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Will EU Regulations Effectively Ban High-End Video Cards?
New submitter arun84h writes "An update to an energy law, which will apply in the European Union, has the power to limit sale of discrete components deemed 'energy inefficient.' GPU maker AMD is worried this will affect future technology as it becomes available, as well as some current offerings. From TFA: 'According to data NordicHardware has seen from a high level employee at AMD, current graphics cards are unable to meet with these requirements. This includes "GPUs like Cape Verde and Tahiti", that is used in the HD 7700 and HD 7900 series, and can't meet with the new guidelines, the same goes for the older "Caicos" that is used in the HD 6500/6600 and HD 7500/7600 series. Also "Oland" is mentioned, which is a future performance circuit from AMD, that according to rumors will be used in the future HD 8800 series. What worries AMD the most is how this will affect future graphics cards since the changes in Lot 3 will go into effect soon. The changes will of course affect Nvidia as much as it will AMD.' Is this the beginning of the end for high-end GPU sales in the EU?"
The report in question. Each performance category of hardware has a power draw ceiling; in this case, regulators are increasing the minimum bus bandwidth for the highest performance category, bumping all hardware on the market into the next lowest. Unfortunately, no current hardware or planned hardware on the high end will come under the power draw ceiling for that category.
Have the driver that ships with the card be designed to stay under the draw cap so the card is still in regulation, and the manufacturer can just offer the normal drivers on the site for people to download.
Naturally anyone who cares will install the real driver, so the law-breaking is on the part of the consumer, not AMD or Nvidia. Seems like a simple workaround as long as you can say 'it's the consumer breaking the law, not us'
Next!
EU won the Nobel peace prize so they can slow down your FPS game framerates
I only read a few bits of the document, but I think there's a loophole. ... ... ... ...
This Regulation shall not apply to any of the following product groups:
(v) game consoles;
Game console means a mains powered standalone device which is designed to provide video game playing as its primary function.
... AMD is complaining because they can't make the GPUs efficient enough to fit the limits and still be competitive with NVidia's.
Yes.
The thing is, the actual, public regulations have very little similarity to the fear-mongering (and certainly click-generating) article on nordichardware. You can check it out yourself: here (pdf).
Also, note, that these regulations are about idle power - and that's an area where some real advancements were made - if AMD's claims are to be believed (3 W in idle with ZeroCore Power), their top-end 7970 GPU's idle power draw is about 10% of the maximum allowed.
The claim that GPUs over a certain bandwith will be banned seems to be absolutely fabricated - it's not something that the regulation's wording or intent or whatever would even hint about.
Real life is overrated.
Betteridge's Law of Headlines states the following: Any headline which ends in a question mark can be answered by the word 'no'.
Nine times out of ten there has been scaremongering about EU regulations, the disastrous consequences haven't occurred. Maybe it's because the regulations weren't as bad in the first place, maybe it's because of the public outbreak, I really don't know... but these sort of issues tend to get fixed. Maybe certain sections are reworded, maybe technology companies are given a special permission to sell their latest models even if they break the limit, acknowledging that it's needed for the technologies to kick off so they can later be optimized (Latest Intel processors require a lot less energy than they used to). Then again... maybe it isn't such an issue even if this does come to effect. I'm not saying "Graphics will never get better than they're now!" but I'm saying that they've been stagnating and the sacrifice that I, as a gamer, might be forced to do wouldn't be that bad.
As for the parent post, the customer who installs a driver wouldn't be breaking the law. This - even if it came to effect - would limit the sales, not criminalize the components.
'Will EU Regulations Effectively Ban High-End Video Cards?'
"Any headline which ends in a question mark can be answered by the word 'no'".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_Law_of_Headlines
Read the actual document people.
This is not policy.
This is not even draft policy.
THIS IS NOT EVEN RESEARCH INTO POLICY.
This is a PRELIMINARY REPORT that looks at potential solutions to rising energy costs and e-waste within the EU by helping people use less power. It merely outlines a variety of means through which this can be achieved in the EU. What is outlined in the shambolic article above is merely one part of this large, well sourced report.
Yet more BS made up by Europhobes.
