Massman

Knopflerbruce, do you realize that most people have a day job as well as a family and do not have time to have 30+ session in one month ?

It's not that the opinions are old school, wrong or not interesting ... it's just that they all relate to the same problems: 1) This is an online environment: very difficult to enforce certain rules (eg: hw sharing) 2) More people are doing extreme oc: more people equals more competition, which increases the value of keeping certain software to yourself (tweaks, bios) 3) More and more we realise that everything we do is relative to silicon quality. The best tweaker will not beat a lucky 1700MHz GTX580 in 3Dmark11. It's "easy" to think or say that it used to be much better, because it's so hard to say if it really was. It was different, that's true.

About 20% too low, I think.

- "Save" money. - Yes, you do need more than 4-5 days to get competitive benchmark scores - Yes it really matters.

Fixed. And yeah ... http://hwbot.org/forum/showthread.php?t=34852

No, I mean: this new rule will not be implemented for HD 7970 (requires too much coding), so finding a quick compromise for grace period (3 weeks, 1 month or longer) isn't what I wanted to discuss when I posted the idea. I just wanted to see if people would like the basic concept of this idea first.

Yeah. I reckon it might be just time to let this one go. What would this wrapper have to do exactly?

Add "ramcache" to the disallow list? I'm fine with that.

I don't think that's a good idea: http://hwbot.org/forum/showthread.php?t=34530

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ....

I'm not looking for a compromise to implement directly, just spitballing ideas here. For 7970, this new rule (if we decide to go with it) will definitely not be used.

I guess its time has come ... What bench to replace it?

The whole point of the grace period is giving people time to save, test, play and bench a card. 1 week is definitely not enough for all that ...

An interesting approach might be to disallow certain "new" hardware in different leagues and thus create a grace period for each league. For instance: - Pro League: everything allowed from day one - Overclockers League: new hardware (eg: i7 3960X or 7970) does not generate points untill 1 month after launch - Enthusiast League: new hardware (eg: i7 3960X or 7970) does not generate points untill 3 month after launch This would allow users of non-Pro leagues to not have to worry about buying new high-end HW directly after launch. //edit: we could even take this a step further and disallow, for instance, 3/4xGPU configurations of the latest VGA tech to be applicable for points in non-Pro leagues.

The problem is that WE can't enforce the rule that "free sample" = pro league. We simply can't track down who got hardware for free. Also, I honestly don't think forcing anyone who gets one free piece of hardware to play with should be moved to Pro. It'll bring along a witchhunt similar to what we saw with the Hardware Sharing, with people claiming others had the HW for free and those who are being accused saying they didn't. There's also a bunch of loopholes to cover: - What to do with events? - What if you are helping out on a public event and can just use the hardware for a week? - What if you just happen to be able to test the newest hardware when a system builder wants to find out how the new tech works?

Yes. I don't think you'll be first, though.

Can you make a screenshot of the issue?

I've updated the names of the stages so it's more clear. - single core = all CPUs with 1 core (multiple cpus allowed) - dual core = all CPUs with 2 cores (multiple cpus allowed) - ...

http://hwbot.org/news/1166_unreleased_technology_not_applicable_for_hwboints http://hwbot.org/news/1656_clarification_regarding_unreleased_technology_and_hwboints

Btw, nothing stops TiN from making a new Untouchable version and selling/giving them to his friends only. That would pretty much be the same like K404 modifying his teammates' cards because the teammate can't do it himself. (and I don't think there's something wrong with that)

The NDA ruling states that people can post results for points if the vendor has lifted NDA. In this case, Evga does not say the Untouchables are under NDA, so people can post results with it and get points. The question then is: is having this piece of hardware enough to be force-moved to Pro? Since there is no forced-move ruling with regards to particular hardware items, the answer clearly is no. So, under current rules, using the Untouchables is allowed for points and in the regular league. We have specifically chosen not to "retail availability" as a criterion for points or league. Why? Because it's a very complicated matter and comes with many, many loopholes. Inserting a criterion that defines "retail" and have ruling based on that definition will lead to more problems than not having the ruling at all. Just an example: - Intel Pentium E6500K: released only in China. - Geforce GTX560 Ti 448: not released in Benelux - Certain countries have no access to certain brands ('cause no distribution): for instance the Zotac/Galaxy extreme OC cards are not available in EU. - Asus Mars: limited edition product - Bulldozer FX8150: still no chips in Belgium These are just the first examples that come to mind. The list is a lot longer, but I think you can see where this is going right.

X79 doesn't need Xpander.

Sure, but we actually have an existing rule on that. Besides, technically ES is not retail. So, according to the nda ruling, it's correct not issuing points for them in the regular league.

Yes, I did. All the others didn't.

Because people bitched and whined about the ES being oh-so WR-capable that it was unfair competing against them.