nVidia ends GeForce Partner Program

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, D13H4RD2L1V3 said:

I don't think it even should be evidence because as it stands, we don't know if it's even continuing in secret. 

 

I guess the only way to know for sure is to wait and see what comes. The damage is already done though 

People keep saying that.  "The damage is already done".  What damage are they talking about?  As far as I know we haven't seen any sales figures, the dust hasn't settled on any of the AIB's branding changes.  We have't had any major changes to GPU availability.    It seems a rather abstract appraisal of a yet unknown condition.

[D13H4RD]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

People keep saying that.  "The damage is already done".  What damage are they talking about?  As far as I know we haven't seen any sales figures, the dust hasn't settled on any of the AIB's branding changes.  We have't had any major changes to GPU availability.    It seems a rather abstract appraisal of a yet unknown condition.

More to do with the rebranding. 

 

Will AIBs suddenly put the Radeon GPUs back into their gaming lineup? 

[mr moose]

5 minutes ago, D13H4RD2L1V3 said:

More to do with the rebranding. 

 

Will AIBs suddenly put the Radeon GPUs back into their gaming lineup? 

Need to know if they actually ever took them away before you can bring them back:

https://www.gigabyte.com/au/Graphics-Card/GV-RX580AORUS-8GD-rev-10-11#kf

https://www.scorptec.com.au/product/Graphics-Cards/AMD/70922-ROG-STRIX-RXVEGA64-O8G-GAMING?gclid=Cj0KCQjwz7rXBRD9ARIsABfBl80FStR0kCvuXxrHlJJYbXHXpRJqWko9pJapwkEG0O0lhK0Oy8rfr20aAthuEALw_wcB

 

 

Lest just wait for the dust to settle before jumping to conclusions based on inconclusive market rumours.

 

[D13H4RD]

Just now, mr moose said:

Need to know if they actually ever took them away before you can bring them back:

https://www.gigabyte.com/au/Graphics-Card/GV-RX580AORUS-8GD-rev-10-11#kf

 

I just Googled the MSI Gaming X RX 580 and it apparently still exists. 

 

Hmm, I wonder what the ASUS AREZ branding's fate is going to be 

[mr moose]

Just now, D13H4RD2L1V3 said:

I just Googled the MSI Gaming X RX 580 and it apparently still exists. 

 

Hmm, I wonder what the ASUS AREZ branding's fate is going to be 

I don't know.  Branding shifts occur all the time in the market.  If I were Asus, regardless of why they resurrected it I would keep going anyway.

 

Trying to work out if branding has changed as a result of GPP is like trying to work out if cloud patterns have changed due to jets flying past.

[D13H4RD]

Just now, mr moose said:

I don't know.  Branding shifts occur all the time in the market.  If I were Asus, regardless of why they resurrected it I would keep going anyway.

 

Trying to work out if branding has changed as a result of GPP is like trying to work out if cloud patterns have changed due to jets flying past.

We'll probably have to wait and see. 

 

 

[leadeater]

35 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I don't know.  Branding shifts occur all the time in the market.  If I were Asus, regardless of why they resurrected it I would keep going anyway.

 

Trying to work out if branding has changed as a result of GPP is like trying to work out if cloud patterns have changed due to jets flying past.

There is very little driver for Asus to want to change branding like that, in the absence of GPP what is the reason? GPP is the most likely reason for the change, there were branding requirements in it but the specifics we don't know however there is enough evidence for me to say beyond reasonable doubt the Asus Arez branding was brought about directly due to GPP.

 

Asus so far is the only clear and obvious example, what others would have done or were doing who knows but not everything is shrouded in confusion and guessing. Unless any other evidence of a reason to change branding comes to light GPP is the cause of Arez, you'll never get that in writing or official statement like many would argue for but if all evidence points to something then that is it, it's more than often good enough for an actual court so it's good enough here.

 

I'll be more the happy to overturn 'my conviction' if new evidence is found.

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, leadeater said:

I'll be more the happy to overturn 'my conviction' if new evidence is found.

I go the other way, I'll happily enact a conviction when evidence is found. Until then it's just a badly thought out program that easily got stumped by the Opposition making accusations.