Firstly it's not something that is even planned for implementation, let alone dated and incoming. If the EU really were to put a limit on the power draw of graphics card to come in 5 years from now which required cards to use 1/2 the power it would hardly matter. There would be a small decrease in the rate graphics improve while they focus on improving efficiency.
Probably my bigger gripe is that it would be simpler, and likely more effective, to tax power use rather than try and legislate what is/isn't allowed in various electronic devices. A generic tax would increase uptake and development of efficient devices and encourage people to be less wasteful while still allowing them to buy some inefficient items (gfx cards if required) and pay accordingly. They're going to tax us anyway so it might as well be focused on discouraging unsustainable behaviour instead of, for example, having an income.
1.1.3. Category D desktop computers and integrated desktop
computers meeting all of the following technical parameters are
exempt from the requirements specified in points 1.1.1 and
1.1.2:
(a) a minimum of six physical cores in the central processing
unit (CPU); and
(b) discrete GPU(s) providing total frame buffer bandwidths
above 320 GB/s; and
(c) a minimum 16GB of system memory; and
(d) a PSU with a rated output power of at least 1000 W.
So the high end cards in high end systems are not banned but exempt. Anyone who is a lawyer care to comment on my interpretation?
Yes, sir.
New ban ruling could actually ban stuff!
We still have regular light bulbs sold in EU, they are sold as "heating devices". I think same could apply to GPUs.
These devices which draw more energy? Do they not output more results?
If electric consumption is to be reduced, why tax/ban/restrict devices instead of taxing electricity more? Now people building game rigs are going for 300W SLI solutions instead of 200W high-end card solutions. But of course, people need electricity for "real" work, so it should not be taxed as is.
The same kind of lawmaker idiocy has infected car markets, at least here in Finland. New cars are taxed based on their manufacturer-claimed, usually quite unrealistic CO2 pollution values. But it's the fuel that produces CO2, so why not tax fuel (more) instead of cars. Now people with old gas guzzlers don't have the money or the will to upgrade to a newer, cleaner equivalent.
All this regulatory nonsense is just making the system more complex for no real reason while providing unnecessary loopholes.
I think this is deliberate counter propaganda that shows up more often when there is some big scandal about business doing something stupid that screws a lot of people. In this case I guess it is the compounding pharmacy that caused the meningitis epidemic. The corrupt criminal organization calling itself the "International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists" successfully lobbied Congress to defeat attempts to regulate their industry. Now there are over 200 meningitis cases and 15 deaths, and the number of exposed patients may be higher because more drugs were tainted.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444657804578052972230404046.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
If you want to be paranoid about something, worry about corrupt politically connected businesses risking your life for profit. It actually happens. Not that it often ends up on Slashdot, as opposed to right wing scare tactics.
Why is Snark Required?
Yes
The EU could fire just one of their fat bloated bureaucrats and save the BTU equivalent in hot air of all the video cards ever produced or ever will be.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
I thought it was about the WII U
All workaround and perceptions aside:
The proposal is absurd.
Now they regulate your PC, next they regulate your coffee machine.
They already made old fashioned light bulbs extinct.
So what is next?
They just regulate and not do it the other way by making the market move in the `right` direction by lowering prices.
So what will this do to our PC's?
Mee 2
"I'm never quite so stupid as when I'm being smart" (Linus van Pelt)
Regulating idle power draw would actually be good, and a lot more clever than regulating the power ceiling. Saying that desktop computers can't use more than 10W in idle, and no component sold discretely can use more than 5W idle would make a huge difference. In reality, those of us running these 300W graphics cards only run them for a fraction of the day, and if they were 150W instead would make much difference, whereas a difference between 20W and 10W for the idle power would make a bigger difference over a week or a year.
This is a "working document", still a far cry from becoming official regulation. Moreover, once it becomes an official EU directive, it must still be implemented by each EU country separately; this is a process that can take years and years. In the mean time, there is space for lobbying, parliamentary action and all kinds of measures on national ( EU country ) levels to circumvent or soften the regulation. TFA is stirring up sensation where, truly, there is nothing to be seen.
Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Yes, that seems to be misreported.
