Ok, recently I had my XFX 7900 GTX which I bought from OCUK show some odd symptoms. I bought it on release day like many others.

It only happens now and again and I've thought it was just an issue with drivers and whatnot, but it seems its something to do with the cards themselves.

I have a friend over in Germany who has recently bought an XFX 7900GT and had similar issues and he dug up this info:

Just phoned XFX for the hell of it and I spoke to some guy who said that he knew about a problem with the 7900GT's ... I got his mail adress and will write him a mail about the problem and he said he'll keep in touch with me.

EDIT x2:

Guru3D forums said:

According to eVGA, the problem belongs to nVIDIA. He informed me that only 2% of all of their cards are bad. He said that it is a problem with the resistors and the chip and that no mod, no BIOS update, no heatsink, nothing will alleviate the problem and that the card will need to be replaced. I asked him if I could just RMA it now for a card that works and he told me that they have no way to tell which cards are good nor bad and that a serial number algorithm makes no difference. Basically, they don't know when or how the problem started but they know what the problem is and they are all working together to have a fix. This "fix" is projected to be completed within the next couple of weeks.

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Also I read that all cards are somehow affected and that every card will be replaced.. :O

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Anyone else having thse issues? Anyone know if XFX will be doing a cross shipping RMA like EVGA?

I know OCUK are an XFX partner so I'm hoping someone from OCUK will be able to organise something for it's customers also. I hope I'm not without my card though, I can't afford to lose any working time at home!

may be an idea to edit out that swerie in the screenshot

i would have thought ocuk will sort it out if they can replicate the fault and determine its faulty...

Bit OTT.... if there is a problem I wouldnt mind betting its closer to the 2% figure.... Think the title is a bit misleading

Goksly said:

Bit OTT.... if there is a problem I wouldnt mind betting its closer to the 2% figure.... Think the title is a bit misleading

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Well the title is a question

Sorry for the sweary, completely forogt. this is the only swear monitored forum I visit. I will edit it now.

I had a problem with my Ocuk one heres a link to the thread

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17576445


I've RMAd it and im waiting for my replacement now

A few more on [H]. Don't forget it's usually people with a problem who comment. It may only be very small percentage overall.

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=7112847&postcount=20

eVGA have stated that there is a problem with some of their 7900's.

http://www.evga.com/community/messageboard/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=15412

Originally Posted by jdarwin
EVGA hears our customer’s concerns loud and clear about the issues on EVGA 7900 series products. We definitely need to improve our quality control and tighten the testing procedure on the EVGA CO, KO and SuperClocked™ product line. There is no excuse for not providing the best quality products to gamers, that’s EVGA’s spirit. We don’t fear the problems or escape from the problems, we are confident the problem will be resolved shortly. Thank you for everyone’s patients and encouragement.


EVGA’s senior tech staff has already started calling individual customers who have stated and left their concerns. Please follow the steps below if you think you are experiencing some issues. Our staff will contact you promptly during business hours. Please remember this is ONLY for EVGA’s customers.


1. If you have an EVGA 7900GT/GTX series with problems (artifacting, freezing, etc.), Please visit the following page and fill out the quick form. http://www.evga.com/7900.asp

2. We will contact you directly and walk thru the issues one by one.

3. We’ll test individual card per customer using games & 3DMark06 tests.

4. We’ll cross-ship you a new card with a prepaid (ARS) shipping label to return the board back to EVGA freight paid.

EVGA will make every effort to get in contact with you in the next few days, if you require a special time or phone number other than the one registered with EVGA product please note that in form you fill out.

Thanks,
Joe Darwin
[email protected]

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Wish EVA would do ATI cards.... their customer support seems pretty damn good.

Great. Now I'm paranoid. I've got 2 7900gts in my case and I'm going to be looking at them sideways every time I get a crash or an artifact.

man_from_uncle said:

Great. Now I'm paranoid. I've got 2 7900gts in my case and I'm going to be looking at them sideways every time I get a crash or an artifact.

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lol owned

I've also heard of numerous persons having this problem

eVGA does look like a good manufacturer.

Looks like modified cards are being returned from RMA. Wonder what the mod is? Thread

Hi,

I am sending you this email because of your 7900GT problem.

We are sending out new, fully tested, and slightly modified cards starting Friday.

We can send this card cross-shipped, I have attached a .PDF form, can you please fill that out and fax in? Once this has been done, we can start the RMA process. Once you receive the new card, simply but the defective card back in the box, and ship back.

