The editor takes: In an obscure worded email, Nvidia told Hardware Unbox Box (and via the extension Texpot) that it would no longer provide them with GeForce installer version review units. Stated reason? Spend very little time focusing on RTX ray fibers, as opposed to raster performance. Hardware unboxed XD, apparently, “can’t see things the way we (Nvidia), gamers and the rest of the industry do.”
As you know, Hardware Unboxed is Steve and Tim’s YouTube channel, and both Steve and Tim have been Texpot partners for a long time. To this day, the same PC enthusiasts in our publications collaborate and share the DNA that we have created together for almost two decades. At Texpot, we are the proud hosts of their work for the latest reviews and written versions of opinions on CPUs, GPUs and their entire PC hardware industry.
As a corporation, Nvidia has the foresight to decide on who it chooses to collaborate with. However, these and other related incidents raise serious questions about the freedom of the press and the expectations of reviewers when they are sent products for biased opinion. As an independent technical publication, we’ve spent the last 20+ years providing objective and informative content. Hardware Unbox XD Tech reviews are extensive. They are meant to inform customers about every aspect of a particular product, so that you know exactly before making a purchase decision.
Nvidia has officially decided to ban us from receiving FFors Installers Edition GPU review samples
His argument is that we are focusing on rasterization rather than ray tracing.
They have said they will revisit this “should change your editorial direction”.
More to come
– Hardware Unboxed (@ Hardware Unboxed) December 11, 2020
In today’s dynamic graphics hardware space, with 350W flagships, hardware ray tracing and foreign cooling solutions, HUB has lots of data points to look at. But at the end of the day, every GPU The only real question the buyer wants to know is: how well do games run on a particular piece of hardware? Considering that 99% of Steam games feature only raster-only rendering pipelines, rasterization performance is a key issue, which Steve considers in the GPU review.
Ray tracing is becoming increasingly important. AMDA has equipped both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X / S with a hardware ray accelerator, and we’ve seen significant ray-trace visuals in games like this. Spider-Man: Miles Morales Upcoming Forza Motorsport on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X / S. While the performance isn’t exactly where it should be (even with help DLSS), Cyberpunk 2077 provides a jaw-dropping vision of next-gen on PCs, dialing RTX effects all the way.
However, most games (including almost all RTX titles) are built on raster render. Most of its death space will run a fictional graphics card QuakeScript II RTX reserved for ray tracing and no other. Ray tracing deserves a place in the most modern GPU reviews. But instead of raster performances, it’s not enough in games for any responsible reviewer to put it in the center-stage. That won’t do justice to customers, who will primarily run the raster workload. That’s why Nvidia’s complaint is surprising.
Thank you for the support, while reading the comments and stories I realized that I reviewed my first Nvidia GeForce product 20 years ago, the GeForce 2 GTS provided by Nvidia. So, they just ended a 20-year working relationship and for what?
– Hardware Unboxed (@ Hardware Unboxed) December 11, 2020
In an email to Steve, Nvidia senior PR manager Brian Del Rizzo says “Nvidia is the best for ray tracing,” and “Despite all this progress, your GPU reviews and recommendations continue to focus on rasterization operations alone and most of you We’ve discounted all the other technologies we offer gamers, “said Del Rizzo.” You don’t see things the way we, the gamers, and the rest of the industry do.
This statement is particularly ironic and vague. On Nvidia’s landing page for DLSS, the GPU manufacturer literally uses a hardware unboxed quote (“extremely impressive”) to promote their AI upscaling technology. Our initial appearance on DLSS in Battlefield V revealed a technology that was in dire need of improvement. Two years later, we reviewed DLSS 2.0 in Control and Wolfenstein Youngblood and recognized the tremendous improvements Nvidia has made to this technology. At the very least, Hub’s claim that “things don’t look the same” is contradictory. As an objective reviewer, Steve’s responsibility is for his viewers and readers to see the way he is, which is not always consistent with the way Nvidia sees him.
Confidence and objectivity are crucial for any successful reviewer. Not every graphics card is a winner. Some, like the Radion VII and the Jeffers GT1030 DDR4, were just plain awful. Not every graphics technology is a game-changer.
I have something else to say about NVIDIA’s recent decision to shoot both its legs: they have now created it so that any reviewer covering RT will be subject to scrutiny by distrustful viewers who suspect suspicion of obsession by the company.
Shortsighted self from NVIDIA.
– Gamers Nexus (@ Gamers Nexus) December 11, 2020
Clearly, the reviewers know this is no different, but Nvidia found it very arrogant that you write an email in such a way that you can either agree with their opinions, or else.
A decade ago, Nvidia’s hardware physics acceleration was seen as a revolution, enabling advanced destruction, fluid dynamics and particle simulation in games. Arkham City And Metro: 2033. Back in 2010, we included the PhysX benchmark in our review of Mafia II. PhysX has extensive coverage in Anandtech, Toms’ hardware and other outlets. However, he never made it more important than a raster performance. There were raster benchmarks, More Anti-aliasing enabled raster benchmark, and then a PhysX test. Here’s a clear, consistent thread from FXX to RTX: HBB and Texpot give GPU technologies the amount of coverage they believe consumers need to make informed choices.
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Texpot and H.B.B. Between the combined, we estimate in the thousands – after looking at one of HUB’s many RTX reviews, it will be difficult to gauge exactly how many people bought the RTX graphics card – but it is definitely worth more than the price. A graphics card. But, in the end, it’s not about playing here …
Attacking press freedom is always a losing-lose scenario: reviewers, consumers and businesses all have a negative impact. Shortly after Steve was revealed with Nvidia’s email, he was spotted Overwhelming Support from the tech community. Not just Hardware Unbox XD, or fans of viewers and readers, but numerous tech outlets who understand that this is not just about Steve or Hardware Unbox, but about the principle.
Clearly, the reviewers know this is no different, but Nvidia was too arrogant to write a full email explaining what you can do. Either get their opinion, or. This can happen with any other outlet. In fact, it has already happened to many of them, but either to a lesser extent or handled in such a way that Nvidia (or any other large tech company) played the role of ignoring the reviewer without ever giving an explanation.
Less than 48 hours later, Steve received good news.
Nvidia apologized and everything went back. Really good news, but let’s be clear that this wouldn’t have happened, had it not been for the support of the community of big and key people in the technical space, who had a big influence that was too much to ignore Nvidia. Linus from LinusTectips (the rage on the WN show embedded above it is pure gold) and Steve from Gamers Nexus, Were two of those individuals.
For the past few days our own Steve Vonton (HB) has been living this whole situation close to his chest and he expects to upload a video with his calculations soon.
Big news
I just got an email from Nvidia apologizing for the previous email and they have gone after everything now.
This thing has been a roller coaster ride for the last few days. I want to thank everyone who supported us, thank you very much linusgsebastian
– Hardware Unboxed (@ Hardware Unboxed) December 12, 2020
Things don’t really have to be this difficult. At the end of the day, reviewers, consumers (and the “rest of the industry”) all want the same things. We want Nvidia, AMD, Intel (and heck, even! Moment!) To produce great hardware that can do justice to the next pay generation of games and computing. There is a lot to look forward to in the coming years.
We continue to take a holistic, holistic approach so that every technology covered has its rightful place. As Nvidia said, consumers work hard for their money. We just want to make sure you know what you’re spending on.
