reddit Nvidia have banned Hardware Unboxed from receiving founders edition review samples

[ENTERPRISE]

Quote

Hi Steve,

 

We've reached a critical juncture in the adoption of ray tracing and it has gained industry-wide support from top titles, developers, game engines, APIs, consoles and GPUs.

 

As you know Nvidia is all in for ray tracing. RT is important and core to the future of gaming, but it's also one part of our focused R&D efforts on revolutionizing video games and creating a better experience for gamers.

Source:

Visit the reddit link above to see the entirety of the transcribed email from Nvidia to Steve @ Hardware Unboxed.

 

Unacceptable behaviour from Nvidia. Silencing journalism based on the fact you do not like the format in which the testing was done or how results were portrayed is bad. Yes RTX and DLSS are new technologies but coverage of those technologies should not be dictated. 

 

Granted that this only means founders edition cards fortunately, but not the point.

[Minotaurtoo]

I was just watching Linus's video on it... I can and can't believe they would do this.  It's a horrible move and proving to be very unpopular... sad thing really as they do make some great hardware... and they are going to kill it with this bad PR... thanks for sharing.

[ENTERPRISE]

5 hours ago, Minotaurtoo said:

I was just watching Linus's video on it... I can and can't believe they would do this.  It's a horrible move and proving to be very unpopular... sad thing really as they do make some great hardware... and they are going to kill it with this bad PR... thanks for sharing.

 

Just another case of a company saying, "Say what we want you to say"....really poor ! 

 

Another video from Jay here

 

 

[J7SC_Orion]

I have been following this as well and think that Nvidia's behavior is beyond unacceptable and in fact limiting competition.

 

I also find it stupid from a completely different perspective: NVidia's $40 billion agreement-in-principal to purchase Arm...this kind of corporate behavior (re. HW Unboxed) by NVidia will surely be brought up by the lawyers at the regulatory bodies reviewing the ARM purchase as they are very much concerned by this purchase re. competition.  Looking around at various other legal actions being brought against big tech now, a very silly move by NVidia, far beyond the outrageous, initial censor-ship on HW Unboxed

[Snakecharmed]

https://twitter.com/HardwareUnboxed/status/1337885741389471745

 

Nvidia walked it back, but the damage is done. GamersNexus also pointed out the obvious.

 

https://twitter.com/GamersNexus/status/1337905467079741451

 

They only went back because they got caught, although it's monumentally stupid for Nvidia to think that they weren't going to get raked over the coals for this.

 

JayzTwoCents made a good point at 4:40 in his video about how that damn email read like a press release that was meant to be shared. I don't have words to describe that level of PR idiocy. Was Nvidia getting bored with merely being shady under the table that they had to crank the difficulty up to 11 and get the entire PC and tech community to become aware of their disrespect for hardware reviewers and independent journalism?

 

Incompetence and hubris is a deadly combination.

Edited December 13, 2020 by Snakecharmed

[schuck6566]

Public Relations:"This kinda sh^t can REALLY hurt us if it goes public..."

Nvidia Corporate: "Don't worry,the Fan Boys will keep us in the black for @ least another 3 years.By then,nobody will remember this and we'll have 5 more generations of cards on the market."

[ENTERPRISE]

5 hours ago, schuck6566 said:

Public Relations:"This kinda sh^t can REALLY hurt us if it goes public..."

Nvidia Corporate: "Don't worry,the Fan Boys will keep us in the black for @ least another 3 years.By then,nobody will remember this and we'll have 5 more generations of cards on the market."

 

This in reality is the unfortunate reality. They make great products but shady as hell.

[Minotaurtoo]

2 hours ago, ENTERPRISE said:

 

This in reality is the unfortunate reality. They make great products but shady as hell.

It's an unfortunate reality that nearly all companies engage in shady business... just some get to the point Nvidia and Intel did where the make the mistake of saying the quiet part out loud... but as stated above... fan boys combined with the lack of competition that was there for years kept them making billions so they didn't care... let's see how that works out now that AMD is actually a contender, and more interesting to me is, how will AMD react.