The only reference to bandwidth I could find is in the following:
1.1.3. Category D desktop computers and integrated desktop
computers meeting all of the following technical parameters are
exempt from the requirements specified in points 1.1.1 and
1.1.2:
(a) a minimum of six physical cores in the central processing
unit (CPU); and
(b) discrete GPU(s) providing total frame buffer bandwidths
above 320 GB/s; and
(c) a minimum 16GB of system memory; and
(d) a PSU with a rated output power of at least 1000 W.
In short, it is an exemption for very high end computers from certain power requirements, not a ban. Nordic Hardware's Jacob Hugosson has delivered a very bad article there.
C - the footgun of programming languages
640kB should be enough for anybody.
If we can't have a single high-power graphics card, can they stop us linking up 4 or more medium-power cards in one system?
Just like how the auto industry cries foul when legislation comes up about enforcing fuel efficiency standards, and then still find a way, so will nVidia and AMD. Sure, they might have to work harder, but it's not like they have a choice. They can't simply disregard the whole european market.
Move sig!
...the middle of the end for the EU.
As if getting the Nobel Peace Prize wasn't a big enough kiss of death.
This regulation only applies to computers not graphics cards. Folks who assemble their gaming rig themselves can continue to do so.
Looking at it, it says that the computer has to meet ALL of the requirements.
My computer is 'high performance'(or at least was), but it's only a quad core and doesn't have a kilowatt PSU.
Which would be bad while tossing in a hexacore CPU and a kilowatt PSU isn't that hard, it's generally not necessary even with the hottest graphics card on the market today. A lightly loaded kw psu will waste more than a smaller, moderately loaded but well designed supply. A 750W power supply that isn't lying about it's ratings and a quadcore works well for games.
Also, the article was complaining that no cards planned today have more than 320 GB/s of frame buffer bandwidth, so therefore outside of two cards/SLI you might not be able to meet that exemption.
Still, I imagine that for the component market it won't be as big of a deal - you could always be putting the card into such a system.
Reading more on the regulations, it looks like such a video card would be considered an 'adder', thus allowing more power to be consumed. But how that would work is beyond me.
I don't read AC A human right
Is anyone else bothered with the idea that government is taking more and more micro-managerial control over just about everything you can imagine doing with your life?
Obvious left-wing troll is obvious.
I appreciate that the editorial added contains correct information, but people who RTFA might not realize it's not clarification but correction of complete and utter BS.
Nordichardware is making a joke of themselves by leaving that article up as is ...
Well, if you read a little bit further down you will see that this exemption will expire 30 months after enacting the regulation - but it is mostly moot anyway, since a desktop computer has to satisfy all four of the requirements above to be exempted, so it effects only a very-very small number of computers.
Real life is overrated.
I certainly hope so! Would be nice if everybody stopped only caring about graphics, when it comes to games.
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
Really, several other sposted PRECISELY what I was going to say and others have pointed out that the regulation requires PRECISELY that: reduce the idle or low power modes where the 3D either doesn't exist or has almost no requirement for such power as the maximum thorughput of the card.
As forward thinking as the EU is with limiting the energy consumption of discrete components; I am surprised they haven't addressed a much larger issue, the cruelty of computer on software violence. Everyday, trillions of instructions are summarily executed with no trial and no right of appeal. This cannot continue!
Mandatory caps of this type worked fine for cars in EU countries, inasfar as I'm aware. The target gas consumption per km decreases over time, and car makers strive to beat it in order to avoid pollution-related taxes. This leads to more innovation and less energy consumption, for the benefit of everyone. As interesting side-effects, the targets conveniently keep low-tech cars made in China and India out of European markets, and the few who arguably get priced out of the car market end up riding bicycle or using mass-transit systems.
Whichever way the EU would legislate on this, assuming ever, competent GPU makers would likewise put more focus on reducing energy consumption. Fwiw, they need to do so anyway for laptops, tablets and smart phones. So imho, nothing to see, move along...
Hehehe, this sounds like a great news for OnLive... oops too late.
We have taken care of everything. You need only what we say you do.
First we ban books and kill all the history teachers. Then we write our new future which ends the past ways.
