Melting GeForce RTX 4090 power cables: A timeline of events

Nvidia’s glorious GeForce RTX 4090 wowed reviewers and set a brand new bar for simply how stupidly quick a graphics card may very well be. Unfortunately, the launch of the $1,600 GPU has been marred by a number of experiences of melting 12VHPWR connectors used within the playing cards damaging each the connector and the GPUs at instances.

The new 12VHPWR connector is a compact energy connector that mixes the aptitude of a number of older 6- and 8-pin connectors into one tiny plug. It was initially adopted with the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition and is now used within the GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition in addition to customized variations of the RTX 4090 constructed by the likes of Asus, MSI, et cetera. The 12VHPWR connector may even be used within the impending GeForce RTX 4080 Founders Edition, slated to launch on November 16.

As of Nov. 7, at least 23 experiences of melted connectors have surfaced within the Nvidia subreddit with one other 5 unconfirmed instances.

With this fast-moving, complicated, and likewise very severe scenario, PCWorld has determined to spherical up the info you must know to assist separate truth from fiction. Nvidia officers have declined to remark whereas it investigates, however the newest improvement appear to level to dangerous 12VHPWR adapter cables. There’s additionally the likelihood that not absolutely inserting the cable might trigger elevated resistance and sufficient warmth to soften the connectors. We’ll replace this story as new info is launched.

• Sept. 10 Hassan Mujtaba of WCCFTech reports of an alert issued from PCI-SIG to members of a “thermal variance, which could result in safety issues under certain safety conditions.” The member alert advises distributors to “work closely with their connector vendors and exercise due diligence in using high-power connections”

• Sept. 14 The full e mail and extra particulars from the PCI-SIG are reported by Stephen Burke of Gamers Nexus and notes that “failures have been observed in certain cable routing conditions from PSUs and test boards that generate side load on the interface.” Burke stated the report–apparently created by Nvidia–from PCI-SIG confirmed three completely different producers have been examined with 10 pattern assemblies with failures manifesting from 10 hours to 30 hours with melting. It’s value declaring that the interior report appears to discuss with the connection on the PSU aspect—not the GPU aspect. In common, nonetheless, ATX 3.0 energy provides PCWorld have seen point out the cables to be an identical on each ends.

• Sept. 22 VideoCardz’s editor WhyCry reports that GPU maker Zotac’s steerage on the brand new 12VHPWR connector is rated for 30-insertion cycles which raises alarms as to the lifespan and sturdiness of the brand new connector. VideoCardz later amends its report back to say that whereas 30 cycles seems very low, many Molex connectors launched during the last 20 years have had related mating cycles.

• Oct. 24 The first report of a melted 12HPWR connector is posted on the Nvidia sub-reddit. The GPU seems to be a Gigabyte 4090 Gaming OC utilizing an Nvidia-branded 12VHPWR adapter cable. Both Nvidia and Gigabyte attain out to the proprietor who experiences a alternative card has been obtained. A second report of a melted dongle is obtained as properly on that day with injury to the adapter cable and an Asus RTX 4090 TUF Gaming OC Edition occurring. The Reddit publish instantly goes viral on the high-profile graphics card with many assuming the brand new connector to be at fault.

• Oct. 24 A couple of hours after the preliminary melting report on Reddit, famend energy provide reviewer and the precept behind PSU certification firm Cybenetics, Aristeidis Bitziopoulos, attempts to replicate the melting 12VHPWR connector by subjecting it to 600 watt hundreds for greater than 90 minutes. He is unable to break the cable whereas seeing solely a small thermal variance. It ought to be famous that the check used a local 12VHPWR cable on an ATX 3.0 energy provide reasonably than Nvidia’s adapter. Bitziopoulos concludes the 12VHPWR connector doesn’t appear to be a problem in his testing.

• Oct. 24 Overclocker Buildzoid of Actually Hardware Overclocking, posts a video criticizing the brand new 12VHPWR connector noting that the brand new connector drastically reduces the variety of pins and wires carrying energy.

• Oct. 25. With failures now reported at three,  Nvidia officers tell the Verge’s Tom Warren that “we are investigating the reports” and are in touch with the house owners of the impacted playing cards. 

• Oct. 25 Former HardOCP editor Kyle Bennett reports AMD’s upcoming RDNA3 GPUs is not going to use the 12VHWPR connector in its reference designs. Neither Bennett, nor his sources at AMD point out when the design choice was made to skip 12VHPWR.
• Oct. 25 Showing what a distraction the 12VHPWR has change into, AMD’s Scott Herkelman publicly confirms the brand new Radeon playing cards will skip 12VHPWR and receives responses reminiscent of “That is a HUGE relief, happy with that news.”

• Oct. 26 The official Reddit megathread itemizing exhibiting documented failures now numbers 5 broken 12VHWPR connectors.

• Oct. 26 Jason Langiven, aka JayzTwoCents, who has lengthy been essential of the connector being “dangerous,” attempts to replicate the failure on a local 12VHWPR cable and is unable to induce a failure on the cable below heavy hundreds.

Brad Chacos/IDG

• Oct. 27 Igor Wallossek of IgorsLab.de conducts a tear down and failure test of a 12VHPWR energy adapter and concludes that the difficulty doesn’t look like the 12VHPWR design itself nor the much-touted insertion cycle concern raised beforehand. Instead, Wallossek concludes it’s the design of Nvidia’s adapter itself, which he describes as “inferior quality (and) can lead to failures and has already caused damage in single cases.” Wallossek stated he believes bending and kinking of the adapter could cause weak solder joints and bridges to interrupt and improve the resistance inflicting the melting.

