PSA: Nvidia's CMP 170HX Full Compute and Memory(80GB) may be unlockable via exploit
Summary
A potential exploit in Nvidia's Falcon security processor may allow unlocking the crippled CMP 170HX crypto-mining GPU into a full A100 80GB, potentially making high-end AI hardware available for under $1000.
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@bdsqlsz: Breaking news: 64GB CMP 170HX NVIDIA GPU(a100 tensor core) has surfaced on China’s secondhand market for just $1,170. R…
A 64GB CMP 170HX NVIDIA GPU with A100 tensor cores has appeared on China's secondhand market for $1,170, and a software-level vulnerability has successfully removed its computing power limit.
@lyq_sqsp: Just saw this brilliant talk. Guessing the AES key is so real...
Researchers unlocked the full performance of Nvidia's CMP 170HX GPU, a restricted mining variant, by cracking the debug AES key and exploiting a firmware vulnerability, enabling its use for AI inference and computing tasks.
I tested the CMP170HX
A hands-on benchmark of Nvidia CMP170HX mining cards repurposed as 64GB VRAM AI inference accelerators, showing they can run large local LLMs like DeepSeek V4-Flash and gpt-oss-120B at useful speeds, with caveats around Ampere-class throughput and PCIe Gen2 x4 connectivity.
Attn CMP170hx 10Gb card owners: unlock from 40Gb —> 48Gb coming along nicely.
Owners of the NVIDIA CMP170HX 10Gb graphics card can look forward to a VRAM unlock increasing memory from 40GB to 48GB, with the mod expected to arrive soon.
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