The GeForce 980 Report Card

[Smalerbi]

Hello,

After having my new workstation for about a week, I thought I would give my experience with the GeForce GTX 980. Unless I am doing something very wrong I found this card to be terrible. It lags behind on everyone of my 2015 apps, Max, PS and CAD on a windows 7 OS. I have tried the 344.75 & 347.52 drivers will the same results. It's painful to work with and the lag time is about half a second or more behind all my commands. Especially working in PS. I can erase an area, sit back in my chair, take a sip of coffee and watch the screen catch up to what I was erasing 3 seconds ago. Picking commands and watching dialog boxes not popping up, but slowing being created in a blistering 2 seconds. In Max, watching my screen pause while the card can catch up to what I want it to do. Oh and the best part, my work disappearing all together and then panning in the viewport a bit and it magically appears again....that always fun. My 6 year old Quadro card performed better than the 980. I can go on and on but I think you get the idea. Unless someone has a magic driver or some other suggestion, I'm going to offer it to some other sucker like myself. Now I have a complete understanding why the 980 is known as a gaming card.

Scott.

[Joelaff]

Odd, we have many 980 cards. All run very fast without issues, blowing away most Quadros. There were issues with any drivers after 344.75 (hangs requiring a reboot). Have not tried that most recent, though.

One machine is win 7 64 bit. The others are 8.1. 8.1 is better of course, but the win 7 is just fine. I don't get why people are still installing win 7. 8.1 is amazing with Classic Shell, must faster, smoother, much better thread handling for multi tasking, etc. With Classic She'll you never see the silly Metro interface at all.

Sounds like you may have a bad card, or a hardware issue. Check for BIOS updates (very important with the newer nvidia cards, especially if your mobo is over six months old).

Odd you are having bad experiences. This really is THE card for our industry right now. Sure you can blow more money on Titans or Quadros, but the gain is minimal ( and often negative depending on the use).

[Joelaff]

Are you sure this is the video card? You tried another card in the same machine, right?

[Smalerbi]

Odd, we have many 980 cards. All run very fast without issues, blowing away most Quadros. There were issues with any drivers after 344.75 (hangs requiring a reboot). Have not tried that most recent, though.

One machine is win 7 64 bit. The others are 8.1. 8.1 is better of course, but the win 7 is just fine. I don't get why people are still installing win 7. 8.1 is amazing with Classic Shell, must faster, smoother, much better thread handling for multi tasking, etc. With Classic She'll you never see the silly Metro interface at all.

Sounds like you may have a bad card, or a hardware issue. Check for BIOS updates (very important with the newer nvidia cards, especially if your mobo is over six months old).





Odd you are having bad experiences. This really is THE card for our industry right now. Sure you can blow more money on Titans or Quadros, but the gain is minimal ( and often negative depending on the use).

Thanks for responding. I will check into the hardware configuration and post it. Perhaps you may see something that raises a red flag. I will also check into the BIOS. I would have to assume it's current based on my auto updates but I have no idea what is being updated. With regards to the windows 7 over 8, that was my computer guys call. I guess he is not a big fan of 8...anyway I appreciate your time and I will get back to you with the information. Also, I realize swapping out the card is trouble shooting 101 but I do not have a spare card lying around at the moment. I would need to purchase one.

Scott.

[Smalerbi]

On a side note.......please see attached. Which of these choices are you using in Max. So far, the Direct 3D-11 was the worst. In shaded mode it worked ok but zero performance in wireframe. I switched to 9. That seem to provide the best overall.

Thanks....Scott

[Joelaff]

This one goes to eleven.

(We are using 11.)

If it is affecting multiple applications I would guess it is either hardware, driver, or OS. Perhaps try completely uninstalling the graphics drivers and letting Windows install whatever it thinks is the best version. (Uninstall, reboot, wait forever for windows to auto-update the driver, usually seen in the Found New Hardware icon on the right side of the task bar.)

Do you have any odd boot issues? (Would indicate BIOS.) I know when we moved a Sandy-Bridge-E machine to one of the newer cards (780 maybe) we had some odd boot issues and other problems that were resolved with a BIOS update. How new is your motherboard (I mean what chipset)?

