much that immediately springs out this way. Sure they have this or that "program" like TWIMTBP or however you want to acronymify that, but so do their competitors.

Anti-technology? They have the pinnacle of just about everything in their field. Just because they haven't released a new gaming GPU, doesn't mean they're just sitting there doing nothing. They'll release it when there's a reason to. They're a business. I'm sure there are daily meetings about strategies for releases. For all anyone knows, they've got even the following iteration all taped out. Meanwhile they're also in general computing, AI, automotive, mobile. What else do they need to develop?

They aren't always my favorite company. They've pissed me off a bit here or there. (especially in the bundled software departmen... experience... something something...) I also like to cheer on the underdog on occasion, but really... People just like to bash I think.

Anti consumer anti competitive? Did the whole gpp and even black listing this site just pass you buy? Hello? Where does your memory begin? This year only?

Their entire rap sheet off the top of my head:

Geforce 4 mx
FX Series driver hacking
Burying dx10. 1 in assasins creed
Killing bfg
Gpp
Having nearly every review site to petrified to call out gpp.

Any others?

Same guy in charge that whole time. But yeah you walk about the earth with your fingers in your ears lalalala.

Without any real competition why would they be anything then what they are at the moment.

They've been like it since the beginning, come rain or shine.
 
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AMD has said Navi is a long time away.
No HDMI/DP cable is currently physically capable of transmitting raw pixels above about 90Hz at 4k with 10 bit colors and no chroma subsampling. (None of that Display Stream Compression "visually" lossless but mathematically lossy non-sense)

Will see if Jensen was being literal in saying 11xx is long time away.
 
Damn, after watching that video,im going to pull my Nvidia card out and jump on it !!
 
AMD has said Navi is a long time away.
No HDMI/DP cable is currently physically capable of transmitting raw pixels above about 90Hz at 4k with 10 bit colors and no chroma subsampling. (None of that Display Stream Compression "visually" lossless but mathematically lossy non-sense)

Will see if Jensen was being literal in saying 11xx is long time away.

He's not. July 31st you'll see the first official info on the 1180. Told you "Long time away" is relative.
 
Say what you will about nVidia but they release kick ass GPUs at reasonable prices. Look at what AMD charged for Vega, it's a joke. If you guys are at all serious about PC gaming I encourage you to go with an nVidia GPU. 4k gaming just isn't possible with AMD.
 
Nvidia products have always "APPEARED" to be the fastest to the uninformed (or blind) because Nvidiq has always been good about manufacturing the environment where their product wins.

If the market created two racing cars, one that turned real well but wasn't super fast in a straight line, and vice versa for the other car, and then the guy who had the most influence built the car that turned the best forced the track builders to make the track tight and windy then he pretty much guarantees himself the win, then he gets to pretend the track was built by someone else with no influence whatsoever and trash the guy who built the car that was only fast in a straight line.
 
The real shitty thing is that the market usually rewards companies that behave this way under the guise of personal need at the moment and to hell with the market. Chanting "I only buy the best" can be heard for miles.
 
I just finished watching the whole thing. Am I the only one who noticed that he was running Adblockers when he did his website pics, but not always?

I'd like to see some investigative work on how ATI/AMD is. I know nVidia is a horrid company, but I don't want to throw my money at AMD without knowing that side of the story either.
 
Without any real competition why would they be anything then what they are at the moment.

Why not? IMO a great company is always willing to act great, not just when there is a so called "lack of competition, people keep throwing $$$$$$$$$$$ at them, it enforces them acting like utter fucking tools, they have done this since they became a company, and persist in doing the same today, even when they had absolute competition, but people keep throwing $$$$$$$$$$$$ at them, no matter what they do, not matter how they act, no matter how much crud they have pulled.

wallets talk, so the bigger their wallet gets, the more shit they think (and usually do) get away with, bad for consumer, bad for technology, bad for innovation, just bad deal all the way around to financially support them and what they do, because of whom they are.
 
I watched some of it, but all I kept hearing was, “We have a piper down! Piper down!”









Okay, cool accent aside, the first 10 minutes has me hooked. Back in an hour...
 
I watched some of it, but all I kept hearing was, “We have a piper down! Piper down!”









Okay, cool accent aside, the first 10 minutes has me hooked. Back in an hour...

I just heard, "Come on Blazcowicz!" (just kidding)
 
I just finished watching the whole thing. Am I the only one who noticed that he was running Adblockers when he did his website pics, but not always?

