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You explanation piques my curiosity so I may have to investigate it. Even if it turns out I do not have a need for it, I am still curious. I would say at least 1300W. The Lian Li Edge seems like a solid and affordable option. I have one in my 4090 build. I have a Thermaltake GF3 1650W PSU in the 5090 build. I like both of them. The GF3 is hard to find. It has dual 12VHPWR sockets and like 6 PCIe 8-pin sockets in addition. I may have to drop down to 0.001 Ohm shunt resistors to bump my power limit. I backed off my core clock a bit and the scores went up. I ran the benchmark again with GPU-Z and HWiNFO64 running on my second monitor so I could watch and it is still showing power limit perf cap reason, so... hmmm. I'm pulling 1350W from the wall already. HWiNFO64 shows like 959W on GPU power rails. Apparently that's not enough. My core temp is still hitting 41°C with 9°C water, so that's not helping. I guess I am going to have to think about using liquid metal on the GPU. I don't want to, but 41°C is definitely not helping https://www.3dmark.com/3dm/144631382 | https://hwbot.org/benchmarks/3dmark_-_steel_nomad_dx12/submissions/5918232

Its an OS you dont actually interact with directly like you would most linux distro's or Windows. Once its installed, you interact with it via Web browser of choice. Its main selling point is acting as your File Server, you can also add 2 drives for parity as well. The other large value add is containers, the functions are in my view endless, though it wouldnt surprise if people more adept in the line of expertise would say otherwise. Most importantly its just rock solid and is all installed on a flash drive, simply notate the Serials of the drives and how you arranged them in the GUI, and you can easily transport to another system and have it boot up without missing a beat. They've also recently added in official TailScale support so you can have friends and family have access relatively easily. Its not something I would expect people here to have too much interest in, but its been a thrilling experience for me while I gather up GPU's for benching this Winter. I have a particular fondness to Anime, make no mistake its an ocean of urine like any genre but it long poses a challenge in media management. Unraid has many containers to make this process much more simplified. More importantly just rock solid stability, wish Windows was as consistent. To answer both of you... They weren't the same, some may recall I had a 1300w PSU that was recommended by most here at the time, that one gave up the ghost, EVGA replaced it with a different model 1300w which I had been using with Unraid for a while, its now powering my ITX system. Open style chassis allows much more freedom than a case would in this regard. I've also killed an 850w EVGA Gold PSU, but like I said I killed it so I did not seek RMA for it. Not sure what the issue was for the 550w Im guessing it didnt like being power cycled as quickly as I had done it. In some ways it does clean things up a bit since I am no longer using the 1200w (900w for 110v) server PSU to power the 7900 XTX. Which now opens things up for a new PSU on the bench system (10850K), should I start looking around for another 1300w?

Off-Topic: The Phoenix Micro Center grand opening for VIP members is 11/5. My wife better hide my wallet. 🤣 It's an hour each direction from where I live, but at least it's not the 6-hour drive each direction to Tustin, CA.