[Smalerbi]

This one goes to eleven.

(We are using 11.)

If it is affecting multiple applications I would guess it is either hardware, driver, or OS. Perhaps try completely uninstalling the graphics drivers and letting Windows install whatever it thinks is the best version. (Uninstall, reboot, wait forever for windows to auto-update the driver, usually seen in the Found New Hardware icon on the right side of the task bar.)

Do you have any odd boot issues? (Would indicate BIOS.) I know when we moved a Sandy-Bridge-E machine to one of the newer cards (780 maybe) we had some odd boot issues and other problems that were resolved with a BIOS update. How new is your motherboard (I mean what chipset)?

It is effecting multiple apps. The system boots ok.....I do not know what MB and Chipset are in in place. Is there a place where I find this information on my system? Thanks again for all your help

[Joelaff]

CPU-Z will tell you. They also make a great monitor program, HWMonitor for seeing temps, etc. Both are free and ad/spyware free.

Google it. Just be careful when downloading it. Their site does have those annoying ads that say "Download" on the ads, trying to trick you into downloading the wrong thing.

You can also dig around int he Device Manager and find the info there, but it is a little more involved.

[Smalerbi]

CPU-Z will tell you. They also make a great monitor program, HWMonitor for seeing temps, etc. Both are free and ad/spyware free.

Google it. Just be careful when downloading it. Their site does have those annoying ads that say "Download" on the ads, trying to trick you into downloading the wrong thing.

You can also dig around int he Device Manager and find the info there, but it is a little more involved.

yea.....I will talk to my person who put the system together about the specs. I don't like idea of downloading software like that. Once bitten twice shy mentality

[Joelaff]

That is a good habit. I have been using CPU-Z and HWMonitor for 5 years or more. So that doesn't worry me. But you really can't be too safe. Especially since reading this type of info requires administrator access.

I usually download any type of free tool like that from multiple sources (always the source site as one). Then I compare SHA-256 and MD5 hashes on them to make sure they are all the same. I figure that way if one hosting site got hacked, or injected adware into it, they would be different.

[Smalerbi]

Ok.....I have the MB and BIOS specs:

Supermicro X8DAI with intel 5520 chipset.
BIOS version 2.1, however, I check SM website and there is a 2.1a.
please let me know what this tells you because it is Greek to me.

[Joelaff]

I don't know the particulars. I would see if the release notes for 2.1a mention anything about PCI or PCIe fixes, or (obviously) video cards.

But upgrading the BIOS is not something you want to do if you are not familiar with it. Might want to enlist the person that helped build the machine.

Did you try removing all nvidia drivers and letting windows install one?

I think I would try to find someone with another video card to borrow and test out.

[Smalerbi]

That is a good habit. I have been using CPU-Z and HWMonitor for 5 years or more. So that doesn't worry me. But you really can't be too safe. Especially since reading this type of info requires administrator access.

I usually download any type of free tool like that from multiple sources (always the source site as one). Then I compare SHA-256 and MD5 hashes on them to make sure they are all the same. I figure that way if one hosting site got hacked, or injected adware into it, they would be different.

I have no intention of installing the BIOS myself. My I.T. will handle that. As for the drivers, I believe the original drivers on the machine where the drivers windows installed but I will check with my person on that as well. As for testing another video card, wouldn't I need to get the same card to see if the problem persist and to get a proper side by side comparison? I'm hoping my card is not to advanced for my MB. My system is not state of the art by any means. I only running Dual 6 core 3.0 Ghz Xeons. Thanks for all the help. I will keep you posted.
Scott.

[Joelaff]

The same card would tell you most, yes. But I would make sure that SOME card works OK first. Hardware issues suck, but usually once you figure them out it is smooth sailing.

[Smalerbi]

The same card would tell you most, yes. But I would make sure that SOME card works OK first. Hardware issues suck, but usually once you figure them out it is smooth sailing.

yea......this is turning into a nightmare. I removed the driver and had windows install the new driver with the same result. I'm going to try a the card in a different slot tomorrow. If you don't mind me asking, what Mother Boards and chipsets are you running?