Faulty GTX 680?

[dandare2012]

I was just forceful, and wouldn't take no for an answer.

They try their best to worm out of DSR's, and the number times they replied stating item would be tested to confirm fault and returned if none found was annoying. Constantly had to keep stating was DSR.

And then, with most places I have dealt with, as long as you get in touch with regards to DSR, they typically give you longer to actually return the item. These guys wanted the item back within the 7 days.

They were just unfriendly and horrible throughout the experience, and I will never, ever buy from them again, even if they were the only people to stock something I wanted.

Thanks for the info, seems you were "lucky" because it actually was not a DSR case at all. If you stated to them that the product was faulty then it instantly defaults to Sales of Goods Act 1979 rules, under which you legally have to prove a fault to them.

I sent them a direct email stating that the product was faulty and I required a direct yes or no answer about a refund so I could make the decision to take them to court or not - The last response I got from them was as follows:

I have received further results from technical as the card is still being tested till now. Please see attached results of our testing. Our technical has now concluded that they are unable to find fault with the graphic card.

If you do not wish to keep the card, we could also re-sell the product for you on our bargain corner for a slight price reduction to encourage new buyers. Items on our bargain corner are sent to Paid Advertising Networks to ensure a quick sale. Not only are the advertising costs entirely paid by LambdaTek, but also you get the full proceeds once the item is sold: LambdaTek takes no commission. Please note this is a service we offer entirely at our discretion and is typically offered solely to our business customers in such situations. As soon as a order is placed against your product we will be refunding you the amount paid by the buyer.

Please let us know if this will be an option for you

 

[Jakus]

So what do you want to do ?

You need to focus 100% on your chosen direction If that's fix the problem I can help you with that.

Quite why everyones been intent on cooking the card for hours on end when the majority of your problems seem to occur with the card is in a different power state anyway ! A short test at reduced stability threshold would suffice, Gigabyte must have testers working day and night that's why I suggested a little bs

Anyway like I said in the beginning GFX cards don't normally rule the roost and providing your CPU and memory function Nvidia's TDR should kick in...can be a bugger if the GFX adapter flatly refuses to display anything though .

Just thought you do connect through DVi or VGA to your monitor ?

 

[eyetrip]

Thanks for the info, seems you were "lucky" because it actually was not a DSR case at all. If you stated to them that the product was faulty then it instantly defaults to Sales of Goods Act 1979 rules, under which you legally have to prove a fault to them.

Well, how it went was I asked them if they considered stuck pixels as fault. They said no, so I then said I was then returning under DSR.

 

[dandare2012]

So what do you want to do ?

You need to focus 100% on your chosen direction If that's fix the problem I can help you with that.

Quite why everyones been intent on cooking the card for hours on end when the majority of your problems seem to occur with the card is in a different power state anyway ! A short test at reduced stability threshold would suffice, Gigabyte must have testers working day and night that's why I suggested a little bs

Anyway like I said in the beginning GFX cards don't normally rule the roost and providing your CPU and memory function Nvidia's TDR should kick in...can be a bugger if the GFX adapter flatly refuses to display anything though .

Just thought you do connect through DVi or VGA to your monitor ?

Thank you for your offer of help. I will see what happens, but I am pretty determined not to have the card back! I am going to stick to my guns and see how far I get. The purpose of all the posting on forums has in part been for me to make a reasonable effort to diagnose the fault, which will also help me if things get legal.

I use dvi. My monitor only has dvi and vga port on it. Tbh i had wondered, with a little nagging thought in the back of my mind if the monitor could have anything yo do with it, BUT, windows event manager clearly shows an irregular shutdown each time it crashes, so it is not simply that the system loses signal.. it is like the card is losing power.

I asked both Gigabyte and LambdaTek about their testing and they say that is all they can do. GBT say they QC'd the card again, the same as it would coming out the factory, + they run multiple stress tests, leaving overnight (thus the 15 hours) Lambdatek just ran 3dmark, heaven and metro 2033 for hours at a time, again leaving overnight. I did ask them to start and stop the test repeatedly rather than running constantly, and they say they did it, but I have no evidence at this point.

When you say a short test at reduced stability threshold, I assume you mean oc the card to see if it becomes unstable? I have a strong feeling that this would not wash with retailer as they would say it is invalidating the warranty with GBT...

Well, how it went was I asked them if they considered stuck pixels as fault. They said no, so I then said I was then returning under DSR.

Nice. and how the **** could dead pixels in the middle of a screen not be considered a fault!

 

[Jakus]

Yup, testing at what you intend to operate at is pretty pointless, you always test at simulated worst case scenario +, its those margins Overclockers exploit

Keep us posted anyway and good luck !

 

[dandare2012]

I have been doing a bit of digging, and it would seem that random and unexplainable crashing is not uncommon with the 680... found a lot of posts from people complaining of system lock up's with them. yet to find anyone who had a valid solution other than enabling XMP profiles on ASUS boards... as I have a gigabyte board and my ram does not support XMP I cannot try it.

 

[RetrogamerX]

Sorry your having troubles with your 680 mate. I haven't had any issues with my EVGA GTX 680. I think faulty cards are random. It's the luck of the draw really or unlucky in your case

 

[dandare2012]

Sorry your having troubles with your 680 mate. I haven't had any issues with my EVGA GTX 680. I think faulty cards are random. It's the luck of the draw really or unlucky in your case

Thanks for the support man.

