Nvidia is "Pulling the Plug on GPP"

[AngryGoldfish]

At this point, I think a good chunk of the program did what they wanted. Brands have been split. They are already marketing it, and they will not throw that away. This gen will sell the separate brands they have created. It will become the norm. They are just pulling out before the government steps in and drops the hammer on them.
They don't give a crap about public perception. They would have never did what they did to start with if they did. The had a goal, and accomplished it. And was able to do it before being investigated and sued.

Yeah, the damage of GPP could have already been done. While I do think that, for example, ASUS having ARES as their AMD Radeon brand is a cool idea and should have been done many years ago, at this stage in the game it would be far harder for consumers to adjust to it than what consumers already have to do now, which is to look at the box and go, 'it's green so it's Nvidia' or, 'it's red so it's AMD', or to use the navigation menu of OCUK like a big boy and not add to cart the wrong brand, pay for the wrong brand, receive the wrong brand in the mail, install the wrong brand in your system, and then play games at a lower frame rate. What Nvidia was trying to do was push their competitors into an awkward position by 'encouraging' their AIB partners to side with them and split their competition's 'inferior' products into a sub-category that only a few have heard of because Nvidia don't want their precious "billions-invested" hardware to be mistaken as red trash. That last sentence contained a lot of hyperbole. I do think that Nvidia is currently making superior graphics cards and has done for a few years.

Well I wonder if the people who got there pants in a bunch about this can also do it about other things which to me seemed like a good idea and have them stopped, like AMD sticking to one socket for mainstream cpu's, or the separation of workstation/enthusiast cpu's from the mainstream cpu's.

There were negatives and positives to what AMD did with their CPUs. I don't see how GPP had any positives for anyone other than Nvidia and "most" of their AIB partners. How on earth would consumers benefit from this? It's almost like if Levi said, 'Only Levi are allowed to brand jeans as 30/30" Slim Fit Jeans because consumers are getting confused and accidentally buying Primark 30/30" slim fit jeans and receiving an inferior product.' The GP program was the ultimate 'eff you' to the general public and the ultimate move of arrogance. They were trying to isolate all the well-established brands people associate with top-end hardware with themselves and only themselves, leaving the scraps, so to speak, for whoever else. Instead of doing that naturally by providing a better product and letting the AIB partners decide their branding for themselves, they coerced them into doing it by signing contracts.

Sorry but Stix and other's are not for just high end card's, they are used on low to high end card's and quite simply it's, shady marketing by manufacturers to trick people in to buying a card that is going to be poor at gaming or just about get by at gaming, for more money than they are worth.

What. On. Earth. Is this utter nonsense you have posted? On the one hand you say that Strix could be a midrange product, but on the other hand you say it's "shady marketing by manufacturers to trick people in to buying a card that is going to be poor at gaming or just about get by at gaming, for more money than they are worth." The RX 580 is perfectly competitive against the GTX 1060, as is all lower-end cards. Even Vega 56 is comparable in some aspects to the GTX 1070 and 1070Ti. Vega 64 is a bit of a disaster, as was the Fury X, but for many generations AMD have had comparable cards at various different levels. Were they better? No. But they were comparable. And it was the AIB partner's decisions to market them with the same branding. They choose to rely on people's intelligence and preference to decide whether to go Nvidia or AMD. Nvidia tried to make that decision when it was never theirs in the first place.

Anyone with any common sense wouldn't care about what name was on the box though they would look at what it does, and get the best one for there budget and what they want to do, but that cannot be done because everything is branded as being the best when it's not.

You don't get it. It's not Nvidia's position to coerce their partners into making these decisions. This should be the partner's decision; and whatever decision they make should not see them refused early access to new hardware or adequate advertising, while their competitor who has signed the contract receives all of the above and more.

As I said I honestly think there should be separate brands for each manufacturer because it would be easier for people to know that they were buying, the right manufacturers card, it's to easy for someone to buy the wrong card, especially given that not many people go to forums etc, and most people working in stores selling these card's, have not got a clue either, so if there is something that can be done to make it easier then it should be done.