For the GPU, I would say select whichever one costs less, especially if you are putting a waterblock on it. My Zotac 5090 Solid OC was a good buy compared to the other more expensive options that deliver nothing for the extra money. It is an excellent GPU. The air cooler on it was fantastic (unlike some of the other affordable brands/models). It ran freakishly cool for an air cooled GPU. The only 50-series GPU I would recommend avoiding like a plague is an FE model. For overclocking potential probably the best GPU silicon quality most consistently will be an AORUS Master, but the cost vs benefit isn't justified. I love overclocking more than anything else I do with a computer, and really the only reason computers matter to me at this point, but paying a WHOLE LOT more for a very small gain in GPU benchmark scores is just not a very intelligent decision. I have owned the following X870E motherboards and I list them in my order of preference: X870E AORUS Master (best overall - only flaw is no way to disable WiFi/BT in BIOS) X870E-E Strix (replacement for second AORUS Master that arrived with shipping damage) X870E Apex (returned first for refund, second was junk, I am using #3) X870E Carbon (returned for refund - good mobo, but no async BCLK and weird glitches) X879E Taichi (my least favorite out of all AMD motherboards I have owned - hated it) I had a X870E Taichi and hated it. The PCIe bifurcation was garbage and I did not care for the firmware. I have only owned two ASRock motherboards and did not like either one. I had a B850 AORUS Elite that I used in a build for my granddaughters and it was excellent. The only criticism I had was the PCIe slots below the GPU slots were X1, but using them did not drop the GPU to X8. This is unavoidable with anything below X870E dual chipset due to a lack of PCIe lanes with an non "E" AMD dual chipset motherboard. PCIe X1 dramatically reduces NVMe speed... makes NVMe speed like SATA SSD. If you plan to insert anything in other PCIe slots in addition to your GPU in an AMD motherboard the "E" version is an absolute must have. The only complaint I have with the Gigabyte boards is no way to disable WiFi/BT in the BIOS. Super stupid flaw they could fix effortlessly if they cared. If you use WiFi/BT and use Windoze 11 as your main OS (I do not do either one) this truly is a non-issue. It really pissed me off that Gigabyte did not provide that option in the BIOS. I asked twice and both times they said no... "you're the only person complaining about it" (essentially we don't care what you want and you are not worth the minimal effort needed to make a BIOS as good as our competitors). Gigabyte is the only brand I know of that omits this essential basic BIOS option. The Strix was an accidental blessing. I purchased a second AORUS Master from Central Computers on sale for less than what I paid for the first. The big and heavy NVMe heatsink under the GPU was not latched. Apparently shipped from the factory without being latched. It flopped around inside of the box and broke several things and scratched up things that did not get broken. I asked them to open the box and inspect before shipping a replacement. They had quite a few in stock and ended up opening all of the boxes and all were damaged in the same way. They offered the Strix for no difference in price. I accepted. The Strix is better than the AORUS Master in terms of firmware. A close second only because I could not install both of my Sabrent quad NVMe X4 cards like I could in the Master. It only has one extra PCIe slot. The AORUS had two, both usable at X4 without dropping the GPU from X16 to X8. The AORUS Master allowed me to install 10 NVMe SSDs and 4 SATA drives while maintaining the GPU at X16. The Apex is a great motherboard with a glaring engineering defect entirely due to an idiotic PCIe slot arrangement. I can only use the X4 PCIe slot above the GPU. The Sabrent quad NVMe card's heat sink touches the GPU backplate. The Strix performs as well as the Apex in terms of the CPU overclocking. It has asych BCLK and I can use the Sabrent card in the bottom slots without the GPU dropping to X8 like it does in the Apex. If I knew everything I know now before buying my first I probably would have purchased two X870E-E Strix Gaming WiFI. If I were going to recommend one, it would be the X870E-E Strix as the best all-around X870E motherboard with the fewest flaws and compromises. Hope this helps. https://www.newegg.com/asus-rog-strix-x870e-e-gaming-wifi-atx-motherboard-amd-x870e-am5/p/N82E16813119682

im in the same position here, will likely need to replace my 90° Seasonic cable, probably going back to the straight Seasonic one that came stock with my 1600W PSU, thus switching back from current top routing to bottom. should be fine 🙂

By some miracle USPS managed to "redeliver" my already delivered 4TB NVMe. Team Group did not repair the old one. They sent a new one. Knowing how inexpensive the parts are that go into them, and factoring in the costs of shipping and handling, sending it to Taiwan to "attempt" repair was truly idiotic and reflects a lack of regard for the people that buy their products. I will still be a brand detractor after this. I've got a bunch of Team Group drives and flash storage, but not planning buy from them again based on this. I changed my Amazon review from 5-star to 1-star based on the 6-week RMA experience.