As an update, I was waiting all day to get an answer from them, I sent the last email on Friday night. my "contact" there now always seems to be "busy" when I phone, and always takes 24 hours to respond to every email, which also mysteriously always happens at 17:25 every day, 5 mins before they close. The guy on the end of the returns line refuses to talk to me and just tells me to re phone the other number and ask for this other dude, it then takes 15 mins on hold to get through to be told he is not even there, or is on lunch, in a meeting etc.. and no one else is able to deal with it I am told.

His last email said it has been escalated to the MD of the company, for them to seek advice - not to try and get me a better solution - but to help them which is all they seem to be interested in. I was given no time scale of when to expect a reply either, just a quick two liner about talking to their MD. Really I do have to wonder how some companies even exist, I mean there whole ethos and attitude is so poor, and they cannot write a decent email to save their lives. I have basically been having a disjointed conversation 1-2 lines at a time, 1 day at a time. grrrrrrr.

 

[dandare2012]

Yup, testing at what you intend to operate at is pretty pointless, you always test at simulated worst case scenario +, its those margins Overclockers exploit

Keep us posted anyway and good luck !

OK, so they have posted the card back to me without my permission. Despite the fact I expressly told them in the letter I included the parcel that I would not accept the card back, they posted it anyway, claim their MD instructed them to refuse the refund.

I spoke to my credit card provider about it for the second time, and heres the bad part... they say that due to the technical nature of the fault, as proof I may have to get the fault verified by a third party technician, which is obviously going to cost me cash, and time if I go down that route.

 

[Jakus]

Looks like You'll be fixing the problem then !

 

[weehamish]

WOW what a story.

Dude this means you would have spent nearly £600!

This is why i only buy from places i trust, its just not worth the hassle if anything goes wrong. 14 days with OCUK is unbeatable even if their prices are a tad higher. Most times they will collect the parcel from your house too or refund postage so its all good.

 

[RetrogamerX]

WOW what a story.

Dude this means you would have spent nearly £600!

This is why i only buy from places i trust, its just not worth the hassle if anything goes wrong. 14 days with OCUK is unbeatable even if their prices are a tad higher. Most times they will collect the parcel from your house too or refund postage so its all good.

That's one of the main reasons why I buy from OCUK. I never forget good service.

 

[Gregster]

WOW what a story.

Dude this means you would have spent nearly £600!

This is why i only buy from places i trust, its just not worth the hassle if anything goes wrong. 14 days with OCUK is unbeatable even if their prices are a tad higher. Most times they will collect the parcel from your house too or refund postage so its all good.

So your new system was from OcUK?

 

[weehamish]

Maybe maybe not? But doesn't change anything as i have bought from ocuk.

 

[dandare2012]

Looks like You'll be fixing the problem then !

Here the thing, Gigabyte UK have agreed to replace the card for me, BUT have said if I get an issue again they will do nothing. I will still have a warranty, but it concerns me that if I had a similar issue I would be sunk as they could blame me and say it was the same...

Also, Citizens advice have said that as my contract is not with GBT it is with the relater, then this would void my statutory rights. I would be voiding my warranty with the retailer and preventing myself form taking any action against them. They also warned that any warranty offered by GBT would not be supported by law as they are "giving" me a card, not selling it to me. All very complex.

It seems now that my options are to either pay a third party company to test the current card, in the hope they can verify the fault, and I can issue a charge back, or just accept the replacement at my risk and move on.

 

[weehamish]

The story goes on!

Well if it looks like nothings gonna fix it and you have no way to get cash back anyways its better to take another card from Gigabyte, ask them to test before hand?

If it doesnt work it must be your pc.

 

[Jakus]

Why don't you run the card for a couple of days and try and resolve the issue ?

If you can not, you have the offer of a new card to try, if things are the same just sell that card S/H.

Assuming you want the card, otherwise just sell on the new card from Gigabyte in it's sealed condition.

I think Gigabyte have been more than fair with that offer...all said and done the original card has been pretty rigorously tested and declared OK.

 

[dandare2012]

Why don't you run the card for a couple of days and try and resolve the issue ?

If you can not, you have the offer of a new card to try, if things are the same just sell that card S/H.

Assuming you want the card, otherwise just sell on the new card from Gigabyte in it's sealed condition.

I think Gigabyte have been more than fair with that offer...all said and done the original card has been pretty rigorously tested and declared OK.

I think you are probably right. Just in the back of my head is the niggle of "what if" the new one goes wrong, and they quibble on warranty. Also that when I set out with this at the end of November the 700 series seemed a long way away, now we are over half way through jan and 700 series due in march... fell a bit stitched with it. Reckon I could get 350-380 max for it second hand, less 15% at least for ebay/pay pal fees.. will lose over £100.00 if I sell.

If I were to try and test again over this weekend, where would you start? i mean it seems unlikely that I could "fix" the issue as I do not honestly see how both my pc's could have the same "fault" in them? it is not a software issue as I have laready done multiple OS installs and tried 3 different drivers.

 

[weehamish]

Better to lose £100 then lose the full whack!

Stick it on gumtree before ebay, but yeah you wanna try sell before the 7 series, and who knows they maybe be delayed?

 

[wunkley]

I feel your pain fella. See my thread here about a faulty Gigabyte GTX 670. Took me 2 months to get the retailer to issue me a credit note. Total nightmare.

Really the retailer should sort it out for you. I used the Govs sale of goods act site (see here) to help back my 'campaign' which I eventually won.
If you're not going to be keeping the new 680 long though, I would probably bite gigabytes hand off for that offer, to save hassle, but I know what you mean.