@bob466 :-
Yes, you quite likely DID buy it new a couple of years ago. I did with my own, around early 2022 (to me, the card is "only" 3 yrs old, or at least, that's when Asus built the card itself).....but so far as Nvidia are concerned, the design of the 'Kepler'-architecture GPU dates all the way back to 2013 - that's when those chips were first released onto the market.
The GPU might "only" be 2 years old to you.....but as far as driver support goes, that's a 12-year old chip design. And that puts it beyond the 10-yr support period.
No reason we can't keep using them though. Mine is working fine......and continues to do so. I finally got around to ordering a GT 1030 yesterday, so that'll be here early next week. And THEN.....we shall see.
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I found out why these older chips came back into the market when they did a few years ago. It was partly in response to the crypto boom pushing GPU prices sky-high (folks were desperate for new cards - ANY card!).....and partly due to there also being a craze for HTPCs. The Asus GT 710 with the 4 HDMI ports - the one I have here - is both low-profile, AND silent. And that makes them ideal for HTPCs.....so a stockpile of older GPU chips, it seems, got put to good use.
Don't forget; Asus (and EVGA, Gigabyte, MSI, etc) buy the chips in from Nvidia, but then build their own card designs around them. So that would, I guess, mean they all have "left-over" chips kicking around in their warehouses, somewhere.
(Off-topic AGAIN. Sorry!)
Mike.
How is a beginner to know and do this.
