Friday, November 3rd 2023
TechPowerUp Selects PNY as Graphics Card Provider for Review Test Systems
TechPowerUp is proud to announce a partnership with PNY, in which PNY XLR8 GeForce RTX graphics cards will power the hardware review test benches featured throughout the site. With a rich history as a key graphics vendor for professionals, PNY has established a longstanding partnership with NVIDIA, serving as a provider of high-end graphics cards and datacenter GPUs. They are also providing memory solutions for professional photographers and creators. More recently the company specialized into gaming graphics with its XLR8 GeForce graphics card series. Over the past two generations, the company has taken product design and development for these cards completely in-house, ensuring that gamers receive top-quality products.
The latest generation of PNY XLR8 GeForce RTX 40-series graphics cards have been extensively tested by TechPowerUp, showcasing exceptional noise levels, low cooler temperatures, ample overclocking potential, efficient power management, and outstanding overall performance. We were so impressed by our first PNY RTX 40-series graphics cards, especially their fan-tuning and thermals, that we decided to incorporate PNY graphics cards as the baseline for our review test beds across the site. Our partnership with PNY will see various models of PNY XLR8 GeForce RTX graphics cards form the VGA component of the test benches, across our review test setups for CPUs, motherboards, cases, memory, SSDs, CPU coolers, and more. However, it's important to note that for graphics card reviews, the baseline values continue to be obtained from reference design graphics cards.
Update 19:31 UTC: Just to clarify, this will not affect our review scoring in any way. We will continue to test AMD-based graphics cards, we will test GPUs from other manufacturers, and we will review every product in the same exact same way like we've done in the past 20 years. We simply needed a bunch of graphics cards for the test systems listed, and PNY was willing to provide them.
The latest generation of PNY XLR8 GeForce RTX 40-series graphics cards have been extensively tested by TechPowerUp, showcasing exceptional noise levels, low cooler temperatures, ample overclocking potential, efficient power management, and outstanding overall performance. We were so impressed by our first PNY RTX 40-series graphics cards, especially their fan-tuning and thermals, that we decided to incorporate PNY graphics cards as the baseline for our review test beds across the site. Our partnership with PNY will see various models of PNY XLR8 GeForce RTX graphics cards form the VGA component of the test benches, across our review test setups for CPUs, motherboards, cases, memory, SSDs, CPU coolers, and more. However, it's important to note that for graphics card reviews, the baseline values continue to be obtained from reference design graphics cards.
87 Comments on TechPowerUp Selects PNY as Graphics Card Provider for Review Test Systems
I saw the /s btw
I would be quite happy to raffle off my old 1080ti FE to a tpu member, lets see what happens!
I personally have no doubts that @W1zzard & crew will remain objective and impartial.
To me, this seems like a good partnership. PNY(and Palit, the designers for most of PNY's PCBs) are well known and trustworthy.
W1zzard has given us no reason to suspect bias in the past and until shown otherwise I'd prefer to take this announcement as the good fortune for TPU it is. Perhaps it's worth holding off on accusations of bias or doom saying until we have some actual hard evidence?
Not everything on the internet needs to be battle or a conspiracy.
I guess time will tell
Hey W1z, mind if I ask which (older) cards are/will be from PNY (as I am that very weird guy that thinks about things down to the clock states when comparing a new product review versus a blanket non-descriptive card on the chart)? Is it all (and only) the 40 series? I had assumed most were FE (where applicable), as IMO that makes the most sense as a non-biased baseline. Not only from a value perspective, but nVIDIA also generally appears not to give themselves the most garbage bins of their chips (unlike AMD, where it may be a choice to make their partners look better and/or be a worse-case scenario). I don't want to say where I think those chips go....people can look at performance of past cards from different vendors of the same chip and come to that conclusion for themselves. Let's just say it would make sense if they end up at Best Buy rather than a dedicated computer site like Newegg (for people are much more savvy about the intricacies of what they're buying.)
Let it be known that as a close observer of the space that I do not like this. While there's always been the possibility, if not overwhelming likelihood that a site like TPU could receive golden samples and the like, this just muddies that water even further. I know you know, but the importance of your charts as a resource for people *could* mean all kinds of things, down to even nVIDIA/PNY straight-up binning parts FOR YOU that show a particular threshold result that may not be indicative of most (or certainly PNY) typical performance. You may think that's crazy, but it really, really isn't. It's marketing 101. This site and your reviews are a very important resource within this scene, and make no mistake that PNY is doing this to bolster their (kind of second-rate) reputation within it. To think they won't do everything in their power (conceivably aided by nVIDIA) to rig perception is naive. That is literally the point of stuff like this. I would go so far as to say you are perhaps the best bang-for-buck for a sponsorship, as your site/reviews are a much-cited 'hard' resource in a world that is converting from written media to video (Youtube) wrt revenue. They also know that.
You being businessman that has put decades of work in for the community, I completely understand wanting to profit from that reputation. You rightfully deserve recognition and to profit from your work because of what you've done.
I really just wish there was some other way. I know it's tough for print/websites competing versus YT, and TPU doesn't doesn't have the foothold there it rightfully should given the quality of content. But still.
I will support you regardless, and I know/trust you do your best to be unbiased, but please be aware this does open a door for someone to come in and do something similar without those thoughts in the back of peoples' minds.