Yeah, the best bet might be to hang onto the 7900xtx unless you have a specific need you're targeting for upgrading outside a new fun toy. 9070xt, depending on use case, is a side grade at best as is a 5070ti. Anything worth the squeeze is going to be a 5080, 4090, 5090. 4090 and 5090 are very expensive. So as you've found it is all about the 5080. I'd still wait and watch sales heading into black friday. I've been tempted to pull the trigger on a few pieces including another 9070xt for my SFF build but I know there will be some decent sales coming up.

Honestly I would just hang on to the 7900 XTX. Neither vendor has anything appealing for us without spending way too much money. I am waiting to see what next generation offerings look like, that being said I can play everything I want to play in terms of gaming at 3440x1440p. Perhaps Monster Hunter: Wilds is the only exception but that game runs like trash on anything right now. I believe you can run a trial for 30 days, there are ways around that "limitation" but I never looked further into it. I used the trial for about that duration and bought a license. The license gives you access to its platform for life but updates for 1 year to the OS itself. You can pay for a lifetime update license of course, i'll probably be upgrading my license to lifetime updates. The only part that is a bit quirky at times is finding a flash drive to use which must have a UUID that it can tie the license too, then of course install the OS to it. Cant remember how I did mine but probably used Rufus.

I was looking at the zotac solid core oc. $999, or the zotac amp extreme $1199. Neither has me terribly excited. I've been contemplating waiting a bit longer to see what AMD has in the pipeline. Hoping that it would be comparable to the 4090.

LOL, that would be the sane move. I think we should count our blessings we got in on the 5090s when prices were low. Your Zotac Solid OC is out of stock everywhere and the cheapest price atm is $3279.99+ on Amazon. Even open box used is going for $2612.... New base price on Newegg when in stock is back up to $2899.99 It is better but won't give you that massive upgrade uplift you like to experience true. With black friday specials starting to activate earlier and earlier now, keep an eye out for a good 5080 sale which is bound to happen or do as @Papusan suggests and hunt down a used 5080 on the $750-850 range depending on model. Which model(s) did you have in mind for the 5080?

I wont pay $2k for a gpu let alone those prices. Gpu+waterblock+thermal paste/pads. I have a 5080 in my cart, but I cannot seem to justify it. The 5080 is only marginally better than the 7900xtx.

There is definitely some user error in the equation along with inherent balancing issues. Luckily with something like the WireView Pro II we now have a proper tool just in case to monitor balancing AND it can handle higher loads along with a serious warranty. Once shipped, it definitely dims the light on the Astral a bit. AMD made a major mistake and damage control is in overdrive. The sad part is if the tech media and users hadn't responded so negatively they would have continued with this business as usual. They may change course but the destination is still set and that doesn't bode well. Like Steve said in the video, "I said earlier this year don't %*%*% up AMD!" That's all they had to do. They had the momentum and actually sold way more 9070xt/9070 cards than expected and had their best sales ever in quite awhile then proceed to make dumb mistakes like this.

Interesting video. Brother @electrosoft asked a rhetorical question not long ago about why nobody we know has melted connectors. Nobody could give a definitive answer. This makes me even more curious. 1600W for 15 minutes did not melt the connector. I think the answer might be "defective Chinese trash" after watching this. More accurately, "expensive defective Chinese crap." People are getting worried about exceeding 60-70°C and twice that much heat didn't melt the plastic connector. Thank you. I think I can still do better. Just need to get my core temps to stay down in the 20°C range or lower.

At least AMD suffering the problem lets us know it is a spec issue and not an Nvidia GPU side issue but still.... Score another for a lighter colored connector showing clear and visible scorch marks..... The blessing and the curse is my closest MC is ~60min away in St Davids. Close enough to where if I really want to go it isn't that far away yet far enough away to keep me honest and not habitually dropping by "just to look" (translation: Coming home with new goodies more often than not). An hour is a medium sized commute. Very doable. Your poor wallet AND you get access to a newer store vs ours which opened in 1991.....