[Snakecharmed]

It's important to realize that any company is capable of doing these types of things if they have the market share and hubris to pull it off. Usually, their PR isn't this incompetent though.

 

As consumers, this only goes to show that a company is not your friend. There is no reason for the consumer to be a rabid fan of a company. They are in the business of making money. They don't know your name. They don't know that you contributed a tiny fraction to their revenue. So why do free advertising for them when their product should be able to speak for itself? Furthermore, in this case, it's clear that if Nvidia does know your name, they feel that you are obligated to shill for them.

[Sir Beregond]

With the idea that this was written with a PR spin on the expectation of being leaked I have to think they still got something out of this even if they had to "walk it back". Scumbag move by Nvidia. Won't matter, every single 30-series card will sell the moment it is available.

[J7SC_Orion]

1 hour ago, Sir Beregond said:

With the idea that this was written with a PR spin on the expectation of being leaked I have to think they still got something out of this even if they had to "walk it back". Scumbag move by Nvidia. Won't matter, every single 30-series card will sell the moment it is available.

  

...there's also the huge and direct RTX 3K sales to miners in China, as reported elsewhere...I still think NVidia is doing itself no favours re. ARM deal review etc with their behavior 

[schuck6566]

lol, my GTX 970, they argued that 4Gb of ram was 4Gb regardless if .5Gb ran slower than the rest or not. Took court action to get the buyers a little satisfaction."Under the preliminary settlement, United States residents who purchased GeForce GTX 970 cards would be able to claim a $30 settlement in return for dropping further litigation against the company. With the GTX 970 having launched at $329, this amounts to a de facto 9% rebate on the card."

[J7SC_Orion]

I never thought I would say this, but after the RTX 3K and XT 6K roll-out / non-availability and also the corporate behavior described above and elsewhere, I am rooting for Intel Xe GPUs...hopefully, they'll bring some halo products (4 tile) to the consumer space (and actually have cards available for purchase...)  

[ENTERPRISE]

59 minutes ago, J7SC_Orion said:

I never thought I would say this, but after the RTX 3K and XT 6K roll-out / non-availability and also the corporate behavior described above and elsewhere, I am rooting for Intel Xe GPUs...hopefully, they'll bring some halo products (4 tile) to the consumer space (and actually have cards available for purchase...)  

 

I think that is a good way off though until Intel is at a competitive level in the gaming market.

[Snakecharmed]

The biggest problem in the GPU and CPU spaces is a lack of competition. GPUs are effectively a duopoly with Intel basically being noncompetitive at the mid-high end for the foreseeable future, and x86 CPUs are a duopoly due to licensing. AMD is looking good right now in both areas aside from supply issues, but it wasn't that long ago that they were committing a bunch of unforced errors as well.

 

If the GPU landscape looked like it did in the old days, Nvidia wouldn't dare pull this kind of crap. Actually, thanks to a source I found off of Wikipedia, I see that Nvidia has been pulling this crap forever. They've been watching politicians for decades learning best practices on mudslinging.

 

Anyway, it's not sustainable in today's market, but it was nice having the choice between 3dfx, ATI, Matrox, Nvidia, and PowerVR in the old days.

Edited December 14, 2020 by Snakecharmed

[Snakecharmed]

Hardware Unboxed's video is out now.

 

 

Edited December 14, 2020 by Snakecharmed

[J7SC_Orion]

44 minutes ago, ENTERPRISE said:

 

I think that is a good way off though until Intel is at a competitive level in the gaming market.

  

...but, but, but - it has already got RGB  

 

     

Yeah, Intel is still a way off (including on efficiency given recent reports), but it is really they only one right now with a shot at eventually joining the NVidia / AMD GPU space...even if that space looks to merge with RISC chips already.  There's also the lack of 7nm (and smaller) manufacturing process issues Intel has.

 

Topic for another day, but I find it incredibly dangerous to have the main CPU/GPU manufacturing capacity for the global markets located in just one country in a somewhat troubled part for the world. I know there are expansions  planned for that kind of wafer manufacturing elsewhere, but that will take many more years. Thus: running an obstacle x-country course with all your eggs in one basket...

