Value of Hardware Unboxed benchmarking

[homerdog]

I think this will eventually get old fast, people are already getting tired of this overly negative tone about their hobby. Gaming is supposed to be about enjoying the moments (gameplay and presentation), not about nit picking bad stuff all the time.

And this is what HUB purposefully do, they now make videos to hate on tech more than anything else, like the video they made about the noise problem in ray tracing .. I have never seen them do a video about the advantages of ray tracing in any title, or about the noise/flicker problem in other graphics techniques (It's not like graphics has been pixel perfect before ray tracing) ... it's stuff like that is face palm worthy, they just hate on new tech for no purpose whatsoever! It's tiresome!

TBH it's far more than just HUB going this route. It's all over youtube these days.

On the plus side my man Daniel Owen and Digital Foundry are great with weighing pros and cons, keeping it reasonably objective, and valuing the things I find valuable

 

[Florin]

I think this will eventually get old fast, people are already getting tired of this overly negative tone about their hobby. Gaming is supposed to be about enjoying the moments (gameplay and presentation), not about nit picking bad stuff all the time.

And this is what HUB purposefully do, they now make videos to hate on tech more than anything else, like the video they made about the noise problem in ray tracing .. I have never seen them do a video about the advantages of ray tracing in any title, or about the noise/flicker problem in other graphics techniques (It's not like graphics has been pixel perfect before ray tracing) ... it's stuff like that is face palm worthy, they just hate on new tech for no purpose whatsoever! It's tiresome!

They've spoken quite a few times and at considerable length about their feelings on the specific subject of ray tracing. So okay, perhaps these just aren't the right people for that particular topic.
But really, I can't recall hearing much about what they DO like in general. I mean, is there any upcoming hardware that has them excited at all? PCIE5, USB4 and HDMI 2.1, DisplayPort 2.1 and HDR, once exotic technologies, are now starting to become more affordable and common. Surely that's cool? That brings new possibilities?
We've also got this fresh batch of APUs out with more cores, bigger caches, quality integrated graphics and low power use, which enables new form factors and long battery life. That do anything for em, maybe?
What about games, is there anything in the pipeline that they're looking forward to playing? Heck, what - if anything - ARE they even playing?

Maybe they do talk about such things, and I just miss those bits. Maybe I'd need to become a Patreon and go on their Discord. I don't know.
I do know I was genuinely surprised when I saw a HUB thumbnail with a smile the other day, and saw Steve share some actual positive feels about the Intel ARC B580.

Followed closely by another video about how on second thought it wasn't really that good. Never change, HUB.

 

[dorf]

In the middle of the video Tim admits that he didn't want to talk so negatively about DLSS4 MFG as it's a useful tech for certain situations, but the way NVIDIA hyped it forced his hand!

I listened to Tim's reasoning from your timestamp for couple of minutes up until Steve starts talking. I think it's pretty clear that he has a point there.

If a drug company marketed their drug saying it cures obesity, cancer and depression and peer reviews would find the drug truly does provide a breakthrough cure for obesity but does absolutely nothing for cancer and depression, surely the community would need to address all claims and not just the one which happily turned out correct? Some might even be irritated about having to get negative about such false claims when they'd much rather spend their time saying good things about the cure for obesity.

So he wants to punish NVIDIA by misleading the consumer and showering him/her with needless negativity?

I think Tim talked about debunking Nvidia, not punishing them. But I could be mistaken and maybe your phrasing is correct and not at all hyperbolic.

Many reviewers have expressed a view that Nvidia is the one misleading the consumer and the right thing to do challenge claims such as MFG makes 5070 a 4090 equivalent. Some I'm sure, think that that's a perfectly reasonable claim to make or that it isn't, but it shouldn't be debunked and only the good things about Nvidia's new products should be covered.

 

[trinibwoy]

But really, I can't recall hearing much about what they DO like in general. I mean, is there any upcoming hardware that has them excited at all?

Tim does get pretty excited about stuff on his monitors unboxed channel. Their GPU content is super negative though. And in this instance they’ve ended up very much on the wrong side of the RT and ML debate.

 

[homerdog]

Tim does get pretty excited about stuff on his monitors unboxed channel. Their GPU content is super negative though. And in this instance they’ve ended up very much on the wrong side of the RT and ML debate.

Monitors Unboxed is a good channel. One of the ones I watched before picking up the excellent Q27G3XMN. Tim highly recommended it and he did not steer me wrong

 

[Shifty Geezer]

TBH it's far more than just HUB going this route. It's all over youtube these days.

Not to take this into a sociopolitical direction, but as a cautionary tale about selecting and ultimately ignoring YT and social media content:

There is a phenomenon empowered by Social Media termed Rage Baiting where videos that generate ill-feeling generate more revenue for the content creator than quality, nice content, and are pushed by The Algorithm, and this actively encourages negative content. It's not new - the stereotypical obnoxious radio host played into this psychology back in the day - but it's something everyone is tapping into these days.

Many content creators are in it for the money, even if they didn't start that way. It's found that the general public are more inclined to interact with negative content to voice their complaints than they will engage with positive content they just move on from; people grumble more than they compliment. More engagement means more advertising, so The Algorithm, in its infinite wisdom, encourages such content into streams and rewards the creators for it.