@Mr. Fox Screenshot Something about needing Nvidia closed source firmware

If you absolutely want 5080 why not wait for the Super cards? I expect the 5080 will drop in price once the refresh is out. And with an 5090 at MSRP (if you can find one at lowest price) will probably keep it's prices a long time, same as for 4090's. Some even got more for their 2 years old used 4090's than they paid. Won't happen with xx80 cards.

The Taichi is now listed on fleabay along with the 7900xtx.

Happy to help. I have not been able to beat any of my Strix high scores with the Apex using my best 9950X. https://hwbot.org/benchmarks/cinebench_-_r23_multi_core_with_benchmate/submissions/5898291 https://hwbot.org/benchmarks/y-cruncher_-_pi-1b/submissions/5904464 I hate cutting aluminum and you are right about using a dremel or grinder. It loads up the griding disk with metal and resists the process. Using a hacksaw or a jigsaw is the easiest way to cut aluminum, but you can't use a hacksaw for some things. My MSI X870E Carbon and the Z790i Edge both had the rear I/O heatsink made about 1/16" too long and had contact interference with the GPU backplate. I was able to install the GPU in both motherboards but it was jammed against the backplate hard enough to damage the anodized finish on the GPU backplate. The NVMe heatsink was also touching the backplate on the Z790i Edge, but not jammed against it super hard. I had to install the GPU first, then the NVMe heatsink.

Amazing, and very appreciated reply. Thank you! You've convinced me to sell the Taichi MB. My gigabyte board had a similar problem with the top pcie heatsink/cpu waterblock, and GPU backplate. I had to dremel a 1/4" off the pcie heatsink in order for it all to fit/mesh correctly. Of course the top pcie is needed for the SSD to run at 5.0, and the GPU to run at x16. Cutting aluminum with a dremel cut off wheel was excruciating. Aluminum does not cut well, so it was frictioned off! 🤣

Opinions!? Zotac rtx 5080 solid oc w/ Alphacool water block....or Msi suprim rtx 5080 Or none of the above? Or hang on to my 7900xtx till next gen? @Mr. Fox Did you have/test the Asrock X870E Taichi mb? I have a brand new one and was considering swapping it out with the Gigabyte Aorus elite x870E thats currently in my rig. What were your impressions of it?

My little trooper EVGA 550w Gold gave up the ghost tonight. Somehow my Aorus ITX AM4 motherboard has now survived 2 PSU's (both EVGA) I yanked out the 1300w EVGA Gold from the Unraid system for now, I am planning some hardware swapping though so I suppose this is a bit of motivation. I recently acquired a Precision 7910, mostly so I can consolidate 3 systems into one. Unraid has been such a consistent OS that I think it will be a good fit for everything I could probably throw at it. I recently purchase a Morpheus 8057 heatsink, also got a second 280X (Windforce this time) and a PNY 780Ti w/ Accelero Xtreme III. About a 100 USD altogether.

Had they just gone with 2x 12v2x6 connectors, it would have been worth it for the niche market IMO. They would have instantly sold out. Nobody really wants to have to buy a BTF board, at least on Intel side and have worse memory performance over the 2x DIMM OC boards. Maybe next gen will have BTF on 2x DIMM boards, but that is a gamble and who really wants to wait. This entire gen has been a mess. I got my waterblock for my HOF XOC card from Ali delivered this week. I still have not gotten the rest of the parts but plan to have those soon and can finally put this bad boy under water. In the end, I think I'll still perfer a good air cooler. But given the recent news of 2027 for RTX 6000 series, I will at least get to get some use out of the setup before it's obsolete lol.

