Opinion: Nvidia's Max-Q is a maximum rip-off

[Phonicx]

https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/27763247
https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/27775572
https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/27782837
(https://pic2.zhimg.com/v2-86df3d64c60cbec7bf3f10650d0dbc21_r.png)
I have the same opinion......but my english is not good......
Hope someone help me to translate those articles......

[Tanel]

I totally agree with you about it all, deception and shxx. Thing is, nobody cares... Certainly not nvidia and most certainly not your average uninformed consumer. Stupid is one that buys, not who sells.

[Hydrogen]

Using a 1070 at the same performance and power level as a 1080 Max-Q is inferior for cooling, because it has less cores (- 20%), so even though the power is the same, the relation power/area increases (generated heat is spread through a smaller area). So, conduction goes down.

Thats the only reason to use a 1080 instead of a 1070 in this case, and probably why the put so much emphasis on the "quiet" aspect of max-q notebooks. Even though the performance is the same, a laptop with a 1080 will be quieter and/or cooler than using a 1070 at the same power.

So not really a rip off. Its just an option for those who look for 1070 performance, but with better thermals.

[D2ultima]

If it is indeed not binned then I see no problem with them charging the same price of these cards as normal ones. The manufacturing and material cost as well as the theoretical performance (excluding clocks and power limits) are the same between Max-Q and normal chips. If NVIDIA is to be taken at its word, there was probably additional cost for these Max-Q cost in the form of the R&D for whatever thermals - meaning the cost could be higher than normal chips.

It's up to the buyer to decide whether or not to fork over same or higher amount of moolah for a lower powered/lower thermal card.

The R&D cost goes into the notebook itself, not the video card. In this case I'm talking solely about the video card's price. Even if price does not change I find it should have some indicator at point-of-sale to indicate it won't be performing like its namesake would suggest.

However, this is indeed an opinion piece (albeit with a lot of history and facts in it) so hearing what other people think is part of the point.

[Tomi]

That "Q" usually stands for heat in various scientific and engineering disciplines.  That the fact Nvidia chose to call this "Max-Q" is quite misleading, given that it chose physicist names for all their recent GPUs since Fermi.  Max-Q would lead you to believe that it is optimized for maximum heat output or dissipation, when in fact, it is quite the opposite in the target devices.  If this isn't intended as a scam, then it is surely deceptive marketing in my opinion.