I broke my motherboard installing a M.2 drive

Quartz · Wednesday at 17:13

I tried to add a 4 TB M.2 drive to my PC. To do this I needed to remove my GPU to get access to install the standoff. The GPU release tab broke and in doing so must have broken some of the PCIe traces because none of the PCIe slots worked thereafter. Fortunately I had a spare motherboard to hand. So I replaced my Asus Prime Z790 D4 with a MSI Tomahawk Z790 D4.

It could have been worse: it might have been my RTX 4090 that broke.

tamzzy · Wednesday at 20:28

Ouch. Expensive mistake but thankfully not £1500 expensive

jeffspuds · Wednesday at 20:35

Tried GPU card in another slot.

something daft already!! · Wednesday at 20:40

jeffspuds said:
Tried GPU card in another slot.

Quartz said:
The GPU release tab broke and in doing so must have broken some of the PCIe traces because none of the PCIe slots worked thereafter.

He did.

Bad luck old chap, at least you had another board.

jeffspuds · Wednesday at 20:40

dave28 · Wednesday at 20:49

I have had one of those GPU release tabs break off in the past but I must have been lucky because it fitted right back on and no ill effects at all.

That is really bad luck.

Quartz · Wednesday at 21:13

tamzzy said:
Ouch. Expensive mistake but thankfully not £1500 expensive

Yes, I was quite bricking it, but I tried the GPU in another PC and it worked which was quite the relief!

Gray2233 · Wednesday at 21:14

That's rough mate.

I hate the release tabs on PCI-E slots, especially with how little room you sometimes have to work with. Honestly I'm hoping that the shift in motherboards having connectors on the back for "aesthetic" purposes also eventually includes M.2 slots as it'd heavily simplify that sort of thing.

Quartz · Wednesday at 21:35

I understand that newer boards have the release tab for the main x16 socket in a more accessible location.

Bito · Wednesday at 22:42

Some Asus motherboards now have a GPU release button instaed. Much better.
Also, the MSI Z790 has a metal reinforced gpu slot, so may help in keep the slot intact!

mickyflinn · Wednesday at 22:44

Accidents happen, you sorted it, props.

RobotGirl · Wednesday at 23:02

GPU release tabs are not very user friendly, I use the flat end of a pencil or pen to press them .Its easily done ,feel for you .

Jay85 · 2024-08-22T00:14:11+0100

Not just release tabs, it's the weight of the gpu's sometimes that make them extremely difficult to remove.

RIP man, try for an RMA maybe? Got nothing to lose.