On paper, the WV2P basically makes the other model DOA unless it comes in much much cheaper but if you've already ponied up for a 5090.....With the ship dates so far out, we don't know what the status of Tariffs or FedEx shenanigans will be so this should be a "fun" ride. 😞 Oh yeah, MC openings are a major event/spectacle in the NerdWorld. As a general rule of thumb I tend to avoid all grand opening types of events (eateries, stores, etc...) or when events/movies premiere in theatres. I usually wait a full month or so before checking them out. I've even cut back on my normal convention hopping a bit because the crowds are ridiculous. I kind of get where TG is coming from since the recipient many times can formally open a claim and they are correct in the delivery status. You have to follow up on your own end. I've had this happen with several shipments over the years delivered to the wrong recipients and having to follow up with the local PO or UPS/FedEx. With most delivery services now taking pictures of the deliveries for verification, it makes it pretty straight forward to submit proof that clearly isn't your domicile. On the other hand, that six week wait is unacceptable. Don't forget you also need to get one of their aux powered MBs to go along with it..... Crazy pricing but one of the few out of the box aux powered 5090s on the market and sad to say with only 1000 being made, these will sell out pretty quickly. Exactly. With the WV2P, I will move away from the MSI tentacle. For my own edification, I do plan on running it for at least a week so I can monitor what's going on. How are 5090 stock levels there? They are drying up so quickly over here and back up to high pricing in rapid fashion.

Sorry to hear about your experience - having to send the SSD to Taiwan really sucks! BUT: At least TeamGroup is one of the companies that extends its warranty to people who buy their SSDs second hand while with others you get nothing when one of their SSDs break. At least this is the case over here for companies like Corsair, Crucial, Lexar and Samsung. The best case would be owner agnostic warranty in combination with a service address in the country where the drive was purchased. I think that where I live (Germany) this may only apply to Seagate SSDs.

Only $4733,03 USD incl tax. Not bad Asus. Why not let the retail break $5000 ? Or is it only for the Gold Edition cards? Don't forget punch the "Notify Me" button. You may have a chance to support Asus with more of your hard earned money. https://videocardz.com/newz/asus-rog-matrix-platinum-rtx-5090-slips-to-late-november-at-e4099

Yup, I expected you wouldn't stand in line… Neither would I.

With Microcenter offering 9070xt reapers on the regular for $599.99 aka MSRP, that's the way to go for bang:buck. All other 9070xts have dropped in price including the mighty Asrock Taichi down to $679.99 and Sapphire Nitro+ regularly down to $719.99. Plus Newegg has added black friday protection to Asrock cards even at $679.99 for the Taichi and $619.99 for the Steel so I am expecting even further price drops probably to $649.99 for black friday on the Taichi and $599.99 for the Steel. The gains in RT and FSR are very very good for AMD. They are here to play and with early reports of next gen GPUs showing a major architecture overhaul again with UDNA on the level of their move to RDNA. AMD is competing very well right now with the 5070ti on down with their stack. Of course AMD continues to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and those series of micro failures keep them from capturing the mindshare from Nvidia fans. Nvidia has its issues, but it continues to deliver on most fronts including the most important, performance and AMD is not afforded the luxury of Nvidia missteps like Intel to finally conquer. Steve went on a little too long about it but the points are sound. Ray tracing is definitely the future along with DLSS making massive inroads but I'm afraid so is FG but if Nvidia can make the same performance increases like they did with RT then FG may reach a day where it has zero latency penalty. If we reach that point, I welcome it too. As for the connector, unfortunately it is here to stay. All we can hope for is line protection/balancing mechanisms enacted to keep them balanced properly on both ends. I look forward to my WV2 Pro. I'm thinking of picking up the Asrock 1600w on sale that is populated with not only 2x 12v-2x6 connectors but also 8x 8 pin PCIe connectors. $199.99 is a good price. It also has Newegg's black friday protection I said it before and I'll say it again. 🙂 5090FE is a SFF engineering marvel but that's where it ends. In every other category I'm going any other card and depending on SFF size you can even fit an Astral in there but the perfect compromise is the Ventus 5090. Coming off an Astral, I literally opened the box to check if it was in there when we left MC because it was so much smaller and lighter and a true 3 slot card vs the Astral and the Vanguard which is similar in size to the Astral. But the Jonsbo Z20 can fit all of them in a mATX SFF form factor. Well, depending on games especially with RT the 5080 can definitely provide a tangible uplift. Even if you wait for the Supers the 5080 and 5070ti aren't really getting a legit performance uplift just an increase in tdp which you can do on just about any 5080 flashing the astral vbios (sans 5080FE). Checking Newegg, the only 5080 they have with Black Friday price protection is the PNY 5080 which is already down to $999.99. This will probably drop to $899.99 or $849.99 for Black Friday so you would be refunded the difference from NE if you're looking to minimize your "cost to play" with something new and better. But I can completely see holding onto your 7900xtx which is nice and blocked up already running the Aqua vBIOS. As much as I loved that Astral, it had to go back for almost $3600 after tax. Waiting paid dividends and I snagged this Vanguard for $1971 open box and even that is a stupid amount of money for a GPU so I get the cost factor too but the uplift from your 7900xtx, especially in RT, would be massively substantial.

