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Why do Graphics Cards fail so much?

I must admit you hear about graphics cards failing a lot more than other components.

They are, by far, the most complex component in any PC though, so it makes sense that they would have a higher chance of failing.
 
only card to ever die on me was a geforce 256 sdram version. the san siezed up and core must have overheated. got all funny colours from card then.

edit: tell a lie, the 7900gs i had was most recent failure, and thats cuz the 79 series are borked from factory. :p
 
Just to throw a spanner in the works...

But how many that are returned "as faulty" are actually FUBAR. I seem to remember reading somewhere, that a high percentage of Graphics cards RMA'd (might even have been someone from OCuk if memory serves me right) are in fact fine and that the fault lies elsewhere.

Just something to ponder, on a wild and windy Sunday evening!
 
If they are rma'd as working they are sent right back, 9 times out of 10 at the expense of the consumer.

Can be a pain in the @55 when it comes to ram and it doesn't work on your machine but does on theirs.
 
Never had a gfx card fail :)

However, I have lost:

HD x2
Mobo x3 (2 of which were DOA...)
CPU x3 (1 DOA, 1 Cyrix didn't liked being overclocked with a faulty fan!)
Mobo or CPU x1 (old rig so haven't been bothered to work out which)
Floppy x2 (one of which started smoking when I wired it up wrong, and it wasn't even mine - oops!)
Monitor x1
DVD-RW x1 (well it still works kinda... but has a lot of trouble reading some disks)

So in my personal experience i wouldn't say gfx cards fail a lot - I've probably owned more of them than any other component with the possible exception of hds and RAM sticks.
 
my previous gfx cards have blown up or malfunctioned because ive either overclocked them too much or ive messed around with them in some way :(
this new 1 i got 7950 gt card i havent even tryed overclocking i just unwrapped it put it in my computer installed the drivers then went on from there not a single problem thus far :)
 
Ive been building my own pcs now for nearly 20 years and I can honestly say the only thing that has even given up on me are a couple of hard drives..

Ive never had anything else blow up or refuse to work....

Ive been well pleased with my luck..
 
Touch wood, I've only ever had one faulty graphics card, and that was my new 2900. It was faulty on arrival, had dodgy memory on it.

I've had plenty of faulty motherboards though.. Got through 3 P5B Deluxes and have just had my OCZ PC8000 memory fail on me! So far I've never had a CPU fail or a PSU.. Yet!
 
Only card I've definitley had go faulty was my Radeon 9950 but even that seemingly corrected itself after a bit of a time out. Symtpoms were all artifacts during boot.

Oh and that after around 4 years of use.
 
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PC components are generally incredibly reliable, Maybe with the exception of Mechanical parts like Harddrives and Fans.

The problem areas are poor manufacturer packaging (often designed show off the product rather than protect it) and retailer packing !
Then user incompetence which leads on to manufacturers frowning on us enthusiasts improving components and treating us like Idiots if we do have problems !
 
I'm surprised to hear people have so many hardware failures, especially graphics cards. I've never had a graphics card fail and I have had many over the years and done overclocking. The only part I have found to be quite vulnerable to breaking down are PSUs. My DVD drives make weird noises, so I think they might not last too much longer, but they still work :p .

Maybe if you find a certain part is breaking very often it could be another part causing it to do so, like a faulty motherboard or PSU.

jrodga2k5 said:
Geforce Ti4200 died after 11months
6800GT died after 3months
6800le DOA lol
x1800xt died after 15months
8800GTS died after 5months

Thats all my dead hardware in graphics card land so far :D
Click to expand...

That seems pretty extreme, it's normal to have a card break every now and then but something must be up for so many to fail after so little time. Maybe it's another part causing them to break so much.
 
*Touches wood*

I've hardly ever had anything fail on me in 10+ years.

The only things I can remember are:

Asus P4C800 Deluxe Motherboard - after about 1month I started getting the infamous "system failed cpu test" error, caused by a short circuit, so couldn't boot. RMA'd and I'm still using the replacement.

An ancient TV Card - died after I stupidly wired up the PSU incorrectly, trying to mod an old Dell case + PSU to take a standard mobo. Was surprised I didn't take out everything, think the TV card took the full force!

I've even got my old Athlon 800 System running to this day - for a couple of years it ran 24/7. Now it's only used occasonally, but still works.
 
Had my 6600GT for a good 1.5 years now I think, only thing I've ever had die on me was Asus A8N Deluxe MB after a year or so of use.
 
Never hard a g/card fail.

Failures I have had:
5 PSU (1xgeneric, 1xjeantech, 2xfsp bluestorm, 1xtagen)
1 HDD (1xraptor 36gb)
1 mobo (1xabit guru AN7, killed by the dodgy jeantech so not a failure par say)
1 screen (1xviewsonic 17"crt)
1 CPU (1xathlon XP2000+, well didn't fail really my fat clumsy fingers cracked the core replacing HS&fan :( )
1 RAM (1x1gb stick geil value pc3200)

Think thats it. Looking back it is the newer stuff, can't remember any trouble with pre 2000 hardware.
Even out of that list not all proper failures, at least half was me running it over the manufactures recommended settings.
 
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