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Broke my 980TI :( Any tips?

Asa

Asa

Asa

Associate
Joined
15 Nov 2011
Posts
411
Hey!

I had a beautiful Zotac reference 980TI, and decided it was a bit too noisy for my liking. I attempted to fit a HG10 980 with an Antec 1200 AIO.

Now my 980TI is broken. My PC boots through to a MoBo splash screen, but that's as far as it goes. I've removed the cooler completely and the result is the same.

My theory is that the board bent a little when fitting the AIO, though if it did it was only very slight. My next thought is to stick it in the oven for a bit in hopes of re-setting some solder, but if anyone has a less rubbish idea I'd definitely be grateful

:(
 
Inspect the board THOROUGHLY, if you can find the break in any contact points. Then yes, maybe stick it in an oven to re seat the solder.

I'd suggest RMA but chances are, it will be refused.
 
I can't RMA it. Even if Zotac would accept it, it's clearly my fault.

I might have to suck it up and play PS4 games for a bit :(
 
Do you have onboard graphics ? my guess is as you have removed the card to mod it the bios has defaulted back to onboard as primary and the nvidia driver isn't seeing it and your net effect is a blank screen after bios / windows boots.

It's a pain I have experienced myself. I can't believe your card is dead if your getting as far as Bios, any damage you'd see corruption of the image even at that level.
 
Asa said:
I can't RMA it. Even if Zotac would accept it, it's clearly my fault.

I might have to suck it up and play PS4 games for a bit :(
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savagesam117 said:
Put it back together, will they ever notice? If not RMA and hope for the best. Worst case you'll get your broken card back.
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I think OP has decided that, since he broke a working card, it would be unfair to return it even if he could.

Well played to him. If everybody who broke working cards sent them back under RMA, the price for all cards would have to go up. It's like insurance fraud - we all pay the price.
 
FoxEye said:
I think OP has decided that, since he broke a working card, it would be unfair to return it even if he could.

Well played to him. If everybody who broke working cards sent them back under RMA, the price for all cards would have to go up. It's like insurance fraud - we all pay the price.
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I agree, know the risks, accept the responsibility.

OP, you can send it off to specialists for £50 or so quid to fix it if an oven bake doesn't fix it.
 
Got to be worth a go at an RMA surely. A few years I RMA'd an EVGA mobo that I borked when fitting a cooler. Slipped and broke one of the chips off. Fully expected to get it back with a no, but to my amazement they sent me back a brand new 780i mobo. I only sent them a 680i.
 
Asa said:
Hey!

I had a beautiful Zotac reference 980TI, and decided it was a bit too noisy for my liking. I attempted to fit a HG10 980 with an Antec 1200 AIO.

Now my 980TI is broken. My PC boots through to a MoBo splash screen, but that's as far as it goes. I've removed the cooler completely and the result is the same.

My theory is that the board bent a little when fitting the AIO, though if it did it was only very slight. My next thought is to stick it in the oven for a bit in hopes of re-setting some solder, but if anyone has a less rubbish idea I'd definitely be grateful

:(
Click to expand...

Inspect the core - chances are you managed to break it, and that will definitely show up once you RMA it (or you could splatter as much thermal grease as you can on it and hope they don't notice).
 
Contact Zotac, see if they will repair it for you at a cost ? £100 repair is better than a dead 980ti. We all know the risks of buggering about with hardware. Dont bake it thats for sure its such a bad idea i have never heard some one get a lasting repair from it. my guess is you have knocked a component and damaged it. I have changed components successfully on a few graphics cards now and it can be done. First port of call is send the card back to the manufacturer be honest and if they are a decent manufacturer they will try to help you. If they reply with basically F off then dont buy another from them. They certainly dont need to help you but i have found good customer service goes a long way in my purchasing decisions hence Dell monitor and EVGA graphics cards.
I broke a Dell laptop when it was 3 months old and sent it back to dell. they repaired is for the cost of parts as a good will. i say contact Zotac.
 
Thanks for the advice.

Visibly I can't see any damage to the card at all, core or anywhere else. It's also able push the "Gigabyte Ultra Durable" splash screen over HDMI or Displayport (with or without PCI-E 8pin+6pin from the PSU).

No on-board graphics to interfere. I have a few AMD cards kicking around that I may as well use to prove I can get to the BIOS, but I don't think there is much to be done from there.

I'd feel dirty trying to pass it off for RMA. Integrity has to be worth more than £550, right? Talking to Zotac about a potential repair has to be worth a go.
 
Asa said:
Thanks for the advice.

Visibly I can't see any damage to the card at all, core or anywhere else. It's also able push the "Gigabyte Ultra Durable" splash screen over HDMI or Displayport (with or without PCI-E 8pin+6pin from the PSU).

No on-board graphics to interfere. I have a few AMD cards kicking around that I may as well use to prove I can get to the BIOS, but I don't think there is much to be done from there.

I'd feel dirty trying to pass it off for RMA. Integrity has to be worth more than £550, right? Talking to Zotac about a potential repair has to be worth a go.
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Absolutely not! :D
 
I'd try and chance it, not like these companies are squeaky clean themselves is it.

Either that or be honest and ask how much a repair will cost.
 
Ayahuasca said:
I'd try and chance it, not like these companies are squeaky clean themselves is it.
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Completely irrelevant. Everybody who abuses the RMA process pushes costs up for everyone else.

Ultimately, it's not "these companies" that foot the bill - it's us.
 
Can't be much abusing going on then as apart from Titan X tier GPU's the high end are roughly the same cost they were 10 years ago.

They have hundreds if not thousands of spare cards sitting there anyway that will likely never be used. It really isn't costing them anything to replace a card they don't know was user damaged.
 
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