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I've heard a rumor the main reason for Nvidia's reluctance to open source their driver is that they use it to enable/disable features. So the same board can be

I've heard a rumor the main reason for Nvidia's reluctance to open source their driver is that they use it to enable/disable features. So the same board can be GeForce or Quadro, depending on what the driver tells it to be. Is this true?

trzeci 5y ago
It's an unconfirmed rumor. Also I'd be skeptical to some extend on this. Maybe back in time when a chip fail ratio was lower was a case. But now, there is a quite measurable amount of chips not passing requirements for a high tier cards, but can be used in the lower models (with limited amount of cores etc or worse thermal efficiency).
- tyingq 5y ago
  It seems plausible given stuff like this: "A developer driver inadvertently included code used for internal development which removes the hash rate limiter on RTX 3060 in some configurations," the company said in a statement. "The driver has been removed."[1] So it's hard to tell when it's binning, and when it's hobbling. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/16/22333544/nvidia-rtx-3060-ethereum-mining-rate-limit-unlock-driver https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/16/22333544/nvidia-rtx-3060-...
  - sixothree 5y ago
    They had to leak it at least once. But seriously, I thought they were clear about this being a driver implementation and not a hardware restriction.
    - tyingq 5y ago
      Yeah, they were not clear :) “It’s not just a driver thing,” said Bryan Del Rizzo, Nvidia’s head of communications, last month. “There is a secure handshake between the driver, the RTX 3060 silicon, and the BIOS (firmware) that prevents removal of the hash rate limiter.”
      - my123 5y ago
        Signed firmware, probably why they are so reluctant to share those for newer cards for Nouveau… because it’d break their market segmentation.
bravetraveler 5y ago
Probably fairly true. Nvidia tries to differentiate their offerings a LOT with software driven features I feel a lot of this comes down to them using closed source software that they either don't have the code to, or aren't privileged to distribute. Libraries are a common spot for this to appear
bserge 5y ago
Yeah, so GeForce/Quadro used to be a software only difference. Later on (around Fermi/Kepler) it became a hardware difference but cards could still be modded by means of board straps and package traces. Kepler could literally have all its cores enabled with a simple bridge on one laser cut. That's fun but very hit or miss, the more cores are disabled the higher the likelihood they're actually defective so it was binned lower. Maxwell can have their Hwid modded but performance will be lower than actual Quadros. Newer cards have an even bigger performance difference, more hardware differences I think.
Tomte 5y ago
Wouldn't it be fun if NVidia could sell a "firmware upgrade" for your GPU, in this time where GPU prices are through the roof and they cannot supply the market adequately? Of course, I'd hate that in normal times, but if they now made me an offer to "upgrade" my 1060 (to moderately higher performance, but still lower end), I'd probably take it.
bitwize 5y ago
Maybe they should take a cue from Intel and implement on-chip DLC?
Const-me 5y ago
Very likely. AFAIK there’re only 4 differences between GeForce and Tesla/Grid: more and faster VRAM, more FP64 GFlops on most GPUs, unlimited count of nvenc encoding streams versus 2 on GeForce, and support for virtualization. Only the first two are hardware differences, the other 2 are software. Another thing about virtualization, it sounds ridiculous but nVidia charges non-trivial per-user fee to allow people to use the hardware they already own. Specifically, for virtual workstation they want $450 per concurrent user. That’s on top of the $3000-$12000 purchase price of these GPUs.
- rbanffy 5y ago
  > fee to allow people to use the hardware they already own. IBM does that with mainframes, but, at least, it’s hardware they own that they shipped in the box for you to rent out when needed or to buy and enable.
- moondev 5y ago
  Wow I did not know this. I've been thinking about picking up an Nvidia card to play with vgpu on vsphere - so it sounds like this would be impossible without an additional license fee?! What a bummer.
  - Const-me 5y ago
    According to nVidia, you gonna need these expensive data center-targeted GPUs (no consumer cards), plus extra licenses. Details and pricing are in that PDF: https://www.nvidia.com/content/dam/en-zz/Solutions/design-visualization/solutions/resources/documents1/Virtual-GPU-Packaging-and-Licensing-Guide.pdf https://www.nvidia.com/content/dam/en-zz/Solutions/design-vi...
xg15 5y ago
Dumb question: Closed-source doesn't mean encrypted. What stops people from disassembling and reverse-engineering the blob? Of course, distributing a "cracked" driver would breach licensing agreements and violate copyright (and possibly other laws), so it's out of the question for any kind of professional use. However, if Nvidia uses it to differentiate services, wouldn't there be a significant risk of private consumers (gamers, hobbyists, etc) using such a driver to "upgrade" their cards for personal use?
- NtGuy25 5y ago
  They have. There are driver patches that allow unlimited encoding streams and other "enterprise" features.
- bravetraveler 5y ago
  That's actually how we got nouveau, as I understand things... The firmware itself truly is signed and so on
- 1_player 5y ago
  AFAIK it is both closed source and encrypted. Otherwise we would already have nouveau with black market firmware extracted from the official driver than unlocks power and clock management (something that nouveau can't do, reason why it's so slow to be useless on modern cards)

trzeci 5y ago

It's an unconfirmed rumor. Also I'd be skeptical to some extend on this. Maybe back in time when a chip fail ratio was lower was a case. But now, there is a quite measurable amount of chips not passing requirements for a high tier cards, but can be used in the lower models (with limited amount of cores etc or worse thermal efficiency).