 

I mean, everyone is hell bent on assuming that GPP was/is responsible for every quirk in the tech industry to the point that people are assuming this was directly going to hurt AMD by it's very nature.  The problem with that thinking is that it precludes the very real possibility of the whole thing backfiring, where the new brands created for AMD are more successful than the existing brands.  New brands and products can take the market by storm and often do with the right marketing and product support.

E.G if AMD's next vega (NAVI or whatever they call it) does perform better than Nvidia then whatever isolated branding AMD receives will benefit from what Nvidia had hoped to corner for themselves.

[leadeater]

19 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I go the other way, I'll happily enact a conviction when evidence is found. Until then it's just a badly thought out program that easily got stumped by the Opposition making accusations.

 

I mean, everyone is hell bent on assuming that GPP was/is responsible for every quirk in the tech industry to the point that people are assuming this was directly going to hurt AMD by it's very nature.  The problem with that thinking is that it precludes the very real possibility of the whole thing backfiring, where the new brands created for AMD are more successful than the existing brands.  New brands and products can take the market by storm and often do with the right marketing and product support.

E.G if AMD's next vega (NAVI or whatever they call it) does perform better than Nvidia then whatever isolated branding AMD receives will benefit from what Nvidia had hoped to corner for themselves.

As I said not everything can be presented on a plate, some things have to be assessed and a determination made. Everything I've heard from Gamers Nexus and changes on multiple vendor websites at the same time GPP was being rolled out is enough, the evidence is there it's just not compelling to you for what ever reason but there is not an absence of it. What I have not seen is counter evidence at all, no reasoning given to any actions been taken so if there is some I'd like to hear it.

 

Asus, as they are currently the only example we can point at with confidence, have invested a lot in to the ROG brand and have been pushing that out to more of their products over it's branding life. It's their near equivalent to Dell and Alienware, not quite but you get the point, so why would Asus enact such a huge and expensive re-branding.

 

In my previous post I didn't say if it was a good or a bad thing only that GPP was the cause. In the long run due to how big Asus is as a company Arez could end up paying off and I think if done well could actually be better, that however doesn't change my assessment of why it happened.

 

I would actually like Asus to go further and bring in Mars branding for Nvidia products and only put in the very top and the very best to the ROG branding, for Nvidia/AMD/Intel or whoever. That would actually bring back in line what ROG was originally.

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, leadeater said:

As I said not everything can be presented on a plate, some things have to be assessed and a determination made. Everything I've heard from Gamers Nexus and changes on multiple vendor websites at the same time GPP was being rolled out is enough, the evidence is there it's just not compelling to you for what ever reason but there is not an absence of it. What I have not seen is counter evidence at all, no reasoning given to any actions been taken so if there is some I'd like to hear it.

 

Asus, as they are currently the only example we can point at with confidence, have invested a lot in to the ROG brand and have been pushing that out to more of their products of it's branding life. It's their near equivalent to Dell and Alienware, not quite but you get the point, so why would Asus enact such a huge and expensive re-branding.

 

In my previous post I didn't say if it was a good or a bad thing only that GPP was the cause. In the long run due to how big Asus is as a company Arez could end up paying off and I think if done well could actually be better, that however doesn't change my assessment of why it happened.

 

I would actually like Asus to go further and bring in Mars branding for Nvidia products and only put in the very top and the very best to the ROG branding, for Nvidia/AMD/Intel or whoever. That would actually bring back in line what ROG was originally.

Asus haven't dropped ROG AMD though, So I am not sure what re-branding they have undertaken.  They still advertise the Vega64 in a ROG strix variant.  Introducing the the Arez could be as simple as market research pointing to a new market.  

 

https://www.asus.com/au/Graphics-Cards/ROG-STRIX-RXVEGA64-O8G-GAMING/

[leadeater]

4 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Asus haven't dropped ROG AMD though, So I am not sure what re-branding they have undertaken.  They still advertise the Vega64 in a ROG strix variant.  Introducing the the Arez could be as simple as market research pointing to a new market.  