We know best. We are the Priests. Your life exists because of us.
does electricity cost money? do customers pay for their electricity?
Well if that is true why do we have a discussion?
I wonder if they can legally pull it through by selling the same hardware, that will use up less power (kind of like underclocking) - and hence under perform - via software locks, with the ability for a user to download a different non-EU driver which would unlock its fullest potential and also consume maximum power.
It's a dirty trick but totally legal as they're not technically breaching the laws-to-be, while keeping users happy too.
I'll only address the bit of your post that isn't wearing tin foil.
Whoever is stupid enough to make this a topic on Slashdot: this is a right wing troll. The big bad evil government is not going to rip your high end gaming machine from your cold dead hands. Stop wasting our bandwidth and time with this dumb ass crap.
I sure hate it when there's an article posted on Slashdot that causes a healthy debate about energy efficiency and computer use. I don't come here to read about computers and the real world, I want to hear about the latest trends in aluminium milliners and the protection their products offer against meningitis or Felix Baumgartner landing on my head.
It'd be better if, instead of limiting the ceiling like that, they set a minimum requirement on efficiency. Numbers pulled from my ass:
GPUs: Minimum of 10 GFLOP/watt
CPUs: Minimum of 750 MFLOP/watt
Then you can slowly increase the requirements over time as technology matures.
This way you don't have to limit legislation to desktop computers or similar - it can easily be applied to portables and mobile devices.
Want to use a 1W CPU in your tablet? It has to deliver at least 750 MFLOP/s. Include maximum power draw at idle if needed.
Provide a free to use benchmark for this, and require that the results are listed with the product, just like you see with cars (city and highway mileage).
Now you suddenly don't have to figure out which is better for your power usage - an i3-3225 or an A10-5800K? You can look at the legally required performance numbers and judge for yourself.
The only fat and bloated people here are the American hot-air-blowers... Don't confuse the US administration for the EU.
If you are paying for the energy, you should be able to use it. The logical next step to limiting sale of devices that use too much energy is to start punishing individuals for using too much energy. After all I can buy three energy efficient video cards and Crossfire them, using more power than a single energy efficient GPU, so better just limit the amount of energy per person in a household and impose harsh penalties on households that violate this cap. This is the same problem I see with 16oz limit on soda drinks in NY. People who want to drink more soda will buy several sodas. People who want more performance from their PC will buy more devices when possible if government limitations make a single device inadequate to meet their needs. If you impose a limit on a single factor, say energy consumption per unit or calories per drink, people will buy more GPU's or more sodas. You need to convince people that using less energy (or getting less empty calories) is in their best interest if you truly want to enact change. You'll never convince everyone, but just look at the amount of people who are recycling voluntarily today compared to 10 years ago. We didn't have to arrest anyone for generating too much trash either. Ultimately, I just don't think an "Iron Fist" approach to energy conservation such as this will have any meaningful effect, and will clearly limit the personal freedom of individuals who are graphics enthusiasts, so as an advocate of personal freedom I am against this type of thing, and I think many others would agree.
This came up on Overclock.net on the 12th, which spread into a large debate and was looked into by a member rather well. This is what he found:
"It's the journalist who is trolling. It's baseless nonsense with a sensationlist title. And he caught most of you hook line and sinker.
Just a few things you could notice if you take a moment to think it through. ..." with no explicit quote. Who said that? Why would they be worried about a report that hasn't resulted in any actual proposal.
All directives, proposals, studies and reports of EU law are publically available. All data must be openly published. So he would be able to link to any proposals.
Therefore "NordicHardware has seen exclusive information about a new energy law that will apply within the EU" is bullcrap.
Only link is to a report from 2007 which looks at possible means of reducing CO2 emissions.
That "buffer bandwidth" table in the middle of the NordicHardware article is based on data collected in 2006.
Report was part of an ongoing study but it hasn't been active since 2008.
The EU directive that the report relates to was recast in 2009, so it's not even valid reference material.
New directive took until December 2011 before publishing any report. You can read it here http://www.meerp.eu/documents.htm
"AMD is worried
Contrary to "Graphics card energy consumption has been rising steadily over the last couple of years" GPUs are actually getting more efficient.