I'd like to see some investigative work on how ATI/AMD is. I know nVidia is a horrid company, but I don't want to throw my money at AMD without knowing that side of the story either.

quack
 
Developers are partly to blame for being part of the nVidia conspiracy.

Developers can choose what they want. Personally, if I'm developing a game, and a GPU-giant says "Here's our set of tools, we'll also send some engineers to help you implement them, and make your game look good if you slap our label on it." I can't say I'd mind. However, at the same time, it's probably not even the developer's own studio some of the time. It's probably a deal that is made at the publisher level.

I'm sure AMD knocks on the doors of the devs too, maybe just not as loudly and with smaller promises.

AMD gets some big names. They got HL2 / Valve, and they got Deus Ex: HR as well. They were also heavily favored on Steam for the longest time, with the automatic driver installer, and things like that.

It's definitely a choice. However, if I was going to choose one or the other in the current climate, I'd choose the one that will push me further. You know... Business and all that.

People start making games because they love them. They start making them to make an impression. Inevitably, if their games are popular, they'll need partners to move up and forward. They grow into their own larger companies, get acquired by the "big boys" and then they're just as corporate as AMD or Nvidia.

If you want developers with heart, values, and do it for the love. You don't need NV or AMD. You're looking at the 2D indie devs, making cool games like Shovel Knight or Hyper Light Drifter.

As soon as you hit AAA, you'll find very few that don't bow to someone.

CDPR is probably one of the few that stand out. I actually don't know though, do they have an NV or AMD splash screen? It's been a while since I've launched a Witcher game...
 
I got to the 40 minute mark then realized I was at the 40 minute mark. I'll finish it tonight but damn, that's a good piece of commentary that's super easy to listen to and understand.

Ignore SickBeast, he must be part of their outreach program :D
More like I'm not drinking the recent anti-nVidia Kool-aid. AMD's GPU division is currently not competitive. And that's only going to get worse once Volta comes out.
 
More like I'm not drinking the recent anti-nVidia Kool-aid. AMD's GPU division is currently not competitive. And that's only going to get worse once Volta comes out.

Did you get your big lcd screen in the mail yet?

Please note the smiley face in the original post.
 
Did you get your big lcd screen in the mail yet?

Please note the smiley face in the original post.
I already game on a big LCD screen. It's a 75" Sharp 4k HDR TV actually. AMD currently has nothing to compete with my current GTX 1080 Ti SLI setup.

And yes, I see your smiley face now. :)
 
It's best not to drink anybody's Kool-Aid, and develop your own views and choices. I guess it's nice to have information though whether or not you agree with it. I didn't find anything in the video to be inaccurate (based on the bits and pieces that I remember or know about) I just don't quite agree on the level of significance many of his points had, or that some of them were particularly examples of malfeasance. Sure some things NV does are utter bullshit. That's where you have to make a personal decision on who you support, why, and whether the quality of product can outweigh the bullshit or not.
 
It's best not to drink anybody's Kool-Aid, and develop your own views and choices. I guess it's nice to have information though whether or not you agree with it. I didn't find anything in the video to be inaccurate (based on the bits and pieces that I remember or know about) I just don't quite agree on the level of significance many of his points had, or that some of them were particularly examples of malfeasance. Sure some things NV does are utter bullshit. That's where you have to make a personal decision on who you support, why, and whether the quality of product can outweigh the bullshit or not.
I agree, a lot of what nVidia does is BS. The one thing they do currently that I can't stand is the whole gsync thing. It's nonsense. Freesync is way better. However other than that nothing they are doing bothers me. And like I said, they offer a superior product for competitive prices. At the end of the day that's all that matters to me. I game on a 4k TV so the gsync/freesync thing doesn't affect me.
 
Did Hardocp ever confirm one of its members to be a paid Nvidia Schill? Just curious if that was ever official. I know several other sites came out with it.

::17 minutes in, looks at timer on bottom:: "holy sht this is an hour long"
 
Did Hardocp ever confirm one of its members to be a paid Nvidia Schill? Just curious if that was ever official. I know several other sites came out with it.
Rollo and Keysplayr at the AnandTech forums were eventually proven to be nVidia shills because nVidia finally decided to have their shills come out and disclose their affiliation. The big problem for tech forums currently is that AMD does not do this. Their shills are completely undercover and there are probably a bunch of them operating right here on the HardOCP forum actually. If you want to talk about viral marketing, nVidia is doing it ethically. AMD isn't. There is evidence of AMD attempting to turn legitimate tech sites into AMD flog sites also. I'm sure they have probably been successful doing that to some websites also. It's not like they would come out and tell us they are doing it.
 
