Nvidia giving free GPU samples to reviewers that follow procedure

It doesn't mean other reviewers were influenced, but it is a very ugly move by Nvidia.
It is not like HU was ignoring ray tracing.

They did on purpose in the first 6800xt review right ?

But yeah, weird move by nvidia.
 
Is anyone honestly surprised by this?
After HWU's coverage of Ampere vs Navi 21 not really, they are heavily skewed almost everything towards AMD.
But still this is a weird move on NV's part as all it does is alienate the review outlet and give fanboys fuel for conspiracy theories. HWU will still get NV cards obviously, from AIBs and via purchasing them on their own.
Not something which I would do in NV's place for sure.
 
Even though we are also not receiving pre-launch samples from Nvidia since mid-2018 either (edit: for different reasons, i should add), I can only say that sadly there's no law that requires a company to give free and/or early access to it's products to everyone.
Your conclusions from this are of course entirely up to you.
 
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After HWU's coverage of Ampere vs Navi 21 not really, they are heavily skewed almost everything towards AMD.
But still this is a weird move on NV's part as all it does is alienate the review outlet and give fanboys fuel for conspiracy theories. HWU will still get NV cards obviously, from AIBs and via purchasing them on their own.
Not something which I would do in NV's place for sure.
How do they heavily skew towards AMD? Do you know how infrequently they have recommended AMD GPUs over the last 8 years?
 
How do they heavily skew towards AMD? Do you know how infrequently they have recommended AMD GPUs over the last 8 years?
It doesn't matter how often something happened over any number of years, it's not a cumulative.
They've ignored RT comparisons, they've skimmed on DLSS, they've used AMD sponsored games without mentioning that, they've made some really weird assumptions based on Turing vs Ampere RT testing, they've went on record a couple of times saying that AMD's launch will be better with zero information to back it up, etc.
I don't think that they've deserved such cutting off from NV but it's hard to argue that their Ampere coverage was pretty bad in objectivity when even some regulars on AMD's reddit said so.
 
As you might know Nvidia is currently the market leader in PC GPUs. It is not the market leader in rasterization performance.

Nvidia tries to punish outlets that do not focus enough on Nvidia advantages by denying them GPU samples.
Others get theirs for free, weeks in advance.

I hope this is a sign of things to come, like with Intel and how nowadays not a single benchmark at any price point is won by Intel; as Intel also showed this kind of anticompetitive behavior



what are your thoughts. Is it correct to give free GPUs in exchange for positive press and trying to downplay competitors advantages?
 
HWU have also run a couple of polls of their subscribers to gauge interest in ray tracing, and the results show that a significant majority of them aren't that interested in it.
 
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HWU have also run a couple of pols of their subscribers to gauge interest in ray tracing, and the results show that a significant majority of them aren't that interested in it.

So, most their viewers dont care about nVidia hardware? Reviewers shouldnt decide. There are nearly 20 games with Raytracing on the market. Give them the numbers and your job is done.
 
Silly move by Nvidia. Yes it’s true that HWUB is openly dismissive of the impact and relevance of RT but they were clear that it was their personal opinion. They also used some shit games in their RT coverage at first but have now moved on to WDL and Control which is far more reasonable.

Being spiteful and refusing to play ball is a poor response from Nvidia. Just keep putting out good hardware and skeptical reviewers will come around eventually. RT’s growing importance is inevitable at this point.
 
Nvida have always been scummy, unfortunately they do make really good hardware

I understand the AMD RT performance is only on par with the previous generation. However, they would be even more scummy if AMD was at the same or higher performance: if Intel is any indication
 
HWU have also run a couple of polls of their subscribers to gauge interest in ray tracing, and the results show that a significant majority of them aren't that interested in it.

It's hardly surprising though, basically selection bias in action. People who don't share their view on ray tracing are much less likely to follow the channel closely enough to be aware of polls and such. If digital foundry ran the same poll I'm sure they'd get drastically different results.
 
After HWU's coverage of Ampere vs Navi 21 not really, they are heavily skewed almost everything towards AMD.
But still this is a weird move on NV's part as all it does is alienate the review outlet and give fanboys fuel for conspiracy theories. HWU will still get NV cards obviously, from AIBs and via purchasing them on their own.
Not something which I would do in NV's place for sure.
Very true ^^
I don't approve Nvidia move but HUB has been incredibly biased towards AMD with the 6000 series launch. The most shocking example is when he said "I'm more excited by AMD SAM than Ray Tracing". Totally insane...
 