Going into winter, I may have some extra time, and was thinking I needed something new to bench 🤷‍♂️ Of course I could always go the route of @Papusan and grab some old cards. That's the problem with hardware geeks, in order to have something new and shiny you have to spend an arm and a leg. Unfortunately this below isn't much of an upgrade. Only a 5090 would be.

Aside from hideous thermals (especially insane hotspot) the 9070 XT was indeed a great value for budget-restricted gamers if it could be purchased for within $100 of the correct price. It was so-so at overclocking. Where it really shines brightest over all other previous Radeon GPUs is ray tracing. It jumped AMD from abject failure to 3090 ray tracing levels in a single bound. Before the 9070 XT this was AMD's most severe shortcoming in terms of image fidelity. When ray tracing first became a popular talking point I considered it a gimmick, but now my opinion is the exact opposite. I think it is the biggest visual enhancement in graphics fidelity in over a decade and I wouldn't be nearly as satisfied without it. A real game-changer (pun intended). The kind of thing where you don't know what you've got until its gone. Whenever I play games that lack ray tracing it is immediately evident and they feel very cartoonish. and similarly insane... I called this out as soon as I saw it: proprietary, fragile, modular piece of crap with no service parts. Absolute rubbish FE GPU. NVIDIA is replacing the GPU for damage control reasons, not because they care. If they cared they would not have produced a piece of garbage.

That is entirely possible if the colored plastics have a lower melting point. The conventional black plastic connectors are something close to 200°C if my understanding is accurate. Per Google Gemini: https://gemini.google.com/share/1bef51d272b8 The housing for both the conventional 12VHPWR and its minor revision, the 12V-2x6 connector, is typically made of a glass fiber-filled thermoplastic 🌡️ Material and Flammability Rating The connector plug housing is required to be made out of glass fiber-filled thermoplastic. This material is specified to meet the UL 94 V-0 classification for flame retardancy. 🔥 Melting Point The melting point of the plastic is not a commonly published specification, as the critical thermal consideration is the maximum operating temperature the plastic can withstand before deformation or failure. However, related testing provides some context: The notorious connector melting issues reported with the 12VHPWR connector were primarily caused by poor or partial seating of the connector pins, leading to high electrical resistance, excessive heat generation, and subsequent melting of the plastic. The material is designed to handle the heat generated under normal, proper operating conditions. Some third-party solutions aimed at protecting the connector have been designed to shut down power if the temperature near the connector reaches around 110°C—this suggests that temperatures significantly higher than this, caused by a fault (like an improperly seated cable), are enough to cause the plastic to melt or fail. For reference, the melting point of the lead-free solder often used in manufacturing is around 232°C, which is significantly higher than the reported plastic failure temperatures. The connector's pins heat up due to resistance, and that heat then causes the surrounding plastic to melt. The high temperature that leads to melting is generally due to thermal runaway caused by poor contact and extremely high current density in a small area, rather than an inherent weakness of the plastic under its rated operating temperature. The article below discusses the issues with the 12VHPWR connector, including contradicting specs and corner-cutting, which led to the reported melting issues. 12VHPWR is a Dumpster Fire | Investigation into Contradicting Specs & Corner Cutting

I doubt it will happen. It might, but I would not hold my breath. If it does it will probably be priced like a 4090 and have 100°C hotspot temps.

