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Forums - PC Discussion - PSA: GTX 970 is really a 3.25 GB 208-bit card

Captain_Tom on 24 January 2015

Just thought I would warn everybody now that this is out...

http://wccftech.com/nvidia-geforce-gtx-970-memory-issue-fully-explained/

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/198214-198214

 

Once it gets past ~3.3GB of VRAM usage the bandwidth for the remaining ~0.5 GB falls to a tenth of the advertised bandwidth and stuttering occurs.  Pitiful that Nvidia would falsely advertise this...

 

Update:  It turns out Nvidia lied about a few other specs as well:

http://www.techpowerup.com/209339/gtx-970-memory-drama-plot-thickens-nvidia-has-to-revise-specs.html

^This is a good summary of the whole situation.



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CosmicSex on 24 January 2015

oh damn



Panama on 24 January 2015

Daily reminder never to trust Nvidia :^)



Jizz_Beard_thePirate on 24 January 2015

Well that sucks! I hope they do a recall but I doubt it! Shame Nvidia



                  

PC Specs: CPU: 7800X3D || GPU: Strix 4090 || RAM: 32GB DDR5 6000 || Main SSD: WD 2TB SN850

Protendo on 24 January 2015

It looks like this affects all units even the ones with Samsung memory. Hopefully it's a driver error. Once games use 4 GB which is expected to start happening next year these cards are going to have abysmal performance to the point of being unplayable. It's fine for now but once games use 4GB, these cards will be in trouble. So if you are thinking about buying one either wait for a revision or wait and see what AMD has in store for us.



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fatslob-:O on 24 January 2015

Well this answers why the GTX 970 has such a great value ...



Captain_Tom on 24 January 2015
Protendo said:
It looks like this affects all units even the ones with Samsung memory. Hopefully it's a driver error. Once games use 4 GB which is expected to start happening next year these cards are going to have abysmal performance to the point of being unplayable. It's fine for now but once games use 4GB, these cards will be in trouble. So if you are thinking about buying one either wait for a revision or wait and see what AMD has in store for us.


Or get an R9 290 right now! lol



vivster on 25 January 2015
Protendo said:
It looks like this affects all units even the ones with Samsung memory. Hopefully it's a driver error. Once games use 4 GB which is expected to start happening next year these cards are going to have abysmal performance to the point of being unplayable. It's fine for now but once games use 4GB, these cards will be in trouble. So if you are thinking about buying one either wait for a revision or wait and see what AMD has in store for us.

Read the first article where Nvidia explains it. It's not a driver error. It's the design of the chip. The last 0.5GB of RAM have their own partition which the GPU cannot access as efficiently as the first partition with 3.5GB. So this only ever occurs with games that use more than 3.5GB of VRAM. Still bad design though.

Makes me feel good in my hardware approach. Either go big or go home. 980 doesn't have this issue.

Also your assumption that by next year games will use much more RAM is false. Reaching 3.5GB of VRAM isn't that easy unless you go 4k. And for 4k the 970 isn't fast enough anyway.



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Captain_Tom on 25 January 2015
vivster said:
Protendo said:
It looks like this affects all units even the ones with Samsung memory. Hopefully it's a driver error. Once games use 4 GB which is expected to start happening next year these cards are going to have abysmal performance to the point of being unplayable. It's fine for now but once games use 4GB, these cards will be in trouble. So if you are thinking about buying one either wait for a revision or wait and see what AMD has in store for us.

Read the first article where Nvidia explains it. It's not a driver error. It's the design of the chip. The last 0.5GB of RAM have their own partition which the GPU cannot access as efficiently as the first partition with 3.5GB. So this only ever occurs with games that use more than 3.5GB of VRAM. Still bad design though.

Makes me feel good in my hardware approach. Either go big or go home. 980 doesn't have this issue.

Also your assumption that by next year games will use much more RAM is false. Reaching 3.5GB of VRAM isn't that easy unless you go 4k. And for 4k the 970 isn't fast enough anyway.

There are games that use over 3GB of RAM in 1080p NOW.  What do you think it will be like in 1-2 years?  The 970 started as a card that rivaled the 290X with 4GB of VRAM, and now the 290 is already starting to beat it and it really only has 3.3 GB.  It isn't aging well, and it is only going to get worse.



vivster on 25 January 2015
Captain_Tom said:
vivster said:
Protendo said:
It looks like this affects all units even the ones with Samsung memory. Hopefully it's a driver error. Once games use 4 GB which is expected to start happening next year these cards are going to have abysmal performance to the point of being unplayable. It's fine for now but once games use 4GB, these cards will be in trouble. So if you are thinking about buying one either wait for a revision or wait and see what AMD has in store for us.

Read the first article where Nvidia explains it. It's not a driver error. It's the design of the chip. The last 0.5GB of RAM have their own partition which the GPU cannot access as efficiently as the first partition with 3.5GB. So this only ever occurs with games that use more than 3.5GB of VRAM. Still bad design though.

Makes me feel good in my hardware approach. Either go big or go home. 980 doesn't have this issue.

Also your assumption that by next year games will use much more RAM is false. Reaching 3.5GB of VRAM isn't that easy unless you go 4k. And for 4k the 970 isn't fast enough anyway.

There are games that use over 3GB of RAM in 1080p NOW.  What do you think it will be like in 1-2 years?  The 970 started as a card that rivaled the 290X with 4GB of VRAM, and now the 290 is already starting to beat it and it really only has 3.3 GB.  It isn't aging well, and it is only going to get worse.

Games with that much VRAM use are the exception and not the rule. 970 is too weak for current games anyway, so of course it will not be able to play future games well, no matter the VRAM. Guess what, neither the 980 or 290X will hold up well in the next 2 years.



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