 

https://www.asus.com/au/Graphics-Cards/ROG-STRIX-RXVEGA64-O8G-GAMING/

I guess you missed all the official news stories from Asus stating that they are bringing in the Arez branding?

https://www.asus.com/Graphics-Cards/AREZ-STRIX-RXVEGA64-O8G-GAMING/

 

Quote

Asus announced that its entire lineup of AMD graphics cards has a brand-new identity, referring to the red-team GPU series as "Arez."

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/asus-arez-radeon-graphics-cards-amd,36906.html

 

Basically it boils down to this currently for me.

 

 

If there is cake on your face then you ate the cake, I didn't see the cake get eaten but.... there is cake on your face 

[mark_cameron]

I'd just like to point out as someone with experience in these sorts of matters:

 

Just because Nvidia say GPP is not going ahead:

 

Will NOT stop a formal investigation by the likes of the competition unit of the European Commission or the FTC.

 

They will investigate, even if Nvidia - say they will no longer implement the policy.

INCASE Nvidia are implementing something unwritten or unacknowledged that damages competition in the vendors/computer games markets. Which are multi-billion $, € and £ industries.

 

The GPP policy merely indicated that Nvidia may be doing something, that means that the regulators will be paying them close scrutiny. What has happened is all of the consumer technology media has basically raised a flag that the regulators will have noted.

 

Even if they do not say publicly there is an investigation.

 

In the case of Intel, the EU investigation took four years to gather evidence.

 

http://ec.europa.eu/competition/sectors/ICT/intel.html

 

Quote

First, Intel gave wholly or partially hidden rebates to computer manufacturers – Dell, HP, NEC, Lenovo on condition that they bought all, or almost all, their x86 CPUs from Intel. Intel also made direct payments to Europe's largest PC retailer – Media Saturn Holding (MSH) on condition that it stocked only computers with Intel x86 CPUs.

 

Second, Intel made direct payments to computer manufacturers – HP, Acer, Lenovo - to stop or delay the launch of specific products containing a competitor's x86 CPUs and to limit the sales channels available to these products.

Intel's anticompetitive behaviour diminished competitors' ability to compete on the merits of their x86 CPUs. This resulted in a reduction of consumer choice and in lower incentives to innovate.

 

Then you have the recent Qualcomm case 24 January 2018:

 

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-421_en.htm

 

Quote

Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy, said: "Qualcomm illegally shut out rivals from the market for LTE baseband chipsets for over five years, thereby cementing its market dominance. Qualcomm paid billions of US Dollars to a key customer, Apple, so that it would not buy from rivals. These payments were not just reductions in price – they were made on the condition that Apple would exclusively use Qualcomm's baseband chipsets in all its iPhones and iPads.

....

Market dominance is, as such, not illegal under EU antitrust rules. However, dominant companies have a special responsibility not to abuse their powerful market position by restricting competition, either in the market where they are dominant or in separate markets.

 

[Humbug]

 

[mr moose]

11 hours ago, leadeater said:

I guess you missed all the official news stories from Asus stating that they are bringing in the Arez branding?

https://www.asus.com/Graphics-Cards/AREZ-STRIX-RXVEGA64-O8G-GAMING/

 

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/asus-arez-radeon-graphics-cards-amd,36906.html

 

Basically it boils down to this currently for me.

 

 

If there is cake on your face then you ate the cake, I didn't see the cake get eaten but.... there is cake on your face 

I didn't miss that, I actually mentioned it in my post. 

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

I didn't miss that, I actually mentioned it in my post. 

Yes but the current ROG branding for AMD cards was going to, not sure if will continue, be removed. Aus website doesn't have any Arez stuff on it at all but the global site has both currently. Either way it was officially announced that it was changing and that, as an official statement, trumps a website that hasn't been updated yet to reflect it.

 

Sure it could be market research however that wasn't mentioned at all and GPP did exist at the time and 3 major vendors all enacted branding changes of various different products or entire ranges of products for AMD all at the same time. If it were just Asus or Gigabyte or MSI then it would be different but it was all three.

 

AMD also brokered this GPP story and then later made a press announcement that AIB partners would all be making branding changes, AMD from the start was obviously not happy and didn't want these branding changes and were obviously a bit pissy in their announcement.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-responds-nvidia-gpp,36905.html

https://gaming.radeon.com/en/radeon-a-gamers-choice/

 

Nothing points to voluntary or natural branding changes at all. If ANYTHING at all points to the counter then I'm all ears, show me something, anything otherwise GPP is the reason for Arez.

