Thursday, February 12th 2015

NVIDIA Disables GeForce GTX 900M Mobile GPU Overclocking with Driver Update

With GeForce R347 drivers (version 347.29), NVIDIA disabled overclocking on its GeForce GTX 900M series mobile GPUs. Buyers of new notebooks, and using older drivers, with the chips fell under the impression that like their desktop counterparts, the GTX 900M series support overclocking, until they updated their drivers to 347.29, to find that their overclocks were wiped back to reference clocks, and overclocking using third-party tools was disabled.

When angry users took to the official GeForce forums to report the bug, NVIDIA explained that overclocking on the GTX 900M series was enabled by accident, and has since been disabled with the recent driver updates. This explanation was met by angry reactions by users who argued that they should be allowed to use the hardware as they want, even if it voids their warranties. Historically, overclocking was allowed on NVIDIA GPUs.
Source: NVIDIA GeForce Forums
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160 Comments on NVIDIA Disables GeForce GTX 900M Mobile GPU Overclocking with Driver Update

#26
moviemarketing
OctopussIf you are playing games on a notebook, you are doing it VERY WRONG, period.
Even at stock clocks 980M still smokes 99% of desktop cards on the market.
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#27
newtekie1
Semi-Retired Folder
It isn't just the 900M series, this affects my 840M as well. I assume it is all Maxwell based GPUs that were affected. Overclocking might not make that big of a difference on the higher end GPUs, but I definitely notice the difference on my lower end one. I had a nice 200MHz overclock on the core and memory, and it allowed me to enable some extra features so I wasn't running games on completely low settings. Looks like it is back to low settings for me. This sucks, but oh well.
OctopussIf you are playing games on a notebook, you are doing it VERY WRONG, period.
I have a nice powerful desktop to play games on. I also travel with my family. Lugging my desktop and 27" monitor around on airplanes and in the car isn't exactly a decent option. So it is either use a laptop or not game at all. There are a lot of situations where a laptop is the best option. And just because laptops aren't as powerful doesn't mean they are useless for playing games. My 840M plays every game on the market. And being a true gamer, I don't care if I'm running at lower settings and lower resolutions, I just care that I'm gaming.
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#28
insane 360
i overclock my dell vostro 3560 when i game. it has the crappy hd7670m amd graphics in it, but when i overclock it, my games run 1080p at medium settings, without overclock, most of those games are slide shows...

and no i didn't buy the laptop for gaming, but it happens to game just fine when i want to game on it
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#29
Uplink10
This is what you call an impeccable timing, an irony. Dust from GTX 970 didn't settle but they keep trying to screw up more along the way. Maybe they didn't think anyone overclocked their GPUs in laptops and then tried to silently turn it off.

Nvidia turned "it is not a bug it is a feature" into "it is not a feature it is a bug".
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#30
TRWOV
Coming up soon on AMD's twitter:



:laugh:

You don't do this kind of stuff nVidia. Not after the 970 drama :banghead:

People would (likely) understand if new parts came out with no overclocking but disabling overclocking on an already overclockable part... :shadedshu:
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#32
romeg
I have a GTX770M in a gaming laptop and while I've given some thought to overclocking it, I've not done so for the simple reason that, as is, it meets my needs and expectations perfectly.

Having said that, I think I should be allowed to overclock if I wish. Afterall, it was MY money that bought the GPU and I should have the right to do whatever I wish to it. I overclocked my GTX780Ti and my GTX980 mainly because I could and I haven't seen fit yo return to the factory settings.
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#33
64K
P4-630sometime ago MSI was mentioning overclocking their GTX980M sli laptop on their website , that text is gone now...
us.msi.com/product/nb/GT80-Titan-SLI-GTX-980M-SLI.html#hero-overview
Good lord that laptop is $3,300 at Newegg. GTX 980m SLI for a 1080p screen. :confused: 1440p would have been a better choice for that much GPU.

I use my laptop with a GTX 660m in it for gaming when I travel and it does fine with older games and with newer games I have to turn down the settings but $800 is as high as will go for the amount of use I get out of it. My desktop rig is for most of my gaming.
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#34
iO
I'd be pissed if I had a 10kg desktop replacement monster and nVidia decides that I'm too dumb to gauge the risk and gains of overclocking...
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#35
Ferrum Master
Does vbios hex editing work on these cards still?
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#37
MxPhenom 216
ASIC Engineer
I never liked the idea of overclocking a laptop anyways. The cooling designs on most of them are bare minimum.
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#38
natr0n
One can use older drivers, mod new ones perhaps, bypass with afterburner always ways around things.
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#39
newtekie1
Semi-Retired Folder
MxPhenom 216I never liked the idea of overclocking a laptop anyways. The cooling designs on most of them are bare minimum.
That isn't really the case. Sure, on the cheap laptops the cooling is bare minimum. But on the high end laptop with GTX 900M cards, the cooling is very adequate. Overclocking might make the fan run a little bit more, but that is it. Even on my 840m laptop, which is classified as an ultra-thin, the cooling is sufficient to let me overclock the 840m by a far bit. Even with the GPU overclocked an extra 200MHz temps never go over 60°C for the GPU or CPU. Upping the clocks doesn't really increase heat output a massive amount, it is upping the voltage that really increases the heat and the mobile GPUs never allowed for raising the voltage.
natr0nOne can use older drivers, mod new ones perhaps, bypass with afterburner always ways around things.
Right now I'm sticking with the older drivers, but obviously that likely won't be a long term solution if I want to keep playing newer games. I'm hoping, at the very least, some wise person figures out how to mod the new drivers to enable overclocking again. Afterburner doesn't work with the new drivers, that is the point. When you hit the apply button in any overclocking software, the overclock isn't applied, the sliders in Afterburner just revert right back to stock clocks.
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#40
Regenweald
marsey99if you overclock them now how can we sell them to you again next year when we do it?

