Properly, that didn’t final lengthy. When Nvidia launched its $330 GeForce RTX 3060 simply weeks in the past, it shipped the cardboard with anti-mining safety that mechanically halved efficiency when it detected Ethereum workloads. Ethereum is a booming cryptocurrency partly accountable for the sky-high pricing of graphics playing cards proper now. This morning, nevertheless, reviews are trickling in that the RTX 3060’s mining safety has been circumvented—by Nvidia itself.
Oops.
Japan’s PC Watch first reported that Nvidia’s 470.05 beta driver for builders mechanically unlocks full Ethereum mining efficiency. Germany’s ComputerBase and HardwareLuxx quickly confirmed the report. You don’t even must flash the RTX 3060’s BIOS. The brand new drivers merely take away the limiter, with HardwareLuxx’s Andreas Schilling reporting that the cardboard’s Ethereum hashrate hit 21.7 MH/s utilizing customary drivers, and over 41 MH/s with the 470.05 beta drivers.
We informed you to not count on miracles when Nvidia introduced the Ethereum safety. Now that these beta drivers are within the wild there’s probably no placing the rabbit again within the hat for the RTX 3060. Miners might probably keep away from newer updates and cargo their {hardware} with this software program as an alternative.
The GeForce RTX 3060 offered out immediately regardless of its preliminary mining safety and at the moment goes for $600 or extra on Ebay and different resale websites. This growth will probably drive demand even increased till the present cryptocurrency bubble bursts. Between provide shortages, insane demand, logistics woes, and the mania swirling round Ethereum, it’s a horrible time to attempt to purchase a graphics card. Even used two- or three-generation-old GPUs are promoting for greater than they launched for all these years in the past. You’re higher off streaming video games through Nvidia’s PC-friendly GeForce Now service or making an attempt to snag a next-gen console than overpaying for a brand new graphics card proper now.