Then see if you can find an open box with 5080 for around $800-825. Not a penny above. Or even better like $750-775. That is closer to what it's worth.

I should just sell both of my monster computers locally for about $5K each and be done with PCs, LOL. None of these parts are worth buying at current prices. It feels almost like part of the evil plan to make us all "own nothing and be happy" whether we like it or not. @Raiderman had better snag a 5080 now and not wait for the "Super" version that will likely sell for 5090 prices, or maybe even more.

5090 Stock is severely drying up and base prices are up These are all sold and shipped by vs BB and Egg having their "marketplace" BS. BB is new to the game but they need to have an option to tick "Sold and shipped by BB" as you have to now wade through everything to find which models are sold by them. MC has 4 models in stock. Cheapest = $2999.99 Egg has 4 models in stock. Cheapest = $2849.99 BB has 3 models in stock. Cheapest = $2999.99 Amazon is all over the map as always. Cheapest = $2649.99 (Master) I'm sure those Masters will sell out just like they did on BB. If anyone is in the market for a 5090 atm, sooner than later is at hand.... --- Memory prices are absolutely bonkers stupid right now. So glad I bought that backup set of Kingspec 8400 M die 2x24GB sticks in June on the recommendation of @Mr. Fox for $140. They're actually a hair better than my TG 2x24GB 8200 sticks I picked up in July 2024 for $278.99 which are now $329.99..... The Patriot 8200 sticks I bought and returned because they couldn't even do 8000 without erroring out on TM5 were $189.99 and now are $274.99. --------------------------------------- Just placed my order for the WireView Pro II. Only FedEx is available for S&H no DHL so this should be fun when it eventually ships..... I'll switch my wiring up then to bottom run cable versus the top/over style I use now since the Vanguard uses the normal clip (non reverse) WV2

I wonder how many that had melted connectors were installed in challenging situations where space was abnormally limited and smart cable management was either very difficult or even impossible. We never know the entire story behind the photos and YouTube videos. User error includes choosing to install the GPU in an environment where its survival is unlikely. The examples of Radeon GPUs with melted connectors really dispel the notion that it was due to excessive load because those GPUs are incapable of drawing more power than the cables and connectors can handle.

This really makes you think with everything done right, and oodles of power slammed through the connection, it is just fine. I would say it is human error coupled with potential QC, but I also believe after the 4090, OEMs/AIBs definitely test their connectors under high stress conditions including MSI. I also still stand by the fact lighter colored connectors will show scorch marks much easier than black connectors and to see if a black connector is degrading you will need to either get it to a point of melting and/or have the actual pins scorched too. I would posit that there are probably equal parts black connectors scorched out there as there is lighter color connectors. You just can't detect it as easily with the naked eye. I do not subscribe to the "yellow tip disaster" theory quite yet. We are talking anecdotal meets the potentially lowest level of confidence. It just doesn't fly. I do subscribe to the "a very small segment of connectors in general burn but we just quite don't know why yet" theory which applies to both Nvidia and AMD cards that have adopted this connector and includes MSIs cables along with other ones. In that line of questioning and wondering about cable/tentacle QC, how many founders edition 5090s / RTX 6000 pros have burnt up using the supplied Nvidia adapter cable? You would think their adapters would be the gold standard in all of this....