Anti-competitive? They have no competition period in any of the spaces the compete in. What do they have to do to not get this label? Hand over all their IP to the competition? Give AMD or Intel some money for R&D? Throw them a free design? I think it's on the other companies to make themselves competitive. Since their acquisition of 3DFX (which is in the distant past) I really don't see much that immediately springs out this way. Sure they have this or that "program" like TWIMTBP or however you want to acronymify that, but so do their competitors.

A lot of this argument comes from how they try to manipulate the market and lock in consumers.

Examples:

Gameworks: An attempt to get game develooers to create games with features prevented from being used on the competitions hardware.

G-Sync: knowing that people tend to buy monitors a lot less often than they do GPU's, they create a tech that only works with their GPU's so that even if the competition were to catch up, consumers are locked in to Nvidia GPU's or their fancy G-Sync monitor no longer syncs.

GPP: A blatant way to try to force board partners to abandon the competition from their gaming brands or face losing support from Nvidia.


I think it is pretty clear they are anti-competition. Sure, they are in the lead right now, and they deserve that spot. They have done a better job than anyone else at putting out high end GPU's. The tactics above are pretty clear attempts to try to hurt competition and make sure no one else ever catches back up again, though, and that is not cool at all and possiböy even illegal.
 
I agree, a lot of what nVidia does is BS. The one thing they do currently that I can't stand is the whole gsync thing. It's nonsense. Freesync is way better. However other than that nothing they are doing bothers me. And like I said, they offer a superior product for competitive prices. At the end of the day that's all that matters to me. I game on a 4k TV so the gsync/freesync thing doesn't affect me.

Yeah, I like to let the companies duke it out, and kinda stay out of that part. I'll toss out an opinion once in a while, but that's about as far as it gets for me. What makes me decide, is what's got the most features I want, with the best performance, for at least a competitive price. (doesn't have to be the best price, as long as it levels up with the rest) For the last while, NV have sipped power, performed great, have the extra features (BS or not) that make the games I play look the way I want, and that's the deciding factor. I still actually buy AMD hardware to try it out, put it in a secondary machine, etc. The fact is, I still play a lot of PhysX era games (Borderlands 2 with my daughters for one) and even though it's just cosmetics, it adds to my experience. I also play Mirror's edge every other year or so. I'd say my game choices are a bit niche, but it's a niche that NV typically excels with. I'll take anything that's good though. If Power VR came back to the desktop space with a modern (and this time reliable) tiling engine that ran current and past games very well for a cheap price, hell, I'd grab one just because it's another option and throw it in a PC in a spare room. One more LAN node for people to play on with me. :D

I like technology. I try to sample it all. The brand matters less than what it does. The ethics behind the company matter less as well. It still matters to me somewhat, but it's not going to decide which GPU goes into my gaming systems. Unless it was just outright atrocity-level.
 
A lot of this argument comes from how they try to manipulate the market and lock in consumers.

Examples:

Gameworks: An attempt to get game develooers to create games with features prevented from being used on the competitions hardware.

G-Sync: knowing that people tend to buy monitors a lot less often than they do GPU's, they create a tech that only works with their GPU's so that even if the competition were to catch up, consumers are locked in to Nvidia GPU's or their fancy G-Sync monitor no longer syncs.

GPP: A blatant way to try to force board partners to abandon the competition from their gaming brands or face losing support from Nvidia.


I think it is pretty clear they are anti-competition. Sure, they are in the lead right now, and they deserve that spot. They have done a better job than anyone else at putting out high end GPU's. The tactics above are pretty clear attempts to try to hurt competition and make sure no one else ever catches back up again, though, and that is not cool at all and possiböy even illegal.

I can see that, but it also depends on whether or not you fully buy into it. I run a 1070, but I refuse to buy a GSync monitor. I made a decision based on what matters to me there. I bought a Shield TV, because it streams games better than anything, and works with the card I already have in my main system. So, I also made a pro-NV choice based on the ecosystem they created to try to lock me in. They pulled that one off because they executed it right for my needs. If they release something else that's kinda cool tomorrow though, I'm not necessarily just going to jump on it. If it provides me some value, then yes. If not, they can bite it. :D

I guess I just expect people to choose based on what they need, want, and does the particular job the best. I know not all people do though, and will just buy up anything fed to them because of brand loyalty.