or is that not what this is saying?
Yeah Amd rebranded the 7870M multiple times and sold that for about 2-3 years....
standard fare for this industry really... but i dn't see the need for OC'ing laptop gpus. heat is too big a factor.
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#41
Recus
First gaming laptops are fail, very expensive. We won't buy it. But when Nvidia disables overclocking everyone changing their minds. And even they can't afford $2000 980M gaming laptop they start advocating those you can buy it. If you can buy gaming laptop you know they have short performance lifetime. You just buy new one.
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#42
moviemarketing
RecusFirst gaming laptops are fail, very expensive. We won't buy it. But when Nvidia disables overclocking everyone changing their minds. And even they can't afford $2000 $1500 980M gaming laptop they start advocating those you can buy it.
Fixed that for you ( www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8652-clevo-p650sg-p-7795.html )

As for whether gaming laptops are too expensive, what exactly are you comparing them to, $200 Chromebooks or $800 consumer grade stuff from hp, dell, etc.? 860M laptops start from around $900, 970M laptops start around $1200.

Most people I know already need a laptop for work or school, and some of us need one that can handle demanding applications. In most cases gaming cards have better performance relative to cost than the mobile Quadro and Firepro cards, and going for decent laptop with 980M or 970M is cheaper than buying separate gaming desktop and laptop.
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#43
Hood
OctopussIf you are playing games on a notebook, you are doing it VERY WRONG, period.
This is the most sensible comment I've heard yet. People play "Bejeweled" on their craptops and think they have a "Gaming Laptop" They probably think a console is better for gaming than a PC...
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#44
Jurassic1024
I think nVIDIA knew how well these overclocked, but something other than rebranding is responsible for this, so I'll save my finger pointing and fear mongering until I get more info.
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#45
TRWOV
RecusFirst gaming laptops are fail, very expensive. We won't buy it. But when Nvidia disables overclocking everyone changing their minds. And even they can't afford $2000 980M gaming laptop they start advocating those you can buy it. If you can buy gaming laptop you know they have short performance lifetime. You just buy new one.
This driver affects even low grade parts (as per newtekie's post) which would benefit more from the overclocking. Not every laptop owner game on a 980M, I still have my old emachines m5310 with an overclocked 320m IGP. Doesn't play anything modern but is fine for my old pre-2000 games and the overclock helped a lot (from 150Mhz to 205Mhz, a hefty 35% overclock). I had to swap the aluminium heatsink for a cooper one though.
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#46
macintux
As someone who owns a Clevo gaming laptop, and has built several gaming desktops, the amount of vitriol and hatred in this thread for people with gaming laptops is saddening and disturbing.

"This is the most sensible comment I've heard yet. People play "Bejeweled" on their craptops and think they have a "Gaming Laptop" They probably think a console is better for gaming than a PC..."

This kind of rude comment is unnecessary, hateful, and does nothing to further the conversation. The GTX 860M GPU in my laptop overclocks very well without reaching thermal limits, and the idea of nVidia taking that away from me is, to say the least, annoying.
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#47
NC37
AMD marketing stab at nVidia by unlocking all their mobile GPUs coming in 3...2...
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#48
xfia
64KGood lord that laptop is $3,300 at Newegg. GTX 980m SLI for a 1080p screen. :confused: 1440p would have been a better choice for that much GPU.

I use my laptop with a GTX 660m in it for gaming when I travel and it does fine with older games and with newer games I have to turn down the settings but $800 is as high as will go for the amount of use I get out of it. My desktop rig is for most of my gaming.
yeah that 980m sli is op for 1080p.. could do 4k pretty damn good
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#49
TheoneandonlyMrK
Crazy times over at nvidia hq but the un answered question is WHY ,I mean they damn well know full well the Exact spec ,layout and pin out of all they sell and they do know how to market it well so why do this They know how these things go .

Because not doing it had the potential to cost them more is likely the answer.
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#50
Xzibit
Nvidia tells you its giving you ROPs, L2 cache and now overclocking only to take it back.

Looks like the goal is to convince people to only play at 1080p and phase out overclocking since its not needed, judging by the reactions.
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