It doesn't matter how often something happened over any number of years, it's not a cumulative.
They've ignored RT comparisons, they've skimmed on DLSS, they've used AMD sponsored games without mentioning that, they've made some really weird assumptions based on Turing vs Ampere RT testing, they've went on record a couple of times saying that AMD's launch will be better with zero information to back it up, etc.
I don't think that they've deserved such cutting off from NV but it's hard to argue that their Ampere coverage was pretty bad in objectivity when even some regulars on AMD's reddit said so.
Just like they use NVIDIA sponsored games without mentioning it. Like pretty much every single outlet out there does no matter which logo is in the game.
Care to elaborate on the "Skimmed on DLSS" portion? Is there some specific time every review needs to be praising DLSS no matter if they like it themselves or not?

Just for the sake of it, their games list:
Assassin's Creed Odyssey
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
Death Stranding
Dirt 5
Doom Eternal
F1 2020
Flight Simulator 2020
Gears 5
Godfall
Hitman 2
Horizon Zero Dawn
Metro Exodus
Rainbow Six Siege
Resident Evil 3
Shadow of Tomb Raider
Watch Dogs Legion
Wolfenstein: Youngblood
World War Z

Could you please mark the games that are allowed to be used and are not allowed to be used by reviewers without being "skewed AMD fans"

Very true ^^
I don't approve Nvidia move but HUB has been incredibly biased towards AMD with the 6000 series launch. The most shocking example is when he said "I'm more excited by AMD SAM than Ray Tracing". Totally insane...

How sick of a world view do you have? Everyone who doesn't think the way you do about tech is incredibly biased?
Their polls on their readers suggest that they're not that excited by raytracing either. I guess they must all be superbiased too.
There's plenty of reasons why people aren't excited about it yet, but probably will be in future, RTRT is still in it's infancy and cards aren't that powerful in it yet.

It's sickening how deep "with us or against us" runs these days.
 
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Just like they use NVIDIA sponsored games without mentioning it.
On quite the contrary, Steve constantly mentions that a game is NV sponsored when that's the case. I know cause I watch them.

Care to elaborate on the "Skimmed on DLSS" portion? Is there some specific time every review needs to be praising DLSS no matter if they like it themselves or not?
There's a time every review should provide all data which there is to the viewers instead of going with "we won't touch this cause we don't like it". The latter is the red sign of not being objective in your review. And HWU's coverage of Nv h/w was full of this shit for the last couple of years.

It's also why I'm not surprised by the outcome and kinda feel that NV is in the right mind here if not correct in how they handle this - they aren't trying to hide anything, they want reviewers to show more data instead. This is actually beneficial to consumers.

Could you please mark the games that are allowed to be used and are not allowed to be used by reviewers without being "skewed AMD fans"
I trust you can find all the relevant information yourself. But just going through the list without actually checking - 6 out these 18 titles are heavily skewed towards AMD h/w in their performance without any good reasons for them to while 0 (that's zero) titles from these are showing the same for NV h/w. Talk about benchmarking suite selection.
 
It is not like HU was ignoring ray tracing.
They are consistently beating the drum of RT being not relevant or important even when consoles are sporting it and when PC games left and right are supporting it.
I don't approve Nvidia move but HUB has been incredibly biased towards AMD with the 6000 series launch. The most shocking example is when he said "I'm more excited by AMD SAM than Ray Tracing". Totally insane...
Exactly.
Their polls on their readers suggest that they're not that excited by raytracing either. I guess they must all be superbiased too.
So reviews should be dictated by polls now? Reviews should be objective not subjective or under the influence of the reviewer personal opinion.

Now that AMD hardware can run DXR, RT games should be included in the bulk category of the review and factored in the general performance comparison figures, and not be relegated to a pathetic separate list of only two games.

HardwareUnboxed tested Metro Exodus and Shadow of The Tomb Raider without RT at all, what is the justification for that move? It's a standard practice in reviews to run the games at max settings, and RT is the ultimate max setting in any PC game right now, excluding it from testing is plain stupid and ridiculous.

I am not encouraging the move by NVIDIA, but reviewers hypocrisy should be exposed when appropriate.
 
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The most shocking example is when he said "I'm more excited by AMD SAM than Ray Tracing". Totally insane...

Agree, that’s a pretty ridiculous position for them to take. SAM is nice but far from exciting. RT while in its early days is an actual game changer.

Still doesn’t justify Nvidia’s response though. They’re living up to their insecure corporate bully reputation.
 
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