tyingq 5y ago
It seems plausible given stuff like this: "A developer driver inadvertently included code used for internal development which removes the hash rate limiter on RTX 3060 in some configurations," the company said in a statement. "The driver has been removed."[1] So it's hard to tell when it's binning, and when it's hobbling. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/16/22333544/nvidia-rtx-3060-ethereum-mining-rate-limit-unlock-driver https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/16/22333544/nvidia-rtx-3060-...
- sixothree 5y ago
  They had to leak it at least once. But seriously, I thought they were clear about this being a driver implementation and not a hardware restriction.
  - tyingq 5y ago
    Yeah, they were not clear :) “It’s not just a driver thing,” said Bryan Del Rizzo, Nvidia’s head of communications, last month. “There is a secure handshake between the driver, the RTX 3060 silicon, and the BIOS (firmware) that prevents removal of the hash rate limiter.”
    - my123 5y ago
      Signed firmware, probably why they are so reluctant to share those for newer cards for Nouveau… because it’d break their market segmentation.

bravetraveler 5y ago

Probably fairly true. Nvidia tries to differentiate their offerings a LOT with software driven features I feel a lot of this comes down to them using closed source software that they either don't have the code to, or aren't privileged to distribute. Libraries are a common spot for this to appear

bserge 5y ago

Yeah, so GeForce/Quadro used to be a software only difference. Later on (around Fermi/Kepler) it became a hardware difference but cards could still be modded by means of board straps and package traces. Kepler could literally have all its cores enabled with a simple bridge on one laser cut. That's fun but very hit or miss, the more cores are disabled the higher the likelihood they're actually defective so it was binned lower. Maxwell can have their Hwid modded but performance will be lower than actual Quadros. Newer cards have an even bigger performance difference, more hardware differences I think.

Tomte 5y ago

Wouldn't it be fun if NVidia could sell a "firmware upgrade" for your GPU, in this time where GPU prices are through the roof and they cannot supply the market adequately? Of course, I'd hate that in normal times, but if they now made me an offer to "upgrade" my 1060 (to moderately higher performance, but still lower end), I'd probably take it.

bitwize 5y ago

Maybe they should take a cue from Intel and implement on-chip DLC?

Const-me 5y ago

Very likely. AFAIK there’re only 4 differences between GeForce and Tesla/Grid: more and faster VRAM, more FP64 GFlops on most GPUs, unlimited count of nvenc encoding streams versus 2 on GeForce, and support for virtualization. Only the first two are hardware differences, the other 2 are software. Another thing about virtualization, it sounds ridiculous but nVidia charges non-trivial per-user fee to allow people to use the hardware they already own. Specifically, for virtual workstation they want $450 per concurrent user. That’s on top of the $3000-$12000 purchase price of these GPUs.

rbanffy 5y ago
> fee to allow people to use the hardware they already own. IBM does that with mainframes, but, at least, it’s hardware they own that they shipped in the box for you to rent out when needed or to buy and enable.
moondev 5y ago
Wow I did not know this. I've been thinking about picking up an Nvidia card to play with vgpu on vsphere - so it sounds like this would be impossible without an additional license fee?! What a bummer.
- Const-me 5y ago
  According to nVidia, you gonna need these expensive data center-targeted GPUs (no consumer cards), plus extra licenses. Details and pricing are in that PDF: https://www.nvidia.com/content/dam/en-zz/Solutions/design-visualization/solutions/resources/documents1/Virtual-GPU-Packaging-and-Licensing-Guide.pdf https://www.nvidia.com/content/dam/en-zz/Solutions/design-vi...

xg15 5y ago

Dumb question: Closed-source doesn't mean encrypted. What stops people from disassembling and reverse-engineering the blob? Of course, distributing a "cracked" driver would breach licensing agreements and violate copyright (and possibly other laws), so it's out of the question for any kind of professional use. However, if Nvidia uses it to differentiate services, wouldn't there be a significant risk of private consumers (gamers, hobbyists, etc) using such a driver to "upgrade" their cards for personal use?

NtGuy25 5y ago
They have. There are driver patches that allow unlimited encoding streams and other "enterprise" features.
bravetraveler 5y ago
That's actually how we got nouveau, as I understand things... The firmware itself truly is signed and so on
1_player 5y ago
AFAIK it is both closed source and encrypted. Otherwise we would already have nouveau with black market firmware extracted from the official driver than unlocks power and clock management (something that nouveau can't do, reason why it's so slow to be useless on modern cards)