"We definitely feel that restrictions that lead to more efficient hardware is a good thing, but it needs to be done properly with the affected companies being involved in the discussion." Journalist obviously doesn't realise that 110 stakeholders (affected companies) were present at the Meerp stakeholder meeting of 9 September 2011. Journalist also doesn't realise that AMD is listed as a stakeholder since at least 11 July 2011.
"According to a report published in August this year the current roadmaps [from AMD and Nvidia] does not support the new requirements..." If it was published, then why not link to it?"
This was provided by member WiSK on Overclock.net... citing my source since I didn't do the research. Don't worry about this sensationalism...
No! Please! Don't infringe on my rights to video game to save Planet Earth! Woe is me! How can this happen?
Let's just ban all electronic devices. They are full of toxic components.
I lack central heating, you insensitive clods!
I factor my computer usage into my heating and power bill.
I get a lot more out of my buck by having a few computers on 24/7 instead of using electrical heating which is my only other option.
The winter is coming, and Norway gets cold, really cold. So I could choose between a heating oven, which doubles as a space eater in a small apartment. Or I could use my computers, and look for aliens via SETI@home while keeping my feet warm by the airstream from my CUDA-heated GPUs
You're smart, and you're ruining my image of humanity.
Seriously, I mean it. Can't be that I'm the only one who remembers the times when their graphics cards did not need a separate power plug (or even two), were one slot high, or even didn't have a cooler at all and still didn't overheat?
Since, when sharia takes over the EU it's going to be living in the 10th century anyway. Time to get a headstart on unwinding that clock.
Hippie and well-meaning Liberal: "It's all our fault! Anybody who says otherwise is funded by the Big Oil Oligarchs!"
Yeah? Guess who benefits from Carbon Taxes?
That's right. Big Oil Oligarchs.
Climate Change is happening on all the other planets.
Though, the debunkers are furiously trying to kill that idea. Type in "Climate change on other planets" and Google returns the first two pages full of polished debunking, shoutdowns and high profile folks wearing Doctor Who bow ties and Doctor Who faces (who openly claim to be American patriots) telling us it's all about car exhaust. That large a coordinated over reaction is a type of media hysteria, and when people over-react with such intensity, it is an indicator of psychological denial and propaganda; that there is a dangerous truth in the suggestion.
And of course, any time a popular belief has all the normals convinced and feeling righteous, you can bet it's the result of successful mind-control campaigning. Because, yes, people really are that stupid. Even the nice ones.
Will it end "high-end graphics?" No more than CAFE standards ended the auto industry. If it's the standard, I have no doubt that innovative solutions will be designed to allow us to live within it, or close enough to it that no regulatory actions need be taken. We're just redefining what "high-end" means, and given the power profile of an Nvidia 480 vs. a 680, it's high time for that kind of high-end progress.
It does really look like (absent things like suspend-to-ram/disk) most computers are stuck at 140-200W on idle. Turning off the monitor will get me maybe down to 120W.
30-50W is more like beefy laptop specs (mine with SiS graphics will draw 21W on idle). Full systems don't seem to get down to 120 with a monitor on. 20W is well wrong.
+1
It's not a video card. It's a computer that happens to be very good at video and very good at communicating with another computer over PCI Express or a similar high-speed communications channel.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
GPU cards are small compared to other energy appliances. What an opportunity for a black market. It is so typical of all such misguided regulation.
Measure by joules/floating-point operation, and I bet video cards win hands-down every time over any other kind of computing unit. If you want to perform certain types of calculations (like, I dunno, graphics), a GPU is the most efficient way to do it. Now that's not to say that some GPUs aren't much more efficient that other per op. Especially when you consider the power they use while not cranking out a top-end game, I'm sure the field opens up even more. But measuring a card by total draw is dumb.
Ze Atomic Device! It iz Ztolen!
Regulations are worse than both Free Market or Tax
http://ceolas.net/#li23x
http://freedomlightbulb.org/ "How bans are wrongly justified" 14 points, referenced (light bulb example, but similarly here)
In summary
1. Energy saving is not the only reason to choose a product, whether video cards, light bulbs (as mentioned in the comments) or anything else
2. Energy saving mandates change product characteristics eg performance, usability, size/weight/appearance as well as price
- or noone would want the products and a ban would not be "needed"
There is no "free lunch".
