NVIDIA CMP 40HX And 30HX Crypto Mining GPU Architecture Allegedly Revealed

However, what was unknown was what GPU architecture NVIDIA decided to use for the CMP HX cards. Some code sleuthing through NVIDIA's most recent 461.72 drivers shed some light on at least two members of the CMP HX family. Based on the power consumption figures, the 6GB of memory, and 26 MH/s hash rate, it appears that the CMP 30HX is based on the TU116 (Turing) GPU, while the CMP 40HX with its 8GB of RAM, 185W TDP, and 36 MH/s hash rate is reportedly based on the TU106 GPU according to VideoCardz.

The CMP 30HX and CMP 40HX are both supposed to be released this quarter and won't affect the availability of the highly sought-after GeForce RTX 30 Series graphics cards (even more so given that they feature defective GPUs). This is good news for gamers already frustrated by the lack of Ampere-based cards available in the retail channel.

The CMP HX family only includes the bare minimum for cryptocurrency mining, which means that it doesn't have display outputs (i.e., DisplayPort, HDMI). In other words, NVIDIA is using lemons to make lemonade by taking defective chips that would have likely been cast into the trash bin and putting them on a cutdown board to sell at a profit to crypto miners.

Many gamers are partly blaming crypto miners for GeForce RTX 30 Series shortages, and perhaps the release of these CMP HX Series will help alleviate that strain. NVIDIA's recent crypto mining block in BIOS/drivers for the GeForce RTX 3060 is another method that NVIDIA uses to give gamers a fighting chance against crypto miners. However, it remains to be seen if NVIDIA's BIOS block will be pushed out to other members of the GeForce RTX 30 Series in the future.