As such, the only way to combat such negativity-enforcing systems is to not watch content. Looking at a video just to see how awful it is and be suitably shocked and appalled and share with all your friends for them to see how shocking and appalling it is plays directly into The Algorithm's machinations, drives engagement (even if not the sort we want to see), and serves their economic ambitions. You are effectively paying whatever 'clowns you wish would shut up' to keep talking.

The only way poor content across the internet will be superseded by quality content is if it is starved of oxygen. Find creators you value, watch them, give them your support, and ignore the dross. Deny all morbid curiosity. Maybe also sacrifice some old 286 and 386 CPUs to The Algorithm if you have them lying around. Overclocking them until they burst into flames pleases The Algorithm greatly.

 

[homerdog]

Many reviewers have expressed a view that Nvidia is the one misleading the consumer and the right thing to do challenge claims such as MFG makes 5070 a 4090 equivalent. Some I'm sure, think that that's a perfectly reasonable claim to make or that it isn't, but it shouldn't be debunked and only the good things about Nvidia's new products should be covered.

I've no problem with them debunking BS marketing. The 5070 is no match for the 4090 and it should be known. This is a separate issue to me from the "everything sucks" vibe I see on PC hardware youtube lately.

 

[homerdog]

As such, the only way to combat such negativity-enforcing systems is to not watch content.

I've actually been doing this (avoiding super negative PC hardware coverage) and the result is less overall PC hardware content in my feed.

Edited just to avoid any off topic or RPSC.

 

[DavidGraham]

By the end of the video when discussing Radeon, they basically flat out admit that on the whole consumers have a totally different way of evaluating value.

I was very surprised with this bit, previously HUB always bragged about the polls they make on Twitter and YouTube, and how that is representative of their audience, but now they admit they know from retailers that Radeon sales are abysmal? That partners are pulling out? That major discounts are taking place yet no one is buying?

Okay, since you know all of that why do you insist that your polls represent anything of value? Why do you think ray tracing/upscaling is not important for consumers? Where do you get that info from?

There is a phenomenon empowered by Social Media termed Rage Baiting where videos that generate ill-feeling generate more revenue for the content creator than quality

In the past year, several creators (Digital Foundry, Frame Chasers, Daniel Owen) have come out to say that negative NVIDIA content usually gets them way more views than positive content, they said that they avoided falling into this pitfall where the do angry/sensational content with sensational headlines and thumbnails to chase views, they try to stay level headed and do content in a balanced manner. They said it was very hard to resist that temptation but they try to do it. Sadly, very few creators do that nowadays.

 

[trinibwoy]

Finally watched Tim’s video claiming the 5080 should be a 5070. He spent a lot of time explaining why GPUs are more expensive due to inflation, wafer costs, R&D etc with the usual disclaimers that his numbers are guesswork. I think he could’ve left that part out as it’s pure speculation. Anyway he seems to agree that prices should be higher today than they were 10 years ago.

The other bit about relative configurations and prices was more interesting. SKU names aside it’s clear that the 5080 isn’t exactly a deal relative to its contemporaries. It’s a straight 50% price cut vs the 5090 for about 50% the specs. Typically the price discount is bigger than the haircut in hardware. The 5070 Ti is 41% of the SMs for 38% of the price so not exactly a deal either.

It’s an interesting but flawed academic exercise. It doesn’t take into account actual performance, release timing of flagship SKUs etc. and most of all it’s still totally irrelevant to someone looking to buy a graphics card today. Comparisons to old GPUs that can no longer be purchased simply aren’t useful. Things will get a lot more interesting when RDNA 4 launches.

 

[Broopster]

It really shouldn’t be that surprising that there’s a big appetite for 50 series sucks content - even people who want one have no chance of getting one for months. Microcenter’s stock of the 5090 was roughly one tenth that of the 4090 launch. Also, it’s time to stop referring to these GPUs at the FE price - most of the cards produced will be AIB models and right now none are at MSRP.

 

[homerdog]

It really shouldn’t be that surprising that there’s a big appetite for 50 series sucks content - even people who want one have no chance of getting one for months. Microcenter’s stock of the 5090 was roughly one tenth that of the 4090 launch. Also, it’s time to stop referring to these GPUs at the FE price - most of the cards produced will be AIB models and right now none are at MSRP.

Where can I find a list of AIB cards and their respective MSRPs? I looked yesterday and mostly struck out.

 

[arandomguy]

The other bit about relative configurations and prices was more interesting. SKU names aside it’s clear that the 5080 isn’t exactly a deal relative to its contemporaries. It’s a straight 50% price cut vs the 5090 for about 50% the specs. Typically the price discount is bigger than the haircut in hardware. The 5070 Ti is 41% of the SMs for 38% of the price so not exactly a deal either.

It’s an interesting but flawed academic exercise. It doesn’t take into account actual performance, release timing of flagship SKUs etc. and most of all it’s still totally irrelevant to someone looking to buy a graphics card today. Comparisons to old GPUs that can no longer be purchased simply aren’t useful. Things will get a lot more interesting when RDNA 4 launches.