3. The bans are about saving electricity /CO2 emissions
Video Cards or light bulbs don't burn coal or release CO2 gas
If there is a problem - Deal with the problem.
4. Normally, mandating resource savings is based on resource shortage.
There is no future low emission and renewable electricity shortage
5. The electricity savings involved are marginal for maany reasons, as linked.
Far more relevant to deal with electricity generation and distribution (eg grid upgrades, smart grids etc)
and alternative consumption savings eg heating/cooling, or unnecessary product use
- than banning the personal choice of products.
6. The product bans are not for usual reason of being unsafe to use - eg like lead paint
The ban is simply to save electricity.
Clearly, electricity or its source eg coal could simply have price increases in that case
- letting people decide for themselves how they wish to use it.
7. Alternatively, the Video Cards could be taxed.
Some comments here imply the "tax would have to be big, and unpopular"
Firstly, being allowed is still better than bans.
Secondly, a tax could be used to lower the price of alternatives ie smaller tax is needed to even up the market,
in fact even a small tax increase likely changes consumption (and people "not just hit by taxes" in having cheaper alternatives)
Government can also gain direct income for other society purposes - unlike with bans.
8. Increase - not decrease- of competition is best of all:
Free market solutions are therefore best - also to save energy
Competition keeps down energy cost among electricity providers and product manufacturers themselves
Rather than ban some Video Cards, the EU could help new alternatives to market (including energy saving ones)
- and they in turn could use energy saving as a prominent advertising feature.
After all - supposedly we have "stupid consumers" who buy the "wrong" products, or a ban would not be "needed".
Given that energy saving is a product and consumer advantage,
then better consumer information (eg "energy star" effortds, product labelling, public campaigns)
along with appropriate "Expensive to buy but cheap in the long run" commercials, ads in Video/computer magazines etc
(think of Energizer battery, washing up liquid commercials) is the way to go.
Politicians - often heavily lobbied by manufacturers looking for profits on new patented Green Technology -
love simple visible media-friendly report solutions that in reality mean nothing.
It is a pity that so many here in the comments fall for the same trick.
Meego now!
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
So this will help the U.S. have the highest performance?
I kid, I kid.
i have no idea what inefficiency they are talking about, my graphics card wastes absolutely no energy, all power consumed is spent heating my room
I agree with what you're saying about quality parts, but to be fair, even premium items fail (like the high end £90 monster) -- that's why expensive servers have redundant power supplies.
I don't think his PSU was broken, just rubbish. Brands like Belkin pretend to be premium high grade parts but are actually cheap junk.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
so dont ban the hardware, that only uses power when it is required..
ban the hd 3d super fragging screen savers.. or better force people to turn off thier machines when not in use.
i have 600 pc here at work and i know most are left on over night with no power savings on... i try but they dont listen...
and these dont have any super graphics, just basic business...
people who buy the fast graphics cards are doing so for a reason....
I'm a pretty avid gamer, but I wouldn't really mind this law in the US. I already go out of my way to get parts that are rated energy-efficient anyway, and everyone else should as well. If that means you have to settle with a slightly lower clock speed that might result in an ALMOST-noticeable framerate drop... you'll live.
The cards and the chips will be forced to become efficient. It worked with the micro-USB for charging phones. It worked with light bulbs that are now LEDs in Europe. It will work with CPUs and GPUs too.
~ Best man at your service.
The New Europe, providing constant reminders why my ancestors left the Old Europe.
They cannot make a law that says XYZ component cannot use N watts.
I mean really, there are too many politicians and groups with nothing to do, no contribution to man kind, except more laws.
Fuck off , get a real job, contribute real shit. Any dip shit can make rules.
Any way, meanwhile, asia rockets ahead of the western world, coz westerners are too concerned with rules.
Say good by to the west, dumbasses, and us GenXers wont visit you shits in old peoples homes either.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
You have to ask if the EU is a market for high end video cards any more?