A beta driver update from Nvidia appears to accidentally disable the hash limiter that had been applied to its RTX 3060 graphics cards, undoing the company's high-profile efforts to reduce encryption amid a CPU shortage. Nvidia's GeForce 470.05 beta driver, according to The Verge, apparently allows a user to mine ethereum to the maximum hash without having to modify the driver at all or disrupt the BIOS. The hash limiter unlock was first reported by Japanese outlet PC Watch, but has since been confirmed by other outlets such as Hardwareluxx.
Ok so it looks like BIOS 94.06.14.00.DF plus GeForce 470.05 no longer limits the performance of Ethereum/Dagger-Hashimoto mining on a #GeForceRTX3060. This is a flashed GeForce RTX 3060 from EVGA. I'm not happy to confirm... https: //t.co/94rVzFwsUV pic.twitter.com/gSvXmx3tnR March 15, 2021 More Information The beta driver, intended to allow developers to verify the performance of RTX 3060 cards in the Windows Linux subsystem along with other general features is clearly not what Nvidia intended to do. Its much-hyped hash limiter, along with the company's introduction this month of new crypto mining processors (CMPs), is the company's attempt to satisfy the overwhelming demand for Ampere cards among gamers and PC enthusiasts. In the few months since the RTX 3070, RTX 3080, RTX 3090 cards launched, finding a stock of these cards has been exceptionally difficult, with many blaming the rising price of cryptocurrency for creating a mining gold rush in the powerful new GPUs. which are essential to the cryptomining process. If it turns out that Nvidia accidentally unlocked its latest GPUs, it could create a run on the low-cost RTX 3060 by cryptominers looking for an edge to cash in on the Ethereum boom, exacerbating a situation that is already frustrating for many. We've reached out to Nvidia for comment on the latest report and will update this story once we receive it from the company.