That's not something I ever thought I would say about this site.
Understand while many other sources generally develop Computer Hardware Reviewer Syndrome eventually, your reputation has stood the test of time like almost no other; the clout is real. You have that clout for NOT doing this.
If nothing else, I appreciate you being transparent with the/your community. Also very cool of you to donate a card to a reader. "Little" things like that go a long way in this world imo, and you probably made their day/week/month/year.
Thanks again, for all that you do. Just, you know, think about it. There's so few sources (left) of your rep/caliber that haven't been destroyed by buying up their talent or tarnishing their cred/skewing perceived reality through sponsorships.
I think your reading to much into this, the cards are for the review machines :- ssd,cases,etc so giving "golden samples" would not make a ssd or case review any better or worse.
And yes this site to me is the bastion of great hardware reviews and a great commuinty to boot, i really dont think having a GPU supplier on board as a sponsor is a bad thing, just good buisness practice?
Also thank you for noticing that W1z has offered me a shiny new gpu, I really didnt expect anything when i asked, honestly.
And i really want to get my 1080ti out to a TPU'er who needs it.
:)
While I don't want W1z to have to write out the model for every card in a chart, this does cloud the picture especially if say he uses a "XLR8" (which these pictures ALL show) versus a stock card from PNY and/or AMD. XLR8 is their premium brand and not reflective of a 'stock' card.
I think my points still stand regardless of how negligible the impact in some scenarios. People see these things and they DO matter, or else the sponsorships wouldn't exist.
No, I do not think it's a good business practice in his line of work, especially given his reputation: that's precisely my point. You may not see it that way, but some will. Others won't know the difference.
I respect your opinion though, of course. Congrats on your card. Like I said, really cool to see that connection. Thanks also for your work on the site, you deserve it.
Like I said, if he chooses to use them in CPU/GPU reviews I think that skews the picture, especially to those uninformed, and that damages his credibility in my eyes.
When I see a GPU chart from the 40 series, I expect it to be running at ~2730mhz because that is an accurate representation for most peoples' ootb experience unless they choose to buy an overclocked AIB model (or do it themselves). That is why the charts are labeled as the vanilla part number. Anything different DOES skew things towards nVIDIA. To not see that, especially when nVIDIA sells their cards at VERY particular clockspeeds so their cards have market segmentation/planned obsoletion in many enthusiasts eyes (when they drop below 60/120fps mins on his charts, for example) is just....well, just wrong and also exactly what they want. I come here for an accurate picture so that I can both pick apart the market as well as help people to the best of my ability. To do that, things must be fair.
If stock isn't and/or no longer will be the case, then W1zard should accurately display the AIB, model, and clockspeed on each card benched...Just as many other credible sites do.
Yes, it does look like shit when they do that. No, I don't want that and think his graphs are very succinct. That is why they must be stock.
Like I said, this muddies the water (likely on purpose from nVIDIA/PNY). You can choose to believe or not believe that, but that's how good marketing works. It's also how credibility dies and makes my job of trying to reccommend a card/cpu to someone based on accurate information of both what it is doing and can do very difficult. I'm sure nVIDIA loves that. As a human that prefers honesty/ground truth, I hate it.
I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing. If W1zard uses stock PNY cards then the problem is completely solved (as long as that card is accurately reviewed itself). I am very curious if XLR8 models are in the contract. I'm not saying it's guarenteed they are, but I'd be willing to guess they are.
Hey, listen, I'd LOVE to be wrong. MAYBE I AM. But, MAYBE I'M NOT. I've just seen this shit way too many times and that's exactly why most consumers are fooled.
W1zard can do what he wants, but I prefer him to be completely transparent and now I have to question that.
go lookup the clock table before spouting off the xrlr8 cards are not factory ocd or binned they are pnys entry level reference clones with a fancy cooler
but ill shut you down with this
clock speed doesn't matter the impacts are negligiable certainly no ware near enough to tip the scales one way or the other considering how terrible amds cards are at anything other then raster performace which like it or not is DEAD. btw even clock to the moon at 2800mhz the 4090 still looses in some raster tests
please gather up your outrage and show your self the door thanks
For the GPU reviews, nothing will changeNo. PEOPLE PLEASE READ THE ORIGINAL POST. NOTHING CHANGES FOR GPU REVIEWSYes, they have .. for around a year .. since I replaced my EVGA 3080 FTW3 with a PNY RTX 4090 .. interesting that just now I'm hearing about this
Could you, if possible, ask your contact about these topics?
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/pny-rtx4070ti-xlr8-high-rpm-hat-30-fan-speed.313049/
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/pny-geforce-rtx-4070-xlr8.314418/
www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/pny-rtx-4070-ti-xlr8-oc-new-worse-bios-version.313690/
I don't like it when a customer changes the bios and fan profile this “much” within the lifecycle of the card without calling it v1 or v1.1 or whatever.
Nice never used one before now that evga is gone guess it's time to consider a new gpu maker ;)
Where is the outrage from folks for that decision?
Sadly, people need to bitch just to bitch, I guess. I think it's great a company sees your work and feels that not only you could benefit from having a sponsor for your work, but also provide you a line of cards to test your systems out with so you're not having to fork out your own cash for such things. I wouldn't care if XFX came back to making Nvidia cards and they became your GPU provider for your bench systems.