Nvidia Reports Large Quantities of Defective Notebook Chips

Nvidia has found that "significant quantities" of older graphics cards that shipped in notebook PCs were defective. Nvidia says it has not determined the exact cause of the problem, but it is associated with a packaging material used with some of the chips, and the thermal design of some notebooks.
Nvidia will introduced a software driver that will cause the cooling fan in a notebook to spin sooner to make the chips run cooler, reducing stress on the chips. The products have been failing at "higher than normall rates."

The company has taken significant hits in the stock market, seeing its stock drop about 30%. The expected repair/replacement costs will total between $150 and $200 million, which it will take against its second quarter earnings. There are no specifics as to which products were affected, except for the fact that they are graphics cards and media and communications processors. To top everything off, Nvidia has lowered is second quarter earnings forecast.

Full Story (Yahoo.com)

 

I wonder how many would actually take the driver update. No every average joe knows how to update graphic drivers...

 

I wonder the same thing. Sadly, the majority of consumers expect everything to be up to date right out of the box, which is usually never the case.

I have a feeling an ATI era is coming.

 

So this only applies to older NV cards?

 

... ATI has a priceless chance to surpass Nvidia, and I hope they do - just to give AMD a chance against intel. the cash AMD could make off this would really help them.

 

If it involves the 8400GS in my XPS 1330, then it makes sense why it's running at high temps (over 100 degrees centigrade) while playing games like WC3 at max settings.

 

I wonder how and where they are gonna release these drivers. To my knowledge Nvidia almost never makes drivers just for notebooks and that fast-track plan I read about months ago, new drivers every couple of months, only applied to some vendors (others didn't support it for some reason). The only way I can see this helping alot of people would be if it was released as an update within Windows. I would also like them to release a list of the gpu they consider faulty because I have an older 7600 (that I can't monitor temps so I just hope its doing alright) and a new 8800 gts.

 

this probably helps to explain why a lot of the newer notebooks by the large companies seem to be accompanied by ati graphics....

 

Damn, I hope my new AMD/Nvidia8400MGS won't break...

 

Cue the investor sell-off of Nvidia stock... Rough times we live in.

 

The Dell XPS M1710 are HARDLY hit. I know people that have had their cards die in the last few months.

I became one of them 3 weeks ago.

Even though i'm out of Dell warranty, they better give me something. I had to buy a new FX3500

 

Can you say Dell M1330?

 

ouch, I'm going with ATI for my next notebook. Who knows what's next...

 

I wonder if laptopvideo2go.com will have a moded driver since I doubt Nvidia will release a notebook driver.

 

I think that answers your question.

 

I hope sager burn in my 8800/9800gtx real good. Speaking of burning in though, if the company really spent the time doing it, wouldn't they see something was wrong?

 

Yeah, I saw that but I'm trying to recall if I've ever used a driver supplied by Nvidia from their website in my laptop. Think I used the Dell driver initially then the modded ones up till now.
Looking on Nvidia's website I don't even find a driver available for either the 8600m or 8700m running Windows XP 32bit (I'm about to convert my OS from Vista to XP).

 

Irrespective of the recall, Nvidia's second quarter revenue estimate had to be revised down 20%. That is a huge miss. Something's changing.

 

My Macbook Pro 8600m GT GDDR3 has been running strong for a year now. It runs at high temps at load (between 82 and 92 Centigrade) but I've been gaming on this system like a monster for almost the entire year and things seem to be going fine.

That said, this will give ATI an extra boost. Now they are gaining their reputation back with the 4800 series and can also boast that their chips are "more reliable" or some marketing phrase like that.

Now for AMD to fix up their processor share.

 

My HP's Geforce Go 7200 failed almost two weeks ago; I'll bet it has something to do with this.

 

Ha ha

I am actually considering picking up more stock at this point.

Market drops are my most active buying period

 

Any chance any of the new cards in the new upcomming Sager's will be affected. Or is this for older notebooks.

 

First Montevina is delayed, giving Puma an advantage, then this happens.

I sense the market shifting very soon. Should be interesting.

 

Could explain why my Dell Vostro 1710 (with 8600M GS) was hitting temperatures of 115 centigrade after running World of Warcraft for 5 minutes. And it would also explain why the replacement part was actually worse, hitting temperatures over 120 centigrade.

Just as well the laptop is being sent back and I'm getting refunded. This would also seem to account for Dell not putting up too much of a fight upon my asking for a refund. But then again, a faulty power adapter, an over heating GPU and an over heating replacement GPU plus the wrong card shipped in the notebook may be enough of a merit.

 

Heh....AMD/ATI has a rare opportunity to topple Intel/Nvidia.

 

Well if temps are getting that high it could best be explained by a horrible cooling system on Dell's part.

 

This is shaping up to be the perfect storm for the Intel/Nvidia powerhouses. I hope AMD/ATI can capitalize on this rare opportunity and grab back some market share and build some consumer confidence so they'll stay competitive.

 

I highly doubt that. I never saw more than 70C on my Vostro 1500 with its 8600 GT, even after long periods of gaming.

And I think this whole ordeal explains a) why the 8400M G in my Asus died and got replaced last month, and b) why its still running at 80C or thereabouts even when not gaming.

 

fingers crossed for my 8600mgt. Anyway good time for Ati to catch up. Haven't heard anything decent until lately.

 

So is this a better time to buy intel/nividea stock while its low, or amd/ati stock because it may rise? Or both?

I've got about 1,000-1,500 I'm willing to put in long term. And I just found out geothermal energy is not a viable option

 

What I dont get is for the most part each notebook runs with their own special thermal profile. Some notebooks enjoy running a fan on low at all times, others spin up at any hint of warmth, while others need to light a fire on your crotch before it will decide to vent the heat.

