This morning, Nvidia announced that it would artificially reduce the performance of its upcoming $329 GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card when it comes to one specific task: Ethereum cryptocurrency mining. As weird as that news might sound, it was music to the ears of some gamers — who have been trying and failing to get their hands on graphics cards for months due to the great GPU shortage, and blaming miners for part of that.
You might be wondering: what does this mean for other GPUs? Nvidia isn't talking about its plans for future graphics cards just yet, but the company tells The Verge (in no uncertain terms) that it won't nerf existing GPUs. "We are not limiting the performance of GPUs already sold," says a spokesperson.
Previously: Nvidia Cripples Ethereum Mining Capability for Upcoming RTX 3060, Announces Dedicated Mining Cards
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NVIDIA Nerfs Ethereum Hash Rate & Launches CMP Dedicated Mining Hardware
NVIDIA's announcement today is two-fold: firstly addressing the upcoming launch of the RTX 3060 graphics on February 25th, and secondly announcing a new range of dedicated mining hardware.
[...] For the upcoming RTX 3060, the software drivers for this graphics card will automatically limit cryptocoin hashing rates to half – making how much they can earn specifically halved. The software drivers will do this by detecting the math coming through the pipeline and restricting access to the hardware for those operations. At this point we're not sure if it's a cut in frequency that the drivers will cause or simply limiting the operations to half of the hardware, but either way NVIDIA is hoping this will detract professional miners from buying these cards if the return on them is halved.
Update: NVIDIA has also confirmed that performance restrictions will be going in for their Linux drivers as well as their Windows drivers. The inclusion of Linux drivers is incredibly important, as most dedicated miners are thought to be using Linux rather than Windows.
[...] In the same way that 'crypto' cards without video outputs were pushing into the market for balance, NVIDIA is going a step further and removing the video outputs from the silicon entirely. There are other potential optimizations that could be made for power and performance, but at this point NVIDIA is simply stating as graphics-less silicon. This could be a mix of customized new silicon, or simply silicon already manufactured that had defects in the video output pipeline.
The new NVIDIA CMP HX dedicated mining cards will come in four variants up to 320 W, and from authorized partners including ASUS, Colorful, EVGA, Gigabyte, MSI, Palit, and PC Partner. These cards (along with drivers) are also set to be designed such that more of these cards can be enabled in a single system.
The CMP HX mining cards have lower advertised hash rates than the RTX 3090, 3080, 3070, and 3060 Ti achieve. This could mean lower or higher efficiency depending on the actual power consumption of the cards.
Cryptocurrency miners found a way to sidestep Nvidia's anti-mining protections for its RTX 3060 graphics card, and craft coins to their hearts' content.
A day before its 3060 went on sale, Nvidia announced the GPU would require a GeForce driver designed to detect whether the hardware was running proof-of-work algorithms used to mine Ethereum. If this code was observed, the driver would force the chipset to slash its mining efficiency, or hash rate, crippling its ability to produce digital currency.
It was hoped that these measures would deter crypto-miners from snapping up all of these relatively cheap cards at launch, and leave a few more for gamers. It was a little bit obvious that miners would just buy the RTX 3060s anyway in hope that the driver-level protection would be defeated eventually.
And not only did the miners get their hands on the gear, they discovered a way, in some circumstances, to subvert the driver to successfully mine Ethereum. The trick is surprisingly trivial: use another driver. Nvidia recently released a technology preview driver, compatible with the RTX 3060, that included CUDA support for the latest Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL 2), allowing applications to tap into the graphics processor to accelerate things like machine-learning algorithms.
This driver also doesn't impose the Ethereum hashing limitations, and so switching to this software evades Nvidia's crackdown, depending on how you've set up your rig. "A developer driver inadvertently included code used for internal development which removes the hash rate limiter on RTX 3060 in some configurations," an Nvidia spokesperson confirmed to The Register on Tuesday. "The driver has been removed."
Previously:
Nvidia Says It Won't Nerf the Ethereum Mining Performance of Existing GPUs
Nvidia Cripples Ethereum Mining Capability for Upcoming RTX 3060, Announces Dedicated Mining Cards
Nvidia GeForce RTX 30 Series Laptop Shortages Likely as Ethereum Hunters Turn to Mobile Mining
(Score: 2) by cosurgi on Saturday February 20 2021, @01:59PM (8 children)
What's the problem with not updating drivers?