Gameworks is kinda double-edged in my mind. It actually does what it sets out to do. It's a set of tools a developer can choose to go with, and yes that also entails some obligations if I'm not mistaken. It makes the developer's job easier, gives some brand recognition etc. as well. Obviously it's leveraged by Nvidia to gain an advantage. I know that. At the same time though it's providing value to the developer if that developer chooses to take that path. That choice is on the dev, or the publisher. They're not tricking them into using it. They offer it, offer services and tools that go with it, it does what they say it does, and then they also get their back scratched. I don't see anything inherently wrong there. Of course a company is going to try to create an advantage for themselves.

It's up to me as the player of the game to decide if it's worth those features for me to buy a card that supports them. Just like I do with PhysX.

Do I wish all features were supported by all hardware and rainbows shot out, and everyone lived happily together? Sure! That's not the world we live in though. I'm just realistic about that.
 
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Rollo and Keysplayr at the AnandTech forums were eventually proven to be nVidia shills because nVidia finally decided to have their shills come out and disclose their affiliation. The big problem for tech forums currently is that AMD does not do this. Their shills are completely undercover and there are probably a bunch of them operating right here on the HardOCP forum actually. If you want to talk about viral marketing, nVidia is doing it ethically. AMD isn't. There is evidence of AMD attempting to turn legitimate tech sites into AMD flog sites also. I'm sure they have probably been successful doing that to some websites also. It's not like they would come out and tell us they are doing it.
whataboutism-intensifies.jpg
 
I was surprised He didn't discuss the segmentation of the market when they stopped shipping their flagship card (titan) and instead started selling a midrange GPU as their flagship product.
 
Say what you will about nVidia but they release kick ass GPUs at reasonable prices. Look at what AMD charged for Vega, it's a joke. If you guys are at all serious about PC gaming I encourage you to go with an nVidia GPU. 4k gaming just isn't possible with AMD.

Reasonable prices on Video cards, eh sure. But their Gsync technology fat chance! Its total bullshit when you can get the same technology from AMD at half the price.
 
The superficial investigation into GTX 970's 3.5 issues was one of HardOCP's poorer showings. None of the reported problematic use cases were investigated and only a handful of games tested, but it didn't stop you from declaring it a non issue.
 
Anti consumer anti competitive? Did the whole gpp and even black listing this site just pass you buy? Hello? Where does your memory begin? This year only?

Their entire rap sheet off the top of my head:

Geforce 4 mx
FX Series driver hacking
Burying dx10. 1 in assasins creed
Killing bfg
Gpp
Having nearly every review site to petrified to call out gpp.

Any others?

Same guy in charge that whole time. But yeah you walk about the earth with your fingers in your ears lalalala.



They've been like it since the beginning, come rain or shine.

Anyone that didn't know that the GeForce 4 MX wasn't a GeForce 4 was quite frankly not all that bright, or didn't research their purchase. It was a budget card, re-branded, and that information was ALL OVER THE PLACE.

FX Series driver hacking? Who bought an FX anyway? I picked up ATI 9700 and 9800 because it was readily apparent that that generation/product line was total bullshit. Dustbuster anyone? I don't blame them for trying to hack drivers, or downplay ATI's advantages, but you know what, some of us were smart enough to go the other way for that cycle. That's where consumer responsibility comes in. Was it devious? Yes. Did it impact me one bit? No. Could someone "get by" if they bought an FX, yes, so if someone made the mistake of buying one, or was uninformed, it wasn't the clear winner or anything, but it still worked. I don't have much pity for people that can't read up a bit, or ask an informed friend.

Killing BFG... Sad. I liked BFG. I sent a metric fuck-ton of money their way. Nvidia can suck it on that one. Does that mean I can't enjoy their last few GPU lines that performed better than anything else? Nope. I'm going to buy what works.

GPP was bullshit. I don't disagree. I guess you play along, or you grow your balls and call them out. They got called out, and promptly adjusted their attitude. That was stupid, and not a great thing to try. I will not even attempt to defend them on that one.

Will they pull some more bullshit in the future? Yep! Will that impact my buying decision if they're still the only game in town? Nope.
 
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Did he mention anything to the effect of useless tessellation in crysis 2 to skew benchmark numbers in Nvidias favor?
 
Reasonable prices on Video cards, eh sure. But their Gsync technology fat chance! Its total bullshit when you can get the same technology from AMD at half the price.

This is where I straddle the line. I'll buy the NV GPU because it does what I want. But I'm not buying the monitor. I'll just adjust my games to play synced without dropping frames. It's worked so far. Then again, I only need 60 or 120 to be happy.
 
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