Low FPS EVGA 3070 card available in various configurations.
Low FPS EVGA 3070 card available in various configurations.
Ah I had heard of the melted cables happening, but didn't know the source of the issue. Also, one last update in case anyone else ever runs into this issue. I was messing around last night updating my chipset and audio drivers. I decided to go to Device Manager and re-enable the iGPU just to see what would happen, and the issue returned. It is definitely the iGPU interfering and causing the performance issues with the 3070. After fully disabling it again, my 3070 is back to normal performance. Hopefully this helps save some people from any future headaches and RMA's.
I'm struggling with this situation. The problem came back after turning off my PC last night, yet everything worked fine the previous day. My GPU reports 420 MHZ in GeForce Experience, while EVGA Precision shows 0MHZ. The GPU-Z vBIOS isn't listed in TechRadar's collection, but searching for it reveals others say it's a standard vBIOS. I've attached some screenshots of what I'm seeing. It's really frustrating because when I come home to relax and play games, I end up stuck fixing things instead.
Observing such changes feels like using a custom vBIOS, though I haven't worked with those since the 900 series. The EVGA Precision X1 includes a vBIOS update utility for its cards that can automatically detect and ask to update the vBIOS. Otherwise, you may need to handle it manually via the GPU-Z repository.
This was my initial thought too. I wasn't familiar with EVGA's tool, so I'll look into it. I attempted the usual method last night, but I couldn't locate my card's model anywhere. When I tried updating the vBIOS, it failed because the model number didn't match. I'm guessing any of the EVGA vBIOS entries on TechRadar would be acceptable? If not, I'll search more vBIOS options for the 3070 to check compatibility. It seems the card might be freezing during initialization. It worked again after I disabled it to flash the vBIOS, then re-enabled it and restarted the PC. Could it be Windows interfering with the boot process?
It could be useful to open a support ticket with EVGA since they tend to be supportive. If you inform them that your purchased card may have an LHR hacked vBIOS, they might be able to assist. Before their RMA policy changed around 2015, I returned many cards without damaging them through extreme overclocking. Even afterward, they remain among the top brands and should still have staff ready to supply a genuine vBIOS. On my RTX 3070 XC3 with an X1, two vBIOS updates were applied when I first installed it, both initiated via X1. If you reinstalled X1 after setup, try uninstalling and reinstalling to see if it works automatically; otherwise, the 'setup' option may prompt for a vBIOS update.
Good thought. I might contact them if X1 causes problems identifying the card. I wasn’t sure they’d assist because I bought it used, and they’re no longer supported by Nvidia. Thanks for the support and guidance during this troubleshooting process.
They've received excellent feedback, which was a key factor in my decision when searching for a new card. It's regrettable that they had to end their partnership with Nvidia.