XFX SLI GFX Cards Failure - HELP NEEDED - read if you have XFX

[Frunk]

Yup folks... 2x PCIe XFX GeForce 6800 Ultras up the tubes. Had them running in SLI, ocassionally SLI would crash or wobble badly. Then when I popped in the DFI mobo (rather than the ASUS one) one card collapsed completely, when I was filling in the online support to try and RMA it the other one started artifacting and was dead within a couple of hours.

Changes made to cards: Changed thermal paste to Arctic Silver - slapped on a Danger Den 6800 GPU waterblock. Memory was self advesive OCZ copper fins - air cooled. The cards were not modded, BIOS hacked or even overclocked... yet! Cards were reading 35-41 degrees when they died

So questions to folks... anyone heard of such nastiness? Any reasons?

Anyone think the Arctic Silver could be to blame?

No physical damage to cards - heat sinks were screwed down as per Danger Den instructions - 50% spring compression, screw them down like a car tyre

And finally AND MOST IMPORTANT... as I need to try and RMA them to get new ones..., a long and convoluted business I need to make them EXACTLY like they were when I received them. If anyone has a 6800 family XFX card can you look on the back. One of the RAM heatsink screws has a red blob on the spring on it... which screw????

I reckon this is maybe how they check whether they have been tampered with and I do not want to give them a reason to leave me high and dry with £800 of buggered gfx card.

I am not having much luck with this new machine... sob! This is the first time in 20 years of buiding computer kit that I have had so many failures - but i will persevere until it works.

Frunk

 

[Vrykyl]

ouch sounds expensive - its possible if you got AS on any part of the card other than the intended surfaces that youve shorted something...

 

[Phil Stanbridge]

Hello Frunk, so sorry to hear about this, what with the first chilly1 going up in smoke as well you havent had a lot of luck.

It does indeed sound like AS5 has spilt over onto the caps? Its quite common, and can cