NVIDIA Founders Edition Cards - Yea or Nay? @ [H]

I'm convinced these cards are ripoffs. I'll be holding out for an EVGA factory-overclocked / binned card for the same price.
 
Did Nvidia have Lamborghini design the reference cooler? It would explain the design and the price. :p

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As far as I am concerned, the FE is just a ref card with a price hike justified by early adopter fee plus a built-by and certified by nvidia (for the life of the GPU) scheme.
The design quality and "craftsmanship" seems to be marketing fluff - not that it is not true, but I think those design choices would have been made irregardless of a Founder's Edition version. Obfuscation obfuscation obfuscation. Still a sexy card though.
 
maverikv said:
If they cost the same, would you buy reference of wait for factory over clocked?
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But there's 290x reference... Or Titan reference. Two completely different levels of quality.

This appears to be Titan quality reference. $100 is a bit steep, but definitely should be great for SFF and SLI. Time will tell.
 
I like the reference design but I'm still wondering if there will actually ever be any $600 1080s period.
 
schizo said:
I am a bit butt-hurt, because spending an extra $100 for an inferior card is the only way to get it a month early. It's a bummer. I'm not crying in my cheerios, but yeah, it sucks.
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Again, as always, people on the bleeding edge wind up paying more than those who buy later in a product's lifecycle...

If you want it early, pony up for an already GOOD product.

If not, wait, save your cash, and buy a possibly BETTER product a couple months down the road...

It's not as if anyone's holding a gun to somebody's head.

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Or...is it....?
 
maverikv said:
If they cost the same, would you buy reference of wait for factory over clocked?
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Depends on my needs.

If I was installing an SFF system, I'd probably just go with the Founders card.
 
mls1995 said:
I'm convinced these cards are ripoffs. I'll be holding out for an EVGA factory-overclocked / binned card for the same price.
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Then they're not ripoffs. Nobody's FORCING you to buy them.
 
Easy peasy. I want a well-built 1070 and I will wait for it. They will likely be better binned and cheaper than these. I don't like waiting, but then, it is implied the drivers aren't ready yet either. By then, most bugs should be worked out there, too.
 
Chas said:
Then they're not ripoffs. Nobody's FORCING you to buy them.
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Yeah and I never said anything remotely like that. Name of thread is yay or nay. I say nay, it's a ripoff to pay extra and not get an overclock or binned chip. I think most people will agree with me around here.
 
Cantroy said:
Easy peasy. I want a well-built 1070 and I will wait for it. They will likely be better binned and cheaper than these. I don't like waiting, but then, it is implied the drivers aren't ready yet either. By then, most bugs should be worked out there, too.
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That was my initial thought but it doesn't look like the 1070 will be the bargain that the 970 was. I'm leaning 1080 now
 
mls1995 said:
Yeah and I never said anything remotely like that. Name of thread is yay or nay. I say nay, it's a ripoff to pay extra and not get an overclock or binned chip. I think most people will agree with me around here.
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Oh for sure it's a ripoff

But it's not an outrage.

It's a ripoff like the collectors edition of a game is a ripoff.if someone wants to buy it whatever, I won't be.
 
maverikv said:
Dude, all they are doing is positioning their reference design as a premium product. The overclocked versions with quieter coolers will still be available, and at a lower price.

Did you buy a reference design before? I never have, so the impact to me is 0
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I buy reference cards to be watercooled so possibility having to pay extra for a reference is another negative.

Positioning their product as premium and offering nothing new is the issue. Hopefully buyers will see the ripoff.....doubt it.
 
What I really want is the HBM2 version which will have 16GB. I will have to wait for Volta it seems. Maybe I'll have enough saved up too buy it.
 
Founder's Edition = The only way you'll be able to buy this card at launch.

If anything this is brilliant marketing. The cards with GDDR5x are going to be in short supply. Mass production of the memory wasn't that damn long ago (like March I think), which is why the launch for any card with this memory type should have been later. So it's likely going to sell out quick. So Nvidia is branding the shortfall in supply as Founder's Edition. LOL This is hysterically funny.

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Damn their marketing department is good. It's like their saying, "Even our shit has double D's and rainbow colored nuts in it. You'll buy these shit flavored Lucky Charms without the damn milk and thank us for it...watch. Everyone will agree no matter who you talk to that the sulfer-like taste was planned that way and you'll pay a premium for it."

From a marketing perspective this is the most ingenious thing I've seen from any IT company.
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I have a feeling that nvidia is making the FE the best card (with $ milking). Just my guess:
FE = vapor chamber, blower, backplate, blah blah
non-FE = fugly plastic cooler (Galax photo is already on the net) or probably a weak single fan cooler, no backplate
ACX/Strix/TwinFrozr/WindForce/IceStorm/JetStream = will not exist
 
Skylinestar said:
I have a feeling that nvidia is making the FE the best card (with $ milking). Just my guess:
FE = vapor chamber, blower, backplate, blah blah
non-FE = fugly plastic cooler (Galax photo is already on the net) or probably a weak single fan cooler, no backplate
ACX/Strix/TwinFrozr/WindForce/IceStorm/JetStream = will not exist
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What are you talking about? Of course ACX/Strix/TwinFrozr/WindForce/IceStorm/JetStream will exist. There is all the reason in the world for manufacturers to build their own custom versions.
 
Agreed, that was nonsense. ACX and such will exist. Only advantage of reference card is getting it a month early.
 
Chas said:
You DO get something for it.

You get the card, built as NV intended it.

You're getting it earlier than the AIB cards.

You're getting a card that's ALREADY doing phenomenal for performance and OC on its own.

And you're getting it directly from NV.

If the card and price point don't happen to be your cup of tea, wait until the AIBs put out a card more to your liking.

Seriously, this is coming across as butt-hurt.
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Except nothing about this new marketing strategy is any different from reference cards released previously. Reference cards are always first to market, built to NVIDIA's tight design specifications and tolerances. NVIDIA started selling video cards directly to consumers with GM100. Charging $100 more for it is the only thing that is new. It's not "butt-hurt," it's simply confusion, and we're simply trying to understand why they went with this marketing strategy. If NVIDIA wanted to price the 1080 at $699 then the should have just done it.
 
I believe this $100 premium is a direct shout out from nvidia to AIBs to give them $100 breathing room to sell their custom editions.


All Maxwell chips clocked to about ~1500mhz, regardless of PCB. MSI/EVGA/Asus all performed roughly the same. More voltage did nothing to help. It must've been annoying for AIBs as none of them could design a board to be a clear winner, the GPU held them back.

I get the impression that's completely not the case with Pascal, and that these chips will just scale linearly with voltage right up to 3GHz.

Seriously, I'm fully expecting to see at least 3GHz on DICE in a couple months time...
 
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trajan2448 said:
I prefer high end custom cards like EVGA classified or ASUS. These ARE binned and usually the cooler is more powerful than Nvidia's. It's not a big deal. 100 bucks these days is a lunch.
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Man, what are you having for lunch? :D:D
 
If Nvidia is so confident in their "craftsmanship" and quality of components why aren't they offering a superior warranty to go with it? I'm pretty sure MSI/EVGA/Asus/etc. all have comparable 3 year warranties.

When Samsung tries to tell you their Pro SSDs are better products, they have measurably superior performance and a superior warranty to go with them, not just a higher price.
 
Stereodude said:
If Nvidia is so confident in their "craftsmanship" and quality of components why aren't they offering a superior warranty to go with it? I'm pretty sure MSI/EVGA/Asus/etc. all have comparable 3 year warranties.

When Samsung tries to tell you their Pro SSDs are better products, they have measurably superior performance and a superior warranty to go with them, not just a higher price.
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Good point. I miss lifetime warranties
 
So the warranty isn't better? Hmm..

I generally buy reference cards, as I prefer blowers to exhaust heat. I've had very good luck with my 980's and am looking forward to moving them to my HTPC and kids' PC. My guess is if I had purchased a 980ti then I would have gone custom for better cooling.

I'm torn.. Might pay the stupid tax to get a founders board early.
 
If you guys think that nvidia's buttrape job is bad just you wait until the vendor who shall remain nameless sees that they are flying off the shelves and jacks up their prices like they always do on hot ticket items. These cards will sell fast imo even at the jacked up prices. Better get your f5 finger warmed and ready and hope their servers are better than what oculus put up in January. Whoever was responsible for that oculus server farm on prelaunch day should be fired 100x times over and banned from ever working in IT again.
 
so if the HE is 699 plus the new product price gouging, we could be looking at a $750-$800 card.
 
The new design is sexy, I kinda understand the price since they don't want to undercut their competitors
 
maverikv said:
If these aren't binned then aren't they kind of reverse-binned by the AIBs who will be yanking out the good chips for their over clocked models?
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That is a very good point. And to take it a step further, AIBs would be smart save the worst chips for their FE models and blame the poor overclocking headroom on the reference design.
 
My understanding is that NV manufactures the entire card. So no, the "founders editions" won't be binned at all, by anybody. Once custom designs arrive that will start happening.
 
Did anyone say when NDA was lifted? Just heard on PCPER its next Tuesday. The 17th.
 
brentsg said:
So the warranty isn't better? Hmm..

I generally buy reference cards, as I prefer blowers to exhaust heat. I've had very good luck with my 980's and am looking forward to moving them to my HTPC and kids' PC. My guess is if I had purchased a 980ti then I would have gone custom for better cooling.

I'm torn.. Might pay the stupid tax to get a founders board early.
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And see, if they did that i would be much more likely to get it. I just don't see the extra value on the founders edition.
 
Along with the controversial FE charge, is nVidia still using SLI bridges to milk customers or are they really still needed? The new ones do look pretty bad-ass and the RGB lighting adds a nice customizable touch.
 
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