Advice on nvidia 970 return

Vistrix

I have tried to return an MSI 970 graphics card I bought back in October last year but have been told that the retailer were only accepting returns during January and February.

The reason for the return is due to the card being mis-sold on the information that was incorrectly advertised (I'm sure most people know the story) and so I gave the reason that the card was faulty AKA not fit for purpose.

I assumed the Sales of Goods Act would cover this and so I would have 6 months to a year to return the item but the retailer has refused to accept the return.

Does anybody know if there is anything else I can do? They have point blank refused a return.

Has anybody had a similar experience?

K33N3R

I'm assuming by mis-sold, you're saying the item wasn't as described when you got it? A bit more information about that would help

If that is the case though, then you can argue it wasn't as described. As it's within 6 months, it's up to them to prove that it WAS as described. If you return it after the 6 months, then it's up to you to prove that it wasn't. So just in case it comes to that, have you got any proof that it was mis-sold to you? A screenshot of the page and how they worded it etc? Anything you can get along those lines could help you later on if you need it.

If you haven't already, notify them that you know your rights, and mention the Sales of Goods Act. It could be that you're talking to someone in the customer service department who genuinely doesn't know about it, and who's been told to refuse returns if they're after a certain amount of time. Ask if you can speak to a manager or someone higher up. Don't be aggressive, you're much more likely to get a good result from being calm with them.

Take a look at this guide from MSE, it might help you with what to say. I'd love for someone else to chime in and tell you how you can take it further though, I'm not sure who you contact to make it more serious.

forgotmyname

Swap to windows Classic?

bluenoseam

IIRC it's a known problem - the cards were advertised as 4gb when in reality they were 3.5gb of physical memory with the remainder as v-ram or some such skullduggery. Either way it's NOT what was advertised, speak to trading standards & see what they say, I'd argue the point it's not as advertised & as such shouldn't be a time bar on the return as it's well within that.

Gordon_Hose

They don't have to refund you, they can replace it with a different brand card for the same value if they wish. It's down to them.

Cycrow

althou a different brand wouldn't help in this case, as they would all be the same.

Technically its not faulty, and it is fit for purpose, so they only thing you could argue about is wether it was mis-advertised or not. But its not really a simple case

Tropez

bluenoseam wrote: »

IIRC it's a known problem - the cards were advertised as 4gb when in reality they were 3.5gb of physical memory with the remainder as v-ram or some such skullduggery. Either way it's NOT what was advertised, speak to trading standards & see what they say, I'd argue the point it's not as advertised & as such shouldn't be a time bar on the return as it's well within that.

This isn't quite accurate.

The GTX970 does have 4GB of physical memory. However, the memory is separated into pools, one of which is 3.5GB and the other is 0.5GB. Applications that do not need to go over the 3.5GB memory limit of the priority pool will not access the remaining 0.5GB, and in most cases, will not report it as being there. Only when an application requires the extra memory will the card grant access to it.

Those who run the majority of their games at 1080p or below may never see the card utilise more than the 3.5GB priority pool because in most cases, 2-3GB of RAM is more than adequate at that resolution (some cutting-edge high-spec games aside).

As a consequence, someone might believe that their card doesn't have 4GB of RAM but it actually does, it just has no call to use it all and so it doesn't display that it has got it. However, there is an issue with the 970 not being able to use the 0.5GB pool at full speed, although some have claimed (including nVidia, unsurprisingly) that this only actually represents a 1 to 3 per cent drop in performance at very high resolutions.

almillar

OP - how does this split of the RAM affect you? What are you not able to do due to the misinformation? Don't you still have a great graphics card?

bluenoseam

Hell I was close enough Tropez

Either way it goes it's an issue which has caused a fairly sizeable hoo-haa (must have if it came to my attention!) but ultimately it's not exactly "good practice". From my own viewpoint I'd say if the OP has purchased the card the chances are they will be looking to use it to it's full potential at some stage. Seems somewhat odd to me that retailers are shooting it down immediately (incidentally - which retailer?) especially given the fact it was a fairly well documented issue.

PenguinJim

bluenoseam wrote: »

Either way it goes it's an issue which has caused a fairly sizeable hoo-haa (must have if it came to my attention!)

Not really. It hasn't retroactively affected any of the benchmarks. There was no cheating involved. There is definitely 4GB of memory on the card, and the card is precisely as fast as every single independent review has found. Anyone returning the card because (deep inside the boring technical specifications) the number next to "ROPs" should have read "56" instead of "64" might also want to have a quick mental health check-up.

Tropez

bluenoseam wrote: »

Hell I was close enough Tropez

Either way it goes it's an issue which has caused a fairly sizeable hoo-haa (must have if it came to my attention!) but ultimately it's not exactly "good practice". From my own viewpoint I'd say if the OP has purchased the card the chances are they will be looking to use it to it's full potential at some stage. Seems somewhat odd to me that retailers are shooting it down immediately (incidentally - which retailer?) especially given the fact it was a fairly well documented issue.

Well we are talking about nVidia so 'good practice' is pretty alien to them anyway. I mean if people thought EA were bad for releasing the same version of FIFA three times in a row, they should have a gander at nVidia's release, rebadge, re-release strategy for a lot of mobile graphics chips

It's a bit of a tricky situation. I can concur that nVidia could have been seen to mislead the consumer on this one but it doesn't actually change where the GTX970 sits in nVidia's card lineup and to be honest, it doesn't affect performance that much. Linus Tech Tips did some testing on the GTX970 at 4K resolutions and found that only a couple of current games go above 3.5GB RAM usage, and his/their argument was that if you're playing at 4K on current cards anyway it's not a great experience as it is, unless you start dropping other graphics options and then that brings the RAM usage down anyway. 4K resolution gaming is where the theory has overtaken the technology, and the chances are by the time 4K gaming is starting to become commonplace, you'll have replaced the graphics hardware anyway.

Even current cards that are advertised as specifically designed for 4K gaming, such as AMD's rather ludicrous power-sapping monstrosity that is the R9 295x2, don't do it very well. They do it but it's just a bit naff, to be honest.

But I do also get the argument that you may well have bought a graphics card like the GTX970 to play at 1080p, or 1440p or some such for a long period of time and expect the card to hold up over that period and the chances are over time, as graphics improve, more games might push over the 3.5GB threshold at those resolutions and you'll end up in the slower 0.5GB memory which will impact your performance, unless nVidia eventually releases some sort of 'fix'.

I'm just glad I got a 290X.