• Oct. 28 Ronaldo Buassali of TecLab.internet.br posts his own failure tests, together with swinging an influence provide utilizing simply the connector and subjecting to a stress check of 1,532—properly past its rated sustained wattage of 600 watts.

• Oct. 30 Stephen Burke of Gamers Nexus attempts to replicate the melting failure by deliberately damaging a 12VHPWR adapter much like what IgorsLab.de had reported and subjected it to a 99 % load for 8 hours with no melting noticed. Burke additionally notes that his 5 adapters all look like constructed the identical—and but in another way than the adapter IgorsLab had. Burke stated his 5 12VHWPR adapters use wires labeled for 300 volts versus the 150 volts the adapter Wallossek had. Burke concludes that we simply don’t know what the difficulty is, however it’s a actual drawback on some adapters—however not all of them. He additionally mentions a idea being floated that the smaller connector might not simply seat in addition to the bigger conventional energy connectors. He additionally factors out that opposite to what many customers imagine, a local connector that plugs instantly into an influence provide may fail the identical means if the native cable is constructed the identical because the failed adapters. Burke additionally asks house owners of RTX 4090 playing cards to report which cable adapters they’ve.

• Oct. 30 With information that there look like completely different 12VHPWR adapters being offered, Stephen Burke of Gamer’s Nexus experiences by way of Twitter that of the 130 emails he has obtained, 7 % of householders report they’ve the 150V cabling that was utilized in IgorsLab’s adapter cable. Burke notes that whereas the cable marking might say 150V, that solely means it makes use of the identical obvious spec cables—and doesn’t point out they’re might have the low-quality solder joints that IgorsLab discovered. Burke additionally notes that of the 130, “not many are burned.”

• Oct. 30 Andreas Schilling of Hardwareluxx.de conducts his own poll of forum members who’ve bought RTX 4090 playing cards. He experiences that 12 have a 4-pins-to-12VHPWR adapter marked “300V.” One has a 3-pins-to-12VHPWR marked “150V,” and two folks have 4-pins-to-12VHPWR marked “150V.”

• Nov. 1 Ronaldo Buassali of TecLab.internet.br posts a longer video of testing from the unique stay stream with further explanations of how he examined the 12VHWPR. Unlike a lot of the testing to date, which used precise GeForce RTX 4090 playing cards, Buassali bodily removes the 12VHWPR connector from the GPU and wires it up for stress testing. This lets Buassali push the connector meeting properly previous the 600 watts referred to as for, together with a great deal of 900 watts, 1,200 watts and 1,500 watts. Buassali’s conslusion? The 12VHPWR connector itself is “well sized, so much so that it supported much more than its specification.” However, Buassali concludes that though the connector can deal with greater than it’s rated for, a poorly inserted connector that creates resistance may certainly be behind the melting of the connector. Buassali additionally doesn’t rule a batch of dangerous cables, however that means a producing concern, not a design drawback.

• Nov. 2 Jon Gerow, director of R&D at Corsair and previously of Jonnyguru.com, posts outcomes from deliberately broken 12VHPWR cable adapters below load and is unable to induce melting as properly. Gerow was capable of supply a number of 12VHPWR adapter cables for harmful testing, and regardless of breaking off solder joints, he was unable to induce melting or a failure. He did notice that among the adapters weren’t constructed very properly however even the worst of the batch handed stress testing with out failing. Gerow concludes that among the issues might have occurred when the house owners didn’t absolutely seat the 12VHPWR adapter cables and likewise posts photos of put in PCs the place even a small hole of 1 mm may lead to elevated resistance.

• Nov. 3 AMD formally announces its RDNA3-based Radeon 7900XT and Radeon 7900XTX and proudly notes that it didn’t use 12VHPWR connections. However, the corporate factors out that the overall notion that it modified its designs solely after the melting issues cropped up a number of weeks in the past just isn’t right. AMD made the choice to stick with standard 8-pin energy connectors greater than a yr in the past.

• Nov. 4 A brand new publish within the Nvidia subreddit, taken from a Facebook post of a Hong Kong-based RTX 4090 proprietor, is the primary reported broken 12VHPWR cable from a local cable plugged instantly into an influence provide. Previous to this report, the entire reported points had solely occurred in 12VHPWR adapter cables, not native cables. The following day, one other particular person experiences a melted connector utilizing a local 12VHPWR cable from an ATX 3.0 energy provide. This seems to sprint hopes {that a} native plug would clear up the issue.

• Nov 7 The variety of confirmed failed connectors now numbers 23 on the Reddit megathread, with points unfold amongst many graphics card makers. Oddly, there are not any Nvidia Founders Edition playing cards listed with failures. There are additionally 5 unconfirmed instances listed from different board makers as properly.

• Nov. 7 VideoCardz editor WhyCry reports that an individual on Reddit has been advised his or her Gainward GeForce RTX 4090 shall be delayed till the center of November because it waits for alternative 12VHPWR adapter cables. The e mail, despatched from Australian PC firm Techfast to a buyer, stated “While investigations are still continuing and Nvidia has not released a public statement, Gainward has told us that cables shipped with their cards will (are) being replaced. As a result, they are holding shipping of all cards until this has taken place. We also understand this cable replacement will not be limited to Gainward alone.” PCWorld reached out to Techfast who confirmed the authenticity of the e-mail.