No it came from here, purchased on the 22nd when they became available. Sapphire have said that there isnt a warranty on the card as it may have been purchased from a discount reseller and that definitely wasn’t the case. I’ve sent them pictures of the serial number on the box and the card but they won’t budge.
I’m hoping it may just be a mix-up, but what would have happened a year down the road if I had a warranty issue that couldn’t have been resolved? Not a good start to an expensive product.
In further developments, I have just read up on the fan specs for my Nitro+ 5700XT and Nitro+ 6800XT and found that I am able to put the perfectly behaving middle fan (87.5mm) from the 5700XT into the 6800XT.
The fans are the same connector and power rating, all that Sapphire did this time around was change the impellers.
No squealing or anything untoward. TRiXX fan health check reports success on all 3 fans and its night and day from the stock 6800XT fan. Given that I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was the middle fan causing the noise, and apart from that, the card is great, I may wait until replacement fans for the 6800XT are released instead of going through a lengthy RMA process.