As some of the best graphics cards makers get ready to roll out their GeForce RTX Lite Hash Rate (LHR) add-in-boards (AIB), designed to limit the mining capability of the cards, enthusiasts are eager to push them to their limits and see how much cryptomining performance is really hindered.  This week, a Zotac GeForce RTX 3060 LHR card and a GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, which Nvidia has yet to announce, were reportedly used to try to mine Ethereum, giving a peek at how well Nvidia’s LHR technology works. 

Chinese tech website Expreview today shared testing of Zotac’s GeForce RTX 3060 LHR Apocalypse GOC graphics card, which is only available in China. When it came to Ethereum mining, the GeForce RTX 3060 LHR reportedly did around 20-22 MHps at 119W, which is half of what a regular GeForce RTX 3060 can do without a mining limitation. Notably, the hash rate limiter kicked off immediately on the GeForce RTX 3060 LHR but took some time for it to start on a non-LHR card. 

Based on the Expreview’s numbers, the GeForce RTX 3060 LHR Apocalypse GOC performed just like a regular GeForce RTX 3060 graphics cards in games. 

Nvidia’s upcoming GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is not expected to be a formal part of the LHR series but is expected to have a hash rate cap by default. We’ve haven’t seen the card tested in games yet, but Twitter user @kavka_Chow pointed to a post on Chinese social site Weibo claiming to test the card in an Ethereum mining application. The board reportedly hit 58 MHps at 299W, which is in line with the hash rate offered by the GeForce RTX 3070 but at a considerably higher price and power. 58 MHps is 2.6 times lower than 150 MHps offered by the GeForce RTX 3090.

Nvidia’s LHR technology relies on a combination of GPU ID, firmware and driver. As of writing, we haven’t seen anybody remove the LHR limiter, but since there are not many LHR cards on the market yet, this could change.