Nvidia's 900M Series Chips Lose Overclocking Ability with Newest Drivers

Nvidia’s reason for doing so according to Customer Care associate ManuelG, is that overclocking can harm mobile processors because of limited cooling.

[crazychris4124]

Just keeps getting worse for Nvidia. These aren't massive issues but it makes you wonder why cant they just give us the facts from the start? Why lie about vram,speeds and overclocking? You know people are gonna be angry and may demand refunds. Im just about to buy an Asus laptop with a 860m gpu so im safe from this.

[vishmarx]

considering you cant replace laptop cards, will nvidia go around replacing full laptops?

[ShottyGibs]

Well you can replace laptop GPU's. As long as they are MXM modules and not the soldered disposable junk. I've had AMD 7970m, 780m, and then a 980m all in the same laptop.

[decrypt]

There really is no point to overclocking a laptop GPU specially with nvidia boost tech. Not much gains to be had overclocking above what the boost already goes, specially laptops don't have much capacity to dissipate the extra heat might just result in throttling.

[Vegamyster]

MSI has started a new program that allows you to buy GPU upgrade kits for their GT72 laptops, expensive but you can do if you want. http://www.hidevolution.com...

[Kurylo3d]

Your absolutely right.. because 150fps at 1920x1080 with full maxed out graphics settings isnt enough for the gtx 980. I have that card and love it... why overclock it? So it can die in a year or 2?

[Infinity_Rasta]

yeah you just try to do that with dragon age I. everything to max and 2x MsAA, you barely going to break 40, but hey i know you meant games like lol, cs go that even a calculator can run, but dx12 is coming and with that an up to 150% boost in performance.

[Fireseed]

Who in their right mind is overclocking a 900M anyway?!?!?! O_o

[Mega24]

Who in their right mind would overclock a laptop in general?

[Khronikos]

My thoughts in general. Idiots who cannot afford something decent? Oh wait laptops usually cost a huge amount for a decent one still....

[Testfire]

Who in their right mind games on a laptop? J/k, I kid, I kid. My first PC gaming experience was on a laptop playing Half Life.

[AndrewLB]

Agreed. I've been building gaming desktops and workstations, and repairing them along with laptops for over a decade now and due to the pi$$ poor cooling systems on anything other than a high end Asus ROG or Alienware "gaming laptop", it's just flat out stupid to overclock them. The biggest problem is the kid who gets a $1500 laptop from his parents while knowing NOTHING about computers, cooling, etc... who reads a forum post about overclocking and now thinks he's "K|NGP|N" (if you don't know who he is, you probably have no business overclocking either), and sets to work. I can't tell you how many times some parent has brought me a laptop where the nVidia/AMD/ATi GPU was artifacting like crazy, so I ask if it's been overclocked and they don't even know what it is, only to find their son thought he'd uninstall the program to hide the evidence. It's hilarious how people seem to think uninstalling a program gets rid of all records of it being installed.

[Vegamyster]

One's with large cooling systems like the GT72 & G751 ect.

[ShottyGibs]

Many people do. A 980m is only around 10 percent slower than a desktop 970 and runs under 70 degree's. Many people have a right to be pissed off.

[TheCommentator]

Couldn't they just update the system to warn the user of the potential risk overclocking presents so that joe average won't "turn it up to 11"? At least then we'd still have the choice.

[Khronikos]

Ha, and this stops the returns from idiots overclocking their cards and burning them how?

[LordDhampire]

Nvidia doesnt sell laptops, nor deal with returns

[Fireseed]

@LordDhhampire

They don't but when their GPU is the part responsible for the return the manufacturer turns around and demands money from Nvidia.

[2pacalypsenow]

shouldn't that be up to the consumer?

[Khronikos]

UUUUHHHH GOD MAN MY NOTEBOOK!

THIS IS THE CONSUMER'S CHOICE!

[idiots send back 100k blown laptop GPUs]

Guys SERIOUSLY LET US PETITION THIS!

WE NEED TO PLAY ASSCREED UNITY AT 60 FPS with a 90000 MHz OVERCLOCK. On a notebook.

End /s

[mixelon]

Surely the performance gain from the overclock (on a laptop gpu) is not worth the heat and extra current etc? I bet we're talking a few fps at most, so it makes sense for them to lock it down.. They can't vouch for whatever cooling solution the laptop manufacturers have used, so erring on the side of caution sounds logical.

I game on my laptop occasionally but anyone using it as their primary gaming pc is "doing it wrong" from my perspective. :)

[Maxor]

I sure as hell will not overclock a notebook unless it has factory overclock. These things are hot enough already. Over clocking them is pointless unless you intend to game on an ice block.

[Kenshin_BATT0USAI]

Good call. I've burnt out many of laptops over clocking the GPU and CPU with seemingly safe and stable over clocks. Thing is, in such a small space, the stuff eventually fails on you.

[Tzuno]

Overclock in a laptop drains the battery faster since it consumes more,it makes sense to loose the overclock ability.

[ATi_Elite]

It's a laptop and overclocking the gpu only leads to roasted nuts. Get my drift?

Proper over clocking requires proper cooling and if no proper cooling is provided then all you are doing is burning up your gpu for an extra frame or two as performance across the board fails.