As Yzonker said.... Yep, I've run 10 amps in games without issue. Connector still runs around 40C on both ends at that power level. I've run 800w continuous which is probably 11 amps or so. That's about as high as I let it go. There's no meaningful performance beyond that anyway. Then we have this I posted above.... The average (gamer) Joe can easly run +12.6A for daily gaming without knowing the connector is out of specs. Pair it with the yellow Tip disaster (most likely China knock-off) and some will smell the smoke from their tight packed slimy slim pc box. And guess... I'm sure some will run above 12.6A on some pins. Weeks after weeks if lucky. And modern pc boxes with less than adequate cooling won't give them any benefits when the tiny trash Nvidia prefer start running out off specs. Without monitoring the different power pins you will never ever see how bad it is. Yup, there is different computer users out there... And 5080/5090 cards isn't only for PC enthusiasts. All sorts of people buy high end if they have the money and want the best of the best.

#1 with a 9950X, nice!

The curse of Frank Azor. Congratulations AMD. You really found yourself a winner.

It is definitely a specification engineering flaw and inherently defective design and not an NVIDIA defect. Any company stupid enough to use it is going to have burnt and melted wiring and connectors just because it's trash. The only thing we can blame NVIDIA for is being the stupid bastards that made this defective piece of crap the new normal.

I think the temptation will be easier for me because I have worked from home as a "virtual office employee" since 2002. I've never worked from an office in all of those years, although I used to have to travel extensively and excessively. Thankfully that ended about 7 years ago. Now I just stay home all the time. I never go anywhere and I don't want to. My compute is walking from my breakfast stool in the kitchen to my desk in the office. About 30 feet one way. There is no "stopping by" anywhere on the way home. It's both a blessing and a curse. I'm so used to staying home all the time I never want to go anywhere, LOL. The hour drive to Micro Center will be a massive pain in the butt. There won't be any impulsive shopping as long as I don't just go there for the heck of it. After about 13 years of 75% overnight travel and only being home one or two days a week, I don't like driving even 30 minutes to go do something anymore. (Mrs. Fox finds that pretty annoying and boring, but she hasn't forgotten my absence 5 to 6 days a week for many years ) All that being said, I'm sure if I have something specific I want to buy I will be more than happy to waste 2 hours of my life driving back and forth to get better pricing and a better warranty, no shipping and the overall better Micro Center experience. I'm going to like not having to purchase almost everything online anymore. That always sucks.

I would love it if this works and we could make our own drivers for Windows 7 on whatever modern hardware we choose to run.

Interesting....

I use 2x Kingston CSODIMM 32 GB DDR5-6400 with no problems - bought them for about 110€ per stick, now 180€. But still cheaper than buying from Dell. 64GB is enough for me. Not sure how many sellers are offering 2x 64 GB CSoDimm - IIRC Crucial announced that.

my Honeywell PTM7950 grease its about to run out. its ebuy7 like many different sellers or just one seller am trying not to get a fake one. the link i used to buy mine no longer works.

This is the case with most displays, but in these systems, the HDMI port is hard-wired to the dGPU and not the iGPU. (Unless you bought an iGPU-only system and it has the DGFF spacer card installed, whose purpose is to basically route the signal from the HDMI port to the iGPU.) So, connecting a display to the HDMI port will always cause the dGPU to engage.

Haha, sorry, I didn't remember how rough that draft was. My plan is to : 1) make hi res photo of both connectors to show what is connected, show starting orientation and enumerate pins we need 2) make some simple schematic in KiCAD to better show what connect to what (instead of printed sketched paper ^_^) Would that be better to make mod yourselves ?

I watched this earlier. I think I'm going to order one too. I really like the design, approach and refinements since the 1.0 variants. Much better than Ampinel and with a warranty that will extend to your card.

Remembering the early days of ssd when everybody needed valium before powering up their machine ? The fear of 'using up' their 2500$ drive after 1\2 hour of writes :O) Amazing longevity for some components, my e7440's 15+ years old 256 msata (C:\ OS), 92% life left, 13700 power on's, and never a hickup.