NVIDIA RMA experience

[tintin82]

Hi all,

I have a 3090 that I am considering RMA'ing due to high memory temps.

I have a fix, that being a Lego stand, and the card is cool and quiet with this solution, but without it memory rockets to 112c and 100% fan with throttling.

I noted my experience here.

Part of me want to keep it as there is only minor coil whine and the lego stand works great with mem maxing at 96c and its so quiet, but the other side wants to rma as this is not acceptable for such a high end card. Aware the worst case is that I get a card back with as high temps and coil whine to boot.

Anyone have a recent experience of rma of a 3090? What was the returned item like? How long did it take?

Thanks

 

[xPETEZx]

I originally bought my 3090FE back end of April 2021. It had coil-whine, and high mem-temps right out the gate. Mem would hit 110c, fans never to 100% though... about 60% tops. Very noisy either way.
I replaced the rear thermal pads on it only, and that dropped temps to 94-96. Not great, but enough to prevent the fans going crazy.
Combine that with an undervolt, and it was mostly fine. Biggest issue was the coil-whine.

December 2021 I decided to try an RMA for the coil-whine. It was accepted straight away. Card was sent away and new sealed-in-box unit arrived about week and half later.

Sadly the replacement coil-whines too. Maybe a bit less... but still annoying.
However on the memory temps things are much much better. Bone stock, mem temps usually sit about 88-90. So 4-6 better than even my old card with replaced pads. And nearly 20 better than the old card stock.

I again put a slight under-volt on, helps ever so slightly with coil-whine. But reduces temp / power use too. Even in this hot weather, mem temps never seem to go above 92. Usually in the 86-90 range.

Id say get an RMA opened. Seems nVidia did change the the pads they use for something bit better.

 

[melmac]

Hi all,

I have a 3090 that I am considering RMA'ing due to high memory temps.

I have a fix, that being a Lego stand, and the card is cool and quiet with this solution, but without it memory rockets to 112c and 100% fan with throttling.

I noted my experience here.

Part of me want to keep it as there is only minor coil whine and the lego stand works great with mem maxing at 96c and its so quiet, but the other side wants to rma as this is not acceptable for such a high end card. Aware the worst case is that I get a card back with as high temps and coil whine to boot.

Anyone have a recent experience of rma of a 3090? What was the returned item like? How long did it take?

Thanks

Nvidia's RMA process is usually pretty good. But, there is no way of knowing whether the replacement card will have coil whine or not.

It's worth trying though if it's annoying you that much.

 

[Trickle]

I use a prop on my 3090FE. Always expected to from day 1. Mem temps hit 96c during rendering if I run the card at stock 350W in warm weather. Same as yours. tbh I think they will just return it to you claiming its not faulty.

 

[tintin82]

I use a prop on my 3090FE. Always expected to from day 1. Mem temps hit 96c during rendering if I run the card at stock 350W in warm weather. Same as yours. tbh I think they will just return it to you claiming its not faulty.

Without a prop does your fan ramp up to 100% and the mem hit 112C before thermal throttling? That's what mine does without a prop. With the prop it's ace, cool and quiet.

 

[LtMatt]

Hi all,

I have a 3090 that I am considering RMA'ing due to high memory temps.

I have a fix, that being a Lego stand, and the card is cool and quiet with this solution, but without it memory rockets to 112c and 100% fan with throttling.

I noted my experience here.

Part of me want to keep it as there is only minor coil whine and the lego stand works great with mem maxing at 96c and its so quiet, but the other side wants to rma as this is not acceptable for such a high end card. Aware the worst case is that I get a card back with as high temps and coil whine to boot.

Anyone have a recent experience of rma of a 3090? What was the returned item like? How long did it take?

Thanks

You are not alone, the 3090 FEs that I was using had the same issue. I purchased my first 3090 FE in March brand new. The second was second hand off the MM a few months ago.

Memory ran at 110c and fans ran at 100%, it was unbearable in the end and I sold them both without rma'ing since it seems to be quite common with the FE models.

Here was the GPU sag stand I used, which knocked about 10c off the memory junction temperatures.

Spoiler

Good luck with the RMA.

 

[Woodsta888]

GDDR6X runs much hotter than GDDR6. Plus the thermal pads were known to be rubbish so people swapped those out. Sagging will twist the card and make some of those memory modules not touch the thermal pads increasing heat.

RMA'ing it for temps when the card works fine will just have Nvidia send it back to you as it works and the memory is within it's operating window.

Though if it runs cool & quiet with the lego, then you've already found the solution.

Always use an anti-sag device, lego or gfx card jack, on big heavy cards like the 3090 (there is no bigger currently). Or mount vertically if case allows and is aesthetically acceptable.

Increase/optimize airflow from case intakes to card,

swap out thermal memory pads as they are poorly installed/performing material. Lots who are brave enough on an expensive card have done it. Plenty of guides on internet. But I'd stick with the lego if it works.

 

[Trickle]

Without a prop does your fan ramp up to 100% and the mem hit 112C before thermal throttling?

Nope, but I wasn't about to let it run prop-less for any period of time as the bend was très alarming.

 

[justwondering]

Set a custom fan curve with Afterburner, I find most factory set fan curves are pretty lame.