Bit-tech.net recieved word yesterday that the Radeon HD 4830’s have been using approximately 560 stream processors instead of the 640 that the card should be using. Even though these are production samples, when hardware gets to this point, it’s supposed to a sample from production just as the moniker implies. Bit-tech.net heard various stories from AMD, from it being a “known issue” to there being problems with the application calculating the number of stream processors.
AMD finally came out and admitted there was a problem with the production samples after their “no comment” earlier in the week.
Here is their quote ….
“AMD has identified that, in addition to reference samples of the ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards sent to media with a pre-production BIOS potentially impacting the card’s performance, a very limited number of ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards were released to market with the same pre-production BIOS. This is in no way hardware related, and an updated BIOS fully resolves the performance limitation.
Through consultations with AMD board partners, it has been determined with a high degree of certainty that fewer than 400 ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards from one AMD board partner, HIS, have reached the market with the pre-production BIOS incorrectly provided by AMD. As only a small number of HIS-branded ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 cards are impacted, we ask any customers that purchased an HIS-branded ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 to test the board using the GPU-Z utility (available at http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz). If the GPU-Z utility reports fewer than 640 shaders, please visit the HIS website for information on how to update the card BIOS via a downloadable install utility.“
Kudos to AMD for publically recognizing this problem and working to fix it. For people that are complaining and wanting replacement, would you rather fix the problem keeping your new video cards installed, or not be able to use your computer for a period of time while someone else flash upgrades the bios on your video cards for you? I would rather do it myself, fix the problem and keep my video cards and save the money it would take for shipping. In other words, shut your mouth and flash the bios and enjoy your new fully functioning hardware. You’re not making any sense other then you’re making people think that your anger is due to your ignorance on how to take care of this. AMD is offering full instructions for this. You people I’m speaking about at this point, you know who you are. (:
Thank you to Bit-tech.net for posting this artickle at http://is.gd/4VbV
Posted by John B 