 

Edit:

Remember this is my take on the situation and only actual evidence, not 'but maybe', will be able to change it.

[laminutederire]

15 minutes ago, leadeater said:

 

 I think GamersNexus made a great point about GPP: Nvidia has been outright lying on GPP officially, since they stated they wanted no confusion on products, but they themselves confused consumers twice this gen with the 1060 and 1030 variants not marketed as different cards and so on.

That's something tangible that can't be denied, and it contradicts the motivation given by Nvidia, raising concern just for this. Why would they lie on their motive if their motive was good to begin with?

[App4that]

8 minutes ago, laminutederire said:

 I think GamersNexus made a great point about GPP: Nvidia has been outright lying on GPP officially, since they stated they wanted no confusion on products, but they themselves confused consumers twice this gen with the 1060 and 1030 variants not marketed as different cards and so on.

That's something tangible that can't be denied, and it contradicts the motivation given by Nvidia, raising concern just for this. Why would they lie on their motive if their motive was good to begin with?

The most important point GN made was this had little to do with discrete graphics cards, and everything to do with Nvidia being afraid of what Vega could do to the mobile market as seen with the Hades Canyon NUC.

[mr moose]

35 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Yes but the current ROG branding for AMD cards was going to, not sure if will continue, be removed. Aus website doesn't have any Arez stuff on it at all but the global site has both currently. Either way it was officially announced that it was changing and that, as an official statement, trumps a website that hasn't been updated yet to reflect it.

Did Asus actually say that though? I can't find it.

 

35 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Sure it could be market research however that wasn't mentioned at all and GPP did exist at the time and 3 major vendors all enacted branding changes of various different products or entire ranges of products for AMD all at the same time. If it were just Asus or Gigabyte or MSI then it would be different but it was all three.

No one mentions market research, MS was relying on Market research when they introduced win 8 and the idea of all OS's from phones through tablets to desktops be the same. But they never said it.  Nearly every (although I believe all) branding decision is based on market research. 

 

35 minutes ago, leadeater said:

AMD also brokered this GPP story and then later made a press announcement that AIB partners would all be making branding changes, AMD from the start was obviously not happy and didn't want these branding changes and were obviously a bit pissy in their announcement.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-responds-nvidia-gpp,36905.html

https://gaming.radeon.com/en/radeon-a-gamers-choice/

 

Nothing points to voluntary or natural branding changes at all. If ANYTHING at all points to the counter then I'm all ears, show me something, anything otherwise GPP is the reason for Arez.

Nothing really points to anything other than Nvidia wanting more exclusive branding.   The exception I take in all this is not so much about whether GPP still exists or not, but the extent to which all these observations of the market are related.     It is very common for a company to back peddle when facing bad PR, this happens all the time.  It is not proof of anything other than the company recognizes continuing with GPP is not to their advantage based on PR.  When we start concluding causality based on correlation we miss the opportunity to be rational about the situation.   Will Asus drop arez? maybe, did all this re-branding cost these companies an arm and leg? likely not, but people will still make all sorts of unqualified claims about it.   Just wait for the dust to settle and see what's left standing. 

 

 

35 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Edit:

Remember this is my take on the situation and only actual evidence, not 'but maybe', will be able to change it.

 

It really comes down to how everyone interprets "evidence" then. 

[leadeater]

8 minutes ago, mr moose said:

It is very common for a company to back peddle when facing bad PR, this happens all the time.  It is not proof of anything other than the company recognizes continuing with GPP is not to their advantage based on PR. 

The backing out of GPP has nothing at all to do with it, that's post change and doesn't play at all in to my assessment. What happens now I don't really care. I don't care that Arez exists either.

 

All I see is all roads lead to GPP as the cause of Arez existing in the first place, that's all nothing more.

 

10 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Did Asus actually say that though? I can't find it.

Yes and the 20+ tech publications that reported it. And that fact I linked you to the new Arez branded page on the global website, it's a real thing. Official statement and reflected on the website. I wouldn't let the ending of GPP cloud this, it was being enacted. If it continues who knows.

