Nvidia accused of lying over Maxwell power usage

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/217732-nvidia-lying-about-maxwell-gtx-980-specs-to-press/

I just noticed this article and thought it was a bit strange that the numbers don't add up.

Are Nvidia telling porkies about the 980's 165w TDP?

Make up your own mind.

Discuss.

Sorry boss wrong section, move to Nvidia please if you want....or just leave it here since it's probably just fud anyway.

 

Could care less. I buy based on gpu power not tdp.

 

Agreed but still shady tactics if they are intentionally making false claims, which i personally doubt they are.

Agreed also that each and every single card will or could have slightly different results.

 

there a lot of variables that can change TDP or wattage use .
two important ones are voltages and clocks speed , many cards are not reference ones and are clocked higher .

Also even on ref model , voltages can vary between cards just like CPU can according to VID of chip .
Last but not least what app are we running to test wattage , well hopefully in that chart it was all the same. Looking at the data there one thing that I found odd.

In most reviews when 980 came out, it got lower wattage than 970 , not sure why if it is just 980 get best bins , lower voltage etc .

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/NVIDIA/GeForce_GTX_980/24.html

http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/nvidia_geforce_gtx_970_and_980_reference_review,7.html

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2014...rce_gtx_980_video_card_review/13#.VGOZdSii9tk

 

Well I watched OC3D run a load of benches using a Corsair 1500W PSU linked to Corsair link software for power usage monitoring, and it never pulled more than 140w the entire time

Thread linked in OP is 2 months old anyway, didn't the 980 release the day 'after' that thread was made ?

 

I just wish my 970 had a 125% power limit setting instead of 110%. I can't get it above 1.45Ghz due to this.

 

I got a good laugh from the first page of that thread. TDP is very loosely related to power consumption. TDP, or thermal design power, is the minimum amount of heat that has to be dissipated, measured in watts, for an electronic device to maintain a safe operating temperature. Unless you're designing heatsinks, there's no reason to even discuss TDP.

If NVidia stated the TDP as 195watts and it only pulled 165watts, then I'd be concerned but in this particular case, it's a simple overreaction....

TDP is pretty useless for us unless you're watercooled or trying to build a silent PC anyway. If you're trying to design heatsinks, it's quite useless since it tells you the minimum amount of heat you have to be able to dissipate. I doubt any of us are designing heatsinks though. Personally, I wouldn't worry about TDP unless performance, price and power consumption were completely identical across the board. Then I might consider going with the lower TDP just for the sake of lower case temps.

 

Uhm TDP does not equal power consumption...

 

Nvidia is actually always referring to power consumption, and not TDP(as in the measure of cooling design).
In all it's charts, roadmaps etc.

They might even call it TDP here and there, but the meaning of it is roughly:
"maximum sustainable power consumption on real-world workloads"

And if we take the above definition of power consumption, then TDP is NOT very loosely connected to power consumption.

TDP becomes "power consumption". And you'd be wise when constructing cooling solution to build the design capable of dissipating at least that much of power(heat/s).

 

For example, gigabytes windforce 3 is rated @ 600watts worth of heat dissipation and is more to do with TDP than actual power usage.

The reason this came up is because i was curious as to why the 980 G1 has 2 x 8 pins, while all other cards only have 2 x 6 pins.

So if you believe a 6 pin is 75w and an 8 pin is 150w then it's 225w vs 375w.

225w vs 375w is what you get with the G1 vs All the other 980's.

If the power usage is around 165w then it makes little sense to me why the G1 would need all that power. Even with huge OC's you might get close to the 225w but that would mean G1 only needed 1x6 and 1x8?

 

Giga refers to TDP rating of it's WF3 cooling solution.

Which coincidentally() should be just enough to deal with GPU pulling (and pretty much dissipating all of it) 600W from PSU. If we believe GIGA that is...

 

your forgeting PCIE slot , 1 8pin would be max of 150w +75w from PCIE = 225w .
so 6pin + 6pin would be 75+75+75 =225w max
6pin + 8pin would be 75+150+75 =300w max
8pin +8pin would be 150+150 +75w = 375w max

That is physical max power through the 3 sources , that is not what card is set to run .

If you look at 3rd party OC cards there bios power targets are a lot higher than ref , thats why they pull more, there clocked higher and can run at higher voltages

 

There are plenty of modified bios' around now that increase this limit.

 

Pcie is obviously added into the final result. 150 150 = 375 + 75w from the Pcie slot. Same for 2 x 6 pins 75 75 75 = 225.

 

This can be the only reason Gigabyte included 2 x 8 pins on the G1?

 

As for 680 rig using less power than 980 rig, and concluding from this that Nvidia is lying about Maxwell GTX 980.

That's a very noobish conclusion.

Because there is no mention of what kind of workload is measured.
It might be power virus, or 680 might be underutilized and running at half it's TDP.
Like some GPGPU app with 680 barely outputting anything, and therefore mimicking a low-power device.

Or it could be some crappy game not optimized well on 680.

But that does not mean 680 generally uses less power than 980, or that you can slap on 680 lower rated cooling solution

 

Minor detail... The PCIe power supplied by the PSU, is limited by the OC protection per output. The spec more or less is for the minimum power a PEG power lead must supply. The GPU is supposed to limit the power draw to the PCIe spec for the 6/8pin PEG and the PCIe slot. GPU manufacturers are rather lax regarding this.

 

whats the difference between tpd and the other thing anyway?

 

TDP = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_design_power

Power consumption is exactly what the name implies.

 

well thats odd. the industry should settle on a standard.

i always thought they were the same thing.

:3eyes:

Sigh