We had a bit of spoiler with the 3080 and it didn't immediately give this impression with Kepler through Pascal due to the staggered releases making the x80 the halo part but historically going back to Kepler the x80 part tended to be poor from a perf/$ standpoint relative to the Nvidia's own stack.

My theory regarding this is we don't look at this way from the desktop perspective but the die used the x80 (with the exception of the 3080) has been the flagship die for mobile which tends to have higher marings/premiums. My feeling is in terms of how Nvidia approaches the stack they take this into account and the production segmentation (including binning) likely factors this into account.

The other thing that affects perception is that prior the RTX 4090 there was a tendency for the halo to be signficantly worse perf/$ but the 4090 really upended that as it was the only 40 series part that really increased perf/$.

Where can I find a list of AIB cards and their respective MSRPs? I looked yesterday and mostly struck out.

AiBs don't really have publicly announced MSRPs.

 

[troyan]

In Spider--Man 2 the 5080 is 12% faster than the 4080 Super and 85% faster than the 3080: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/spider-man-2-performance-benchmark/6.html

It would be a 33% improvement over the 4080 when we account the 20% price cut and the 13% performance uplift. I really dont see how the 5080 is bad. The card maybe not awesome or exciting, but it is a better product than anything else on the marktet and only 12% slower than a 4090.

 

[dorf]

I've no problem with them debunking BS marketing. The 5070 is no match for the 4090 and it should be known. This is a separate issue to me from the "everything sucks" vibe I see on PC hardware youtube lately.

I was addressing the claims made about HUB specifically, so this is kind of besides my comment. But if "everything sucks" is a more common vibe in the PC hardware youtube, I'm kind of wondering why on this forum only HUB has a 80+ page thread with a mostly negative vibe. I see a thread about Linus with 7 pages... and that's it. Do other outlets get called names like AMD Unboxed here? I don't think so.

So there's gotta be something about HUB specifically that's wrong, no? Or maybe the HUB negativity is just an echo chamber thing on this forum?

 

[trinibwoy]

So there's gotta be something about HUB specifically that's wrong, no? Or maybe the HUB negativity is just an echo chamber thing on this forum?

HUB is pretty unique in being vocally anti-raytracing and anti-upscaling among the biggest GPU reviewers. It’s their admitted resistance to those technologies that sparked most of the debate in this thread. They’ve now accepted those technologies are good and have now set their sights on framegen. It’s a more balanced take though since Tim is more open to it while Steve is on his usual soapbox about these technologies being useless for competitive gamers because that’s all he cares about. His latest refrain is that input lag is the holy grail for competitive gaming and nobody cares about motion smoothness. I wish he would do a piece on the absolute latencies gamers experience in fast paced shooters similar to what DF is doing now for AAA stuff.

 

[troyan]

He doesnt care about latency either. Have never seen a latency test between nVidia and AMD from them.

 

[trinibwoy]

He doesnt care about latency either. Have never seen a latency test between nVidia and AMD from them.

None of his content has anything to do with competitive gaming or latency. It’s just something he says to downplay Nvidia tech. You would think he’s super excited about Reflex but haven’t seen that either.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I was addressing the claims made about HUB specifically, so this is kind of besides my comment. But if "everything sucks" is a more common vibe in the PC hardware youtube, I'm kind of wondering why on this forum only HUB has a 80+ page thread with a mostly negative vibe. I see a thread about Linus with 7 pages... and that's it. Do other outlets get called names like AMD Unboxed here? I don't think so.

So there's gotta be something about HUB specifically that's wrong, no? Or maybe the HUB negativity is just an echo chamber thing on this forum?

There was/is only one YT channel officially discussed here which is Digital Foundry.

Other sources are cited ad hoc in discussions. Of these, HUB was being cited regularly and its value being discussed, derailing the threads it came up in. In a talk about raytracing performance, say, we'd end up with pages of people arguing 'HUB is no good' or 'HUB is just as useful as other sources'. As it happened repeatedly, HUB got its own thread to discuss its usefulness and consolidate that discussion out of others - hence the title. (I don't know if this thread should be renamed "HUB Discussion" or what, as I still don't know or understand its/their contribution.)

Function started a similar thread on Linus to discuss their value, whether they should be used as a trusted source. This is in essence a Tech Discussion Meta, identifying which sources are worth listening to and which we'd be better off avoiding.

In short, what made HUB worthy of special attention is that users here were referring to them where there was no consensus to trust their work, causing OT arguments and requiring that content to be separated out. Other channels are cited sporadically as they create and share benchmarks with not enough debate about the channel to be a problem. DF are talked about because of our Special Relationship.

Spoiler

Digital Foundry is kinda like 'the USA' to B3D's 'Old Blighty'. Grandmaster lived here but then sailed off to land at Plymouth Rock, changed his name to Richard Leadbetter, and created an empire while B3D wallows in reminiscing about past glories. Or something. So we talk about them often and watch all their movies, but they don't mention us at all. They might air a sitcom or period drama on their YT pages if we made one.