"it's to easy for someone to buy the wrong card"

Are you serious? While there is a tiny amount of truth to this, again, it is down to the AIB partners, NOT Nvidia or AMD or Intel or any of the silicon manufacturers. They should not have jurisdiction on marketing when they are selling the product to a middle man. They should provide a product, a spec sheet, and a basic template to use as a frame of reference. If they could get away with it, Nvidia would likely ditch their partners and sell direct. They thought they could get away with it by overcharging for their 'Founder's Edition', which was marketed specifically as the 'superior version, the OG version, the one that all the cool kids are going to have. I guess you could buy a card with better cooling, greater variety of aesthetics, lower noise, longer warranties, etc., but you wouldn't be in the elite 'Founders' club, so why bother? Give in. Pay an extra $100 and receive the crème de la crème. Because you're worth it.' But they didn't get away with it. The overpriced FE is no more.

 

[ImprovizoR]

It's not illegal for Nvidia

Actually it is. It's anti-competitive as f**k. It's just that it's really difficult to prove in most cases. Not in this case though. Which is why they tried to keep it a secret and when it got out they had no choice but to fold. But they have a legal team. They knew.

 

[Dicehunter]

If we lived in a good world some high up legal team would say "Hang on, This is extremely warped" and get rid of anyone that had anything to do with GPP even if one of those was Jensen Huang.

It seems as time progresses the world is getting more and more corrupt by the day.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Actually it is. It's anti-competitive as f**k. It's just that it's really difficult to prove in most cases. Not in this case though. Which is why they tried to keep it a secret and when it got out they had no choice but to fold. But they have a legal team. They knew.

Well because we know nothing about it you can't say it is anti competitive. There's technically proof it is but it's so vague it would be impossible to prove.

 

[BigDaddyKong]

Well because we know nothing about it you can't say it is anti competitive. There's technically proof it is but it's so vague it would be impossible to prove.

That depends on what Dell and HP does. They were bent pretty bad over the situation. I'm sure they have the documentation. At the end of the quarter they find they lost money on the situation, I'm sure more might surface.

 

[Warchild]

Actually it is. It's anti-competitive as f**k. It's just that it's really difficult to prove in most cases. Not in this case though. Which is why they tried to keep it a secret and when it got out they had no choice but to fold. But they have a legal team. They knew.

This right here sums it up. Any practise that can force others hand resulting in one company having sheer monopoly of a market is illegal. Proving it is the problem.

 

[NeverBackDown]

This right here sums it up. Any practise that can force others hand resulting in one company having sheer monopoly of a market is illegal. Proving it is the problem.

They already own the majority. So it's not being forced. There are only 2 members in this market. Monopoly is inevitable if one company cannot keep up. That's not anti competitive. That wouldn't hold up in court. Now cheating and paying people to not use the competitors products in any form IS anti competitive. But all Nvidia was doing was in exchange for money, asking there products be branded differently. Not anti competitive. So technically it's okay.

That said there intent is definitely anti competitive. And if the news we have on it is correct all the threatening they were doing was not written down and implied in words. Which can't be proven. So they know what they are doing. they were just threading the needle so to speak.

 

[Warchild]

They already own the majority. So it's not being forced. There are only 2 members in this market. Monopoly is inevitable if one company cannot keep up. That's not anti competitive. That wouldn't hold up in court. Now cheating and paying people to not use the competitors products in any form IS anti competitive. But all Nvidia was doing was in exchange for money, asking there products be branded differently. Not anti competitive. So technically it's okay.

That said there intent is definitely anti competitive. And if the news we have on it is correct all the threatening they were doing was not written down and implied in words. Which can't be proven. So they know what they are doing. they were just threading the needle so to speak.