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#\ @ ? [adom.de] Colonize Mars [kozicki.pl]
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(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Saturday February 20 2021, @03:19PM (7 children)
The number one cause of graphics not working is not updating to the latest graphics card. That said, I am sort of surprised the miners do not create their own firmware as I would of expected them to be able to get way better performance if they tweaked the card to do nothing but mine.
But then you would think they would not even using consumer graphics cards any longer. Their has to be cheaper ways to make more effective computational modules for that specific use case.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @05:11PM (5 children)
What is the viability of getting a couple FPGA boards to do the mining?
(Score: 2) by Tork on Saturday February 20 2021, @07:52PM (4 children)
How long do you think it'd take you to do it?
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @08:50PM (3 children)
Would not take me too long. But I have no personal interest to expend effort in the realm of internet fantasy bucks.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by jasassin on Saturday February 20 2021, @09:17PM (2 children)
Considering the vBIOS is encrypted [tomshardware.com] and handshakes with the silicon and the driver, I doubt it would be as easy as you think.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 21 2021, @03:20AM (1 child)
Who the fuck is talking about emulating NVIDIA? I was proposing using FPGA boards to do buttcoin mining. Like using real math and such.
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Tuesday February 23 2021, @01:25AM
Sorry, my mistake. I was reading a thread about making a firmware or driver that would bypass the hash limit. It was not my intention to aggravate anyone.
My apologies, please disregard my previous post.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 21 2021, @02:39AM
It wouldn't get that much better performance, if at all. The actual algorithm is quite simple, just repeated for a large number of rounds, and can easily be loaded without any delay introduced by not having special firmware. Even if you had the time and money to put into custom firmware for this sort of thing, you'd be better served with a FPGA or ASIC.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Snotnose on Saturday February 20 2021, @02:07PM
I bought your product. I have the right to use your product in any (legal) way I see fit. It's none of your business. How do you know my app, whatever it is that doesn't involve mining, isn't seen by your code as mining?
Good on them for making cards optimized for mining, I hope they make a mint (ha!).
Latest news is they've changed their mind on this, they won't be nerfing performance after all.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by takyon on Saturday February 20 2021, @02:25PM (6 children)
NVIDIA may re-release the RTX 3080, RTX 3090 and others with anti-mining features built-in; current SKUs to be phased out [notebookcheck.net]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @05:14PM (4 children)
I talked to someone who wanted to build a gaming rig, but complained that no graphics cards were available.
Perhaps nvidia wants to maintain customers that don't want to burn electricity for Internet fantasy bucks?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday February 20 2021, @05:28PM (2 children)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sg__YdXbRtI [youtube.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @05:33PM (1 child)
Not going to watch a random yt link. What's the take home message?
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Saturday February 20 2021, @06:13PM
Nvidia's actions are completely anti-gamer/consumer. The CMP mining cards will lower the supply of Ampere gaming GPUs. Gamers who want to mine Ethereum to recover some of the value of the GPU they bought won't be able to do it effectively if the "50% nerf" works. There will be less GPUs on the used market, and at higher prices, after the mining boom is over 1-2 years later. All this comes after Nvidia sold $175+ million of GPUs directly to miners late last year, keeping prices inflated. Anybody who believes that this is good for consumers is buying Nvida's PR spin.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @06:07PM
"burn electricity for Internet fantasy bucks?"
stfu and use your counterfeit green backs, dumb goi slave.
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Saturday February 20 2021, @05:16PM
Ulgh. I have been trying to buy any 30 series GPU since release primarily for gaming, however running NiceHash on my PC 22 hours a day is critical for justifying the more expensive cards.
It might not be the end of my casual mining if I have a hampered card. I suspect the card mining at half speed would require less electricity, and prolong its life. Less total hashes at a better hash/watt would ultimately be better for my use case.
Situation is still very uncertain. Until I start seeing GPUs in stock it doesn't really matter for me anyway.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 20 2021, @02:32PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by Tork on Saturday February 20 2021, @07:55PM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by boltronics on Tuesday February 23 2021, @03:01AM
Linus Tech Tips did a nice little video about this the other day:
NVIDIA pretends to care about gamers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfIibTBaoMM [youtube.com]
It's GNU/Linux dammit!