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Nvidia RTX 3000 launch was so far a big disaster

S3C43TST4SH | 09/26/2020

Nvidia RTX 3000 launch was so far a big disaster

It was simultaneously the best GPU launch ever and the most frustrating one. The demand for the new card was truly unprecedented, even the website stopped working properly.

Nvidia latest cards went out of stock almost as soon as they went on sale, websites struggled to cope with demand. A lot of PC gamers around the world tried to get their hands on the new graphic card and failed. Units were quickly sold out thanks to limited supply and automated bots, which were capable ordering dozens of them instantly, only to then try to sell them on sites like eBay for vastly inflated prices. This left many prospective buyers annoyed and disappointed.

Nvidia publicly apologized for RTX 3000 launch and promised to ship more cards every week. They also stated they canceled ‘hundreds’ of orders that were made by bots.


Sadly new Nvidia launch is not the only problem they are facing right now. Some owners that were lucky getting a new RTX 3000 graphic card are experiencing crashes. 

The reason for this is Nvidia partners didn't have enough time to thoroughly test their designs. When OC products with higher boost clock hit 2 GHz frequency you get a crash to desktop. Apparent the problem is the actual design (poor choice of capacitors). Some partners went the cheaper way using worse capacitors, so they could set the card price cheaper. It seems like cards cease crashing when underclocked by 50-100 MHz, since at lower frequencies the boost frequencies  stay below the 2 GHz mark. Board partners have already confirm stability issues, but Nvidia has still not officially acknowledged the issue.

Replies • 5


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StellarSellards said:

WHy would Nvidia confirm a problem caused by EVGA? Thats like Ford taking crap for Saleen messing up a mustang... 

Well one of the reasons this apparently happened was that Nvidia released the compatible driver much later than usual for AIB partners, this meant that their actual testing was mostly limited. Nvidia also left open choices in terms of power cleanup and regulation in the mounted capacitors. The Base Design features six mandatory capacitors for filtering high frequencies on the voltage rails. There are a number of choices for capacitors to be installed here, with varying levels of capability.


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After several of Nvidia's third-party partners have altered their designs with modified capacitor arrangements, Nvidia has provided the following statement via its forums:

“NVIDIA posted a driver this morning that improves stability. Regarding partner board designs, our partners regularly customize their designs and we work closely with them in the process. The appropriate number of POSCAP vs. MLCC groupings can vary depending on the design and is not necessarily indicative of quality.”


One of the big issues is that NVIDIA was already looking at AiB's to carry the load for them. NVIDIA was already planning artificial scarcity of founders edition cards. So them messing up driver releases for third-party is an even bigger snafu and shows NVIDIA really bungled the release.