I sometimes wonder why Nvidia hasn't been forced or at least threatened into splitting their company into two, such as the microsoft case back in 1999/2000 based on monopoly and anti trust laws. Microsoft pretty much forced users to use IE since it was prepackaged and in the age of modem dial up, getting a new browser was a chore. In this case, given the popular nature of the "RoG" terminology, users may have swayed towards it if ASUS, complied to Nvidia GPP. That in itself would have been unfair.

For the drones and clones who feel the need to have all gear branded the same... <_< yawn. It would have forced them to Nvidia to some extent. They could easily break off into a subsidiary focussing on AI, automation etc like project Xavier

 

[AngryGoldfish]

What bothers me about Nvidia's statement is, if they cared so much about distinguishing their brand and helping consumers make 'the right choice', they would not sell their chips to AIB partners at all. That way they're guaranteed to distinguish themselves as elite graphics developers and no one will 'accidentally buy an AMD card' (even though that argument is still as fragile as a SJW's feelings and will always be dumb).

Or, maybe they've already asked their partners many times over the years to create separate logos and branding, but ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI, etc have all said no and kept splitting their branding between Intel, Nvidia and AMD—because, you know, that's their choice. If however Nvidia have never asked ASUS to rebrand Nvidia GPUs from ROG Strix, for instance, to something else, something that isn't used for anything else, why not do that? Wouldn't that help distinguish Nvidia from AMD? They don't want to do that though because the word ROG and Aorus and Gaming mean big money without doing a damn thing yourself.

To me, what Nvidia have done is, 'Hey, ASUS, I like your ROG branding. You've built it up over many years using both our products as well as your own and other people's. It's a brand that screams quality. Since our products also scream quality and our competitors don't, why don't you give us sole access to that brand? In the GPU space alone of course. I mean, you'll probably have to remove ROG from AMD motherboards as well for continuity, but hey, if that's the way the cookie crumbles, it wasn't us that did all the nibbling. If you do we'll give you lots of cool nifty things like t-shirts and stickers. If you don't, we'll take away a lot of less important stuff like early access and promotion, but lets focus on what we can give you, not take away. So, what do you say? Give us sole use of the brand YOU developed using EVERYONE's products or watch us walk away with a large chunk of your business and give it your least favourite competitor, good old Gigabyte. What d'ya say?' *wink wink*

Again, lots of hyperbole, but the more I think about GPP the more it rattles my cages. I wasn't that fussed about it at first. But the more I think about it, the more evil it sounds.

 

[RobM]

I said when the initial story broke out earlier in the year it was not good and was swiftly dismissed.


"I told you so"

 

[Warchild]

Le Hybole

It sounds evil because it basically was pure evil.

I agree though. I am one who put up with the extra cash for the FE version because I do love their standard cards. I also water cool in SLI so no need for me to use AIB.

They could have easily pulled an AMD a la, Fury. Block all AIB from making aftermarket blocks. Then again, I dont know nvidia that well so perhaps they make a far better profit just distributing the GPU core, removing all cost of PCB, caps, and chips etc?

 

[AngryGoldfish]

It sounds evil because it basically was pure evil.

I agree though. I am one who put up with the extra cash for the FE version because I do love their standard cards. I also water cool in SLI so no need for me to use AIB.

They could have easily pulled an AMD a la, Fury. Block all AIB from making aftermarket blocks. Then again, I dont know nvidia that well so perhaps they make a far better profit just distributing the GPU core, removing all cost of PCB, caps, and chips etc?

Exactly. If they cared so much about the poor idiot who doesn't know what he's putting €700 down on (or even €200), they would have released their cards without partners and self-branded everything. But that wouldn't make them as much money because ROG and Aorus and Gaming are well established brands, as AMD have proven, so they won't do it. Fair enough. I totally understand. I wouldn't either. Except Nvidia don't think that should be the end of it, as we now know.

By the way, I also think the FE versions are really good. They do sometimes lack the power delivery to maintain high clock speeds when all other diminishing factors are removed, but they're sexy, practical for watercoolers, good for compact cases, and are often found at cheaper prices.