New reports have surfaced that RTX 50-series laptop GPUs are facing the same missing ROPs problem as all of Nvidia's desktop counterparts. Heise Online (via HardwareLuxx) reports that Nvidia has asked notebook manufacturers to catch bad batches of laptop devices sporting faulty RTX 50-series GPUs with missing ROPs.
However, Nvidia has responded to these claims, stating the exact opposite. Nvidia told The Verge that laptop GPUs are unaffected by the issue of missing ROPs. The Verge asked Nvidia for additional clarification, to which Nvidia stated: "Correct, no further issues."
The original report from Heise Online states that several notebook manufacturers are allegedly working extra shifts in the Far East to catch buggy laptops with GPUs sporting missing ROPs before they get sold to the public. As previously stated, Nvidia (ironically) was allegedly the one to ask these companies to look for these faulty laptop GPUs.
Nvidia's response to these reports does not fully confirm if the issue was ever present or if it was only recently fixed. According to Nvidia's wording, there's a chance RTX 50 series laptop GPUs were, in fact, missing ROPs only to be fixed by the time reports came out stating there were problems.
Regardless, if the reports are true, Heise Online did not disclose how many GPUs are affected. There's not even an indication if certain GPUs or all RTX 50 series laptop GPUs are missing ROPs (after all, most existing desktop Blackwell GPU models launched so far are known to suffer from this issue).
However, the problem (again, if it did actually happen) appeared to have only affected a fraction of laptop devices (just like Nvidia's desktop counterparts). One manufacturer Heise Online spoke to allegedly only mentioned that its first batch of laptop devices had to be fixed. The manufacturer neglected to share if more batches were affected.
Again, if Nvidia's claim is true, it is good to hear it has finally plugged the missing ROPs issue on its latest RTX 50 series GPUs. However, the RTX 50 series laptop GPUs are still suffering from supply chain issues just like their desktop counterparts, forcing manufacturers to postpone their device launches.
High-end devices have reportedly been pushed back from January to March, and mid-range and lower devices have been pushed back from March to April.
The missing ROPs anomaly first started on the RTX 5090 when reports of defective RTX 5090 AIB partner models sporting fewer ROPS than advertised began to spring up in late February. Soon afterward, Nvidia issued an official statement confirming that the issue was real, affecting not only the RTX 5090 but the RTX 5070 Ti as well.
However, after Nvidia's statement, reports of defective RTX 5080s also began to appear, forcing Nvidia to publish another statement confirming RTX 5080s were also affected.
Missing ROPS on a GPU is bad for performance as ROPs (Render Output Units) are part of the render pipeline. Third-party testing confirmed that the RTX 5080, with its missing ROPs, loses up to 11% of its performance compared to its advertised performance. The RTX 5090 likewise also allegedly loses up to 11% of performance, at least in TimeSpy.