The fax number is on the .PDF form. For the RMA ID field, please put "7900GT Problem"

Thanks,

Jacob

EVGA

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I havehad a help desk issue with XFX too. This is the only response I have had so far in terms of finding a solution:

[TONY - 2006/05/23] Hi, sorry, no BIOS update available and with errors of this nature, many factors can contribute. But these measures can help in discounting many possibilities, set BIOS optimal (or setup) defaults, but note your IDE/SATA/RAID settings before changing the BIOS. Please avoid overclocking the CPU or the PCI-E slot (disable peg-link mode) and ensure you have supplemental power leads to both the graphics card and the mainboard (where required). Also, please ensure you have installed up-to-date mainboard BIOS chipset drivers before the graphics drivers, try ftp://www.xfxsupport.com/public/driver/83.91_XP_MCE_2K_forceware.zip. But if this does not help, ensure you have up-to-date dx9c and any required game updates installed. Reduce both video and audio hardware acceleration, disable write combining in the troubleshooting section of the advanced display pproperties and let us know if this helps. Thanks Tony

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Unfortunately, if anything this advice has casued the problem to occur more often.

Have this same problem...

...on a Gainward 7900 GTX I bought from OCuk just before going on holiday at the beginning of May. Before I left I tried out FEAR, seemed to run fine - but since returning I've finally got around to installing Quake 4 (patched to v1.2) and initially found it very glitchy in-game with various artifacts and massive tearing - did some fiddling, and this seemed to clear up - but after 20 minutes or so of playing, framerates started bogging down for no apparent reason - then when I exited to the desktop, I had graphical corruption and the screen blacking out/flicking off and on again and general freezing (Task Manager, Start Menu etc).

GPU and CPU temps seemed well within acceptable parameters.

Initially though the problem was to do with having Dual Core support activated in the game (I have an Athlon X2 4400), but problem has persisted in 'single CPU' mode.

Have disabled PEG mode on my ASUS A8N-E - still a problem.

Have just updated AMD chipset drivers to 1.3.1, but don't expect this to clear it up.

Drivers are XG 84.37v2 btw - modded drivers, but I've never had a problem with them with my 6800 Ultra or 7800 GTX.

Many many posts around the Web on this, including a 42 pager on nvNews forum, but everyone remains mystified it appears.

Maybe a problem with the card BIOS? Perhaps the fact that 2D and 3D clocks are not running at the same frequency? Seem to remember that has been a problem with nVidia GPUs in the past...

Or perhaps it's the curse of Gainward - had to reflash my 6800 Ultra when I got it due to a dodgy BIOS...

Any thoughts?

FEAR is one of the games that will not show the problem with these cards, BF2 & HL2:Lost coast are games that will show the issue.

I have the same issue as the thread poster with the XFX 7900GTX I bought last weeked.

The card works flawlessley using 550/750 core/memory clock, but not the as
bought settings of 675/850 which proves it's not a driver issue.

The cards going back at the weeked for a full refund, suppose I'm lucky finding the problem early on and being able to get my money back.

XFX shut down their forums and are basically trying to ignore the problem!

I will not be buying another XFX product.

If you want to know for sure if your card has a problem, accelerate the MTBF. Put it on soak test with the overclock. From what I've read, the fastest way to accelerate any failure is to run the last test of 3Dmark06 "Deep Freeze" with max settings and high resolutions for 4 hours and see if it starts to artifact.

Very good article about it here at [H]ardOCP points the finger at the manufacturers

My Gainward is not overclocked, mind, and it is locking up like crazy. Now have an RMA number from OcUK, however, so hopefully they'll be able to replicate the problem and will replace it.

Seems a good idea would be for nVidia to release a new BIOS that lowers the vertex clock in line with the GPU.

I don't suppose the new 91.28 drivers solve this?

Yeah it's not just overclocked cards that are dying. From what I've read once it starts to play up its too late for any bios fix, apart from lower clocks. A 5% RMA is very high. Can't see drivers fixing tbh.

Can you clarify:

A 5% RMA is a very high

Did you read this? 5 in a 100 cards returned, not good. Only a percentage of those will actually be faulty, but its still very high.

BFGTech said:

Asking if they had seen RMAs on the rise on the 7900 series he explained that the return rate had moved up somewhere between 3% to 5% on those cards

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