 

Not every company has a place on their website for news announcements and not all announcements are handled that way, more commonly press announcements are made directly to the publications who then publish articles.

 

19 minutes ago, mr moose said:

No one mentions market research, MS was relying on Market research when they introduced win 8 and the idea of all OS's from phones through tablets to desktops be the same. But they never said it.  Nearly every (although I believe all) branding decision is based on market research. 

Microsoft always mentions why they are doing something like that, they might not say "Market Research" but they give a why and a story. They sell it, talk it up, actual reasoning, none of which has been given by Asus for Arez other than we are doing it. Why?

 

15 minutes ago, mr moose said:

It really comes down to how everyone interprets "evidence" then. 

I don't know why you say "evidence" like that. It's real you can see it, Arez it's real and exists. There is no need to de-emphasize it. It's not the only evidence either, I put more trust in to Gamers Nexus and what they have said on this than just watching a few companies and the goings on on their websites. Actual industry sources have commented in part on this to Steve and the most clear thing to come of those discussions is never piss off Nvidia, ever. What little they have said is enough to make your own judgement.

 

I'm not going to rehash his videos, you're free to go watch them yourself. There's at least 3 videos with GPP coverage in them.

 

If you don't think GPP is the cause of Arez that's fine, I'd be interested in what you think is the reason though. Instead of getting stuck in the it's not this conversation, because I've said what I think it is, what do you think it is? What market research? Like what is the driver for it? I'm fine with just an opinion on it but you need to be more specific than a simple it's market research answer.

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, leadeater said:

The backing out of GPP has nothing at all to do with it, that's post change and doesn't play at all in to my assessment. What happens now I don't really care. I don't care that Arez exists either.

 

All I see is all roads lead to GPP as the cause of Arez existing in the first place, that's all nothing more.

 

Yes and the 20+ tech publications that reported it. And that fact I linked you to the new Arez branded page on the global website, it's a real thing. Official statement and reflected on the website. I wouldn't let the ending of GPP cloud this, it was being enacted. If it continues who knows.

 

Not every company has a place on their website for news announcements and not all announcements are handled that way, more commonly press announcements are made directly to the publications who then publish articles.

 

Microsoft always mentions why they are doing something like that, they might not say "Market Research" but they give a why and a story. They sell it, talk it up, actual reasoning, none of which has been given by Asus for Arez other than we are doing it. Why?

 

I don't know why you say "evidence" like that. It's real you can see it, Arez it's real and exists. There is no need to de-emphasize it. It's not the only evidence either, I put more trust in to Gamers Nexus and what they have said on this than just watching a few companies and the goings on on their websites. Actual industry sources have commented in part on this to Steve and the most clear thing to come of those discussions is never piss off Nvidia, ever. What little they have said is enough to make your own judgement.

 

I'm not going to rehash his videos, you're free to go watch them yourself. There's at least 3 videos with GPP coverage in them.

 

If you don't think GPP is the cause of Arez that's fine, I'd be interested in what you think is the reason though. Instead of getting stuck in the it's not this conversation, because I've said what I think it is, what do you think it is? What market research? Like what is the driver for it? I'm fine with just an opinion on it but you need to be more specific than a simple it's market research answer.

I know Arez is real,  I was asking if Asus have claimed they are no longer making ROG AMD? have they actually said that or is it just insinuation form the 20+ tech publications reporting on it?

 

I "" evidence because what you claim is evidence to me is just correlation.   Evidence in indisputable,  personal conclusions based on correlation is not evidence.  Until Asus stop selling ROG AMD then I see nothing to support the claim Arez is specifically a GPP thing.

[leadeater]

22 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I "" evidence because what you claim is evidence to me is just correlation.   Evidence in indisputable,  personal conclusions based on correlation is not evidence.  Until Asus stop selling ROG AMD then I see nothing to support the claim Arez is specifically a GPP thing.

Not all evidence is indisputable, evidence is evidence and is usually not conclusive like you're implying. Even the definition of the word evidence reflects that if we want to get super pedantic over it.