NVIDIA releases thermal guidelines to notebook manufacturers on best temperatures for the chips to operate in, and the notebook maker builds a cooling system that can adequately cool the CPU and GPU. If your GPU is pushing 120C, you have some massive problems. Either the fan isnt turning on (not NVIDIAs problem), too small heatsink (not NVIDIAs problem), or improper thermal paste/pad application (again not NVIDIAs problem).

If the defect is in fact a chip problem like it is always under load and putting off excess heat I could understand the situation. But most of these notebooks are not running under constant load (you would notice horrible battery life).

For the most part it sounds like NVIDIA's GPU lineup cant handle the heat under higher loads (maybe 100C instead of 120-150C) and failing sooner.

 

I dunno - it's not easy to stop a freight train.
C2D is far and away leaps and bounds better than AMD - and I'm an AMD 'fanboy' - I still have a couple Athlon XP's around the house!

But, comparing, for example, my work Latitude D630(T9300/4GB/160GBx7200RPM/Nvidia 128MB Quadro NVS 135M) against even the BEST AMD has to offer, is really no contest.

Sad, too, because I've always rooted for AMD - I'm the only sucker in my whole company with an AMD-based server (HP Proliant DL145), even though we ALMOST bought some Sun Micro 8-way Opteron boxes for VMWare Infrastructure.

Ended up going Xeon with VT

Maybe this is their chance - I hope so.
The era where the AMD64 chips ruled was great - innovation was happening, speed was increasing by leaps and bounds, stuff was good. But what RELATIVELY AFFORDABLE discrete gfx does AMD have for notebooks? There's not much there. Do they even have something competitive with the 8600M GT?? At a reasonable price, that can be put in a sub-$1000 notebook?

I want :
14.1" 1680x1050 LED backlit
T9300 equivalent
4Gb RAM
160GB 7200 RPM drive
DVD-Super with at least Blu-Ray Read ability (for HD for above screen)
Discrete Graphics at least equivalent to NVidia GeForce GO 8600M GT+256Mb DDR3

and I want it for $899, so by the time you factor in tax, it's still under $1000

I don't need any stupid LED lights on the backside of the LCD, no whacky Logitech GameLCD, I don't need any computer-controlled lighting, it doesn't need to have a cigarette lighter - I want a freaking BASIC GAMING LAPTOP.
And I don't want to have to get a 2nd mortgage to afford it! Keep the cutsie paint jobs, the cutsie slipcases - give me function, not flim-flam!


T

 

I just had to have my whole system board replaced on my M1330 last month. I was having weird video problems along with blue screens and the system not booting at all. Dell's diagnostic utility couldn't locate the problem, but I suspected the Nvidia 8400M GS was the issue.

Good thing I got a 3 year warranty on my Dell.

 

I have to have the motherboard replaced on my X205. The video cards (8600s in SLi) have already been replaced but still overheat after ~2 minutes. I don't really like NVIDIA anymore after their GTX 280 pricing fiasco, my laptop dying twice, my 7800GS dying after less than a year, and the fact that I have mostly used AMD/ATI for the last 6 years, with no dead parts. Right now I am typing on an Athlon XP 2.2GHz with 2GB ram and an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro. It still runs flawlessly, and can run TF2 and any HL2 game at very high settings. I just hope that AMD grabs a lot of market share and keeps the competition going.

-J.B.

 

The articles mentioning this, that I have read, mention Nvidia giving money/discounts/write-offs to OEM's...

Have any consumers received anything, considering they are DIRECTLY affected by the defective chips?
Guess it's moot, because most of the affected sysems shoud still be under warranty...


T

 

Well the consumer should hopefully be getting the "money" in terms of warranty coverage. The manufacturer (Dell, HP, etc) kinda got screwed when this happened... well at least the place that handles warranties.

 

Hmm, it might.. I'm having same heating problems with my dv2700t. Overheating and shutting down while playing games. Cpu idles at ~60C instead of ~40C due to them sharing same heatsink; and GPU idling at 70C is never good and topping out at 100C++.

 

yeah my go7600 idles at 70C too while using a notebook cooler. havent used it to play games in a long time though

 

Foul play conspiracy by Nvidia? Jack up your performance by lowering the lifespan? Hmm.... :laugh:

 

I've suspected that the problem in my dv2500t was due to the 8400M GS. I sometimes get crashes and blue screens, and interestingly enough, something will only go wrong if I'm doing something that is video-associated. No video, the computer seems to work okay, though it can still get hotter than I would like. I've been looking for driver updates for months, but to no avail. It's a pain.

 

ahhhhh yes here we go with the fruits of everyone whining about noise...... thus marketing research wins over practicality and the consumers loses again.

Keep those fans spinning high boys and girls

 

Dang - and I've been eyeballing those for a couple days...was thinking of the CTO dv2700tse.

I suppose you'd advise NOT getting it, from experience?

T

 

Sounds a heck of a lot like the ATI X1400 in my T60

 

I like both for short term as I like to buy/sell tech companies based on hype. Aside from the .com boom, I havent had too good a long term with tech

 

I like ATI and want them to ramain competetive, but i dont want them get a better market share through a mistake on nvidia's part i want them to do it through innovation and performance.

 

LOL I don't think it's your choice to make

 

id say your too late ati's stock has already risen a little and nvidias stock has already fallen , people who predited this before and bought/sold stock a few weeks back are the ones that win

 

damn insider traders who get away with it!

 

but they are, the new 3xxx series cards are faster, and more effecient than nvidia's cards, the IGP Radeon 3200 is faster the 8400gs.... etc.

 

not necessarily, your gain depends on your buy in and when you plan on selling.

Infact if you bought amd or nvidia 2 weeks ago, you are in the red if you still have it