[Supercrumpet]

16 minutes ago, J7SC_Orion said:

  

...but, but, but - it has already got RGB  

 

     

Yeah, Intel is still a way off (including on efficiency given recent reports), but it is really they only one right now with a shot at eventually joining the NVidia / AMD GPU space...even if that space looks to merge with RISC chips already.  There's also the lack of 7nm (and smaller) manufacturing process issues Intel has.

 

Topic for another day, but I find it incredibly dangerous to have the main CPU/GPU manufacturing capacity for the global markets located in just one country in a somewhat troubled part for the world. I know there are expansions  planned for that kind of wafer manufacturing elsewhere, but that will take many more years. Thus: running an obstacle x-country course with all your eggs in one basket...

 

I'm curious, what is that image based on/is there any substance behind it? I just did a quick Google reverse image search and didn't find anything informative.

[J7SC_Orion]

4 minutes ago, Supercrumpet said:

 

I'm curious, what is that image based on/is there any substance behind it? I just did a quick Google reverse image search and didn't find anything informative.

   

...here you go: https://hothardware.com/news/closer-look-intels-xe-hpg-gpu-gamers

[Supercrumpet]

2 minutes ago, J7SC_Orion said:

   

...here you go: https://hothardware.com/news/closer-look-intels-xe-hpg-gpu-gamers

 

Interesting, thanks.

[Sir Beregond]

5 hours ago, J7SC_Orion said:

I never thought I would say this, but after the RTX 3K and XT 6K roll-out / non-availability and also the corporate behavior described above and elsewhere, I am rooting for Intel Xe GPUs...hopefully, they'll bring some halo products (4 tile) to the consumer space (and actually have cards available for purchase...)  

 

This won't be any time soon.

 

Damn you 3dfx. Why'd you have to blunder your way into bankruptcy and an Nvidia buyout.

[schuck6566]

As to Nvidia's RTX is the be all/end all future of gaming. Here's what I could find that was valid as of around mid Nov,2020. RTX enabled games...

#1. Amid Evil
#2. Battlefield V
#3. Call of Duty:Black Ops Cold War
#4. call of Duty:Modern Warfare
#5. Contol
#6. Deliver Us the Moon
#7. Fortnite
#8. Ghostrunner
#9. Justice Online
#10. JX3 HD
#11. Mechwarrior 5:Mercenaries
#12. Metro Exodus(and The Two Colonels DLC)
#13. Minecraft
#14. Moonlight Blade
#15. Mortal Shell
#16. Pumpkin Jack
#17. Quake II RTX
#18. Ready or Not
#19. Ring of Elysium
#20. Shadow of the Tomb Raider
#21. Watch Dogs:Legion
#22. Wolfenstein: Youngblood
#23. Xuan-Yuan Sword VII
Coming soon or just released  
#24. Atomic Heart
#25. Boundary
#26. Bright Memory: Infinite
#27. Convallaria
#28. Cyberpunk 2077
#29. Doom Eternal
#30. Dying Light 2
#31. Enlisted
#32. F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch
#33. Grimmstar
#34. Project X
#35. Sword and Fairy 7
#36. Synced: Off Planet
#37. Vampire: The Masquerade-Bloodlines 2
#38. World of Warcraft: Shadowlands

 

 

[J7SC_Orion]

Further to one of my posts on Monday (re. TSMC, all eggs in one basket) above, I just saw this at Tom's HW...

 

[mouacyk]

The root issue here is a quid-pro-quo.  I think the reporting and reactions are overblown and sensationalized. A company takes a risk on a leading edge tech, and they are sending out free samples to ask for the favor of dedicated coverage.  I'm not seeing anything malicious in this request, such as requiring the reviewer to manipulate data, exclude relevant data (raster results), or outright exclude competitor exposure.  Unless I missed some detail, it seems HWUB interpreted the directive as #2, and correctly weighed its audience against NVidia.  But the interpretation is badly stretched.  I get that NVidia and AMD are no ones friend, but I also only see one of them taking leading edge risks. As one customer, I'd like to see what the rewards are.