 

As I said don't let the cancellation of GPP cloud this, it was going to happen. Asus isn't obligated to remove ROG now so what happens hence forth is no longer an indication of what was going to happen. 

 

Edit:

What you're asking for is proof, not evidence.

[mr moose]

3 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Not all evidence is indisputable, evidence is evidence and is usually not conclusive like you implying. Even the definition of the word evidence reflects that if we want to get super pedantic over it.

 

As I said don't let the cancellation of GPP cloud this, it was going to happen. Asus isn't obligated to remove ROG now so what happens hence forth is no longer an indication of what was going to happen. 

 

Edit:

What you're asking for is proof, not evidence.

 

I think you had better look up the definition of evidence.   Evidence is proof that a belief or condition is true or false.  

[leadeater]

1 minute ago, mr moose said:

I think you had better look up the definition of evidence.   Evidence is proof that a belief or condition is true or false.  

I have, I did exactly that before posting. You want something tied in a bow and presented to you as indisputable, that's not going to happen and very rarely happens.

 

I'm not going further with this line. I've asked for your opinion on what it is other than GPP so give that, everything else is fluff and irrelevant. I've assessed the evidence and made my conclusion, you've made yours so I'd like to hear it. If you don't want to give an alternative then you'll very clearly need to explain the counter for why it's not GPP, you'll need to address every point from all the videos from Steve at Gamers Nexus and how that relates to the branding changes we have actually seen all at the same time, coincidence is a pathetic reason in my view so it better not be that.

[mr moose]

12 minutes ago, leadeater said:

I have, I did exactly that before posting. You want something tied in a bow and presented to you as indisputable, that's not going to happen and very rarely happens.

Evidence is proof, if it isn't proof of something then it isn't evidence.  Period.

 

12 minutes ago, leadeater said:

I'm not going further with this line. I've asked for your opinion on what it is other than GPP so give that,

My opinion is that all we have are a bunch of correlations and a program that set out to gain exclusive branding.   No evidence to make claims one way or the other.  Be concerned, be skeptical be unsure about how good this is for consumers sure, but My opinion is that we can;t call it fact because there is no evidence too support that yet.

12 minutes ago, leadeater said:

everything else is fluff and irrelevant. I've assessed the evidence and made my conclusion, you've made yours so I'd like to hear it. If you don't want to give an alternative then you'll very clearly need to explain the counter for why it's not GPP, you'll need to address every point from all the videos from Steve at Gamers Nexus and how that relates to the branding changes we have actually seen all at the same time, coincidence is a pathetic reason in my view so it better not be that.

I think I have missed the last couple of videos from steve on the subject.  Not sure what they contain, but I am not about to make assumptions to explain market trends.  Especially when no one will officially state why any of this has happened.

[leadeater]

45 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Evidence is proof, if it isn't proof of something then it isn't evidence.  Period.

I guess you're ignoring this definition then, "signs or indications of something." So don't period me. It doesn't even work that way in court either, "smoking guns" just don't exist in practicality. If that is your bar for something to be evidence then that is highly unrealistic.

 

Say what you want evidence simply isn't what your implying. You can draw your own, different, conclusion from the evidence but I'd appreciate the end of "this is not evidence", it is and I will not budge on it. If you can't agree that there is evidence then we have nothing to discuss, there is no common ground so it's impossible.

 

45 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Especially when no one will officially state why any of this has happened.

And why would they? Another unrealistic expectation to have and one that could potentially have legal consequences if such a person went on record.

 

If Arez was unrelated to GPP then is it not odd that Asus will not comment further on why they brought it in? Don't read in to that, it plays no part in my assessment of GPP being the cause but Asus stating something counter to my assessment would instantly change my opinion. It's actually very easy to change my opinion on this, I believe very little about what is claimed about GPP but currently I have no doubts about the branding requirements.

 

Neither did I say it was fact, I've said based on the evidence I have seen my assessment is GPP is the reason for Arez, without it Arez would not exist.

 

There is reason in action, in this case Arez, so again all ears on one. Does Asus think there are too many products under ROG? That could be one, unlikely to warrant such a large branding change. AMD wanted the change, also unlikely given their response to GPP and press announcements in the last month.