Better silent than stupid - German proverb
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Nvidia's GTX590 fried by an old software driver
SWEDISH OVERCLOCKERS have blown up two Nvidia GTX590 cards by using an old 267.52 software driver that lacks overcurrent protection.
Only one day after its release, Nvdia's flagship Geforce GTX590 high end graphics card, which is staggeringly expensive at £569, has been tried and fried. Not once, but twice.
Respected Swedish overclockers Sweclockers reported the incident after receiving sample cards from a local vendor to test. The team raised the voltage to the GPUs on card one, which died smoking and popped some components. But, in name of science, though more probably in the name of blowing up expensive stuff, the team got another reference board and tried again, only to see it also shuffle off its mortal coil.
After discussions with Nvidia, it seems that the problem isn't the GTX590 card itself but with an older 267.52 software driver that lacks the overcurrent protection found on later drivers. The Swiss team tried again using the 267.71 drivers, which has the overcurrent protection built in and the GTX590 didn't fry itself.
The problem for the Green Goblin is that punters who have shelled out a small fortune to buy its brand new high performance GTX590 card are engaging in software driver roulette. Those older 267.52 drivers are shipped with the card and anyone willing to pay top whack for a high end niche graphics card will likely be an overclocker and prone to tinkering.
We haven't found any UK forum updates from GTX590 users affected by the same problem but Nvidia has already responded to the issue.
"A few press reports on GTX 590 boards dying were caused by unsafe overvoltaging (as high as 1.2V vs. default voltage of 0.91 to 0.96V), & using older drivers that have less overcurrent protection," an Nvidia spokesperson told the INQUIRER in an email.
"Rest assured that GTX 590 operates reliably at default voltages, and our 267.84 launch drivers provide additional levels of protection," they added. µ
Tags: Hardware
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Swedish overclockers are part of a swiss team?
I'm from America, so anyone not on our side of the pond is in the 'other' camp, but come on. Everyone knows the swedish baker from the muppets doesn't eat swiss cheese!
Hey Steve-O I work at AMD in Markham, our voltage regulations is handled by bios lock. We have a special utility not for the public which unlocks the voltage. It's used for testing purposes.
The reviews sound retarded to me. Oh by the way we love the inquirer in the office. It does all the nvidia bashing for us! Keep up the good work guys!
As they say in overclocking, nothing is guaranteed except disaster. I'll bet Nvidia will be replacing a lot of these over-priced fanboy toys for smoke and fire damage.
Nvidia, the software company.
Overvoltage protection should be built into the actual physical video card itself. AFAIK, AMD does this. I thought NV was smart enough to do this. I guess since NV skimped on that 1" and made a smaller card than the 6990, the 590 is missing some "obvious features".
Every NV driver for the next while is going to be suspect for it's ability to maybe fry the card.
@Mike
Latest drivers? From where? They did this as reviewers, with the driver provided at the time, before launch. Also, 1.025 V isn't really that much of a increase..
Anyway, this isn't a very big deal as long as users are aware of the issue and download new drivers before overclocking.
I don't get it.
Why did the Swedes become Swiss residents afters destroying 2 GTX590 cards??
Did they choose to? Or where they forced??
Or where they afraid being prosecuted after 'leaking' the news ;-)
LOL at these guys. Overclocking is not officially supported. Even so, they'd have been OK if only they'd remembered to get the latest drivers. And when it went wrong they fried another card instead of fixing the problem first. Idiots...
I wouldn't blame nVidia here. It's like blaming Ford after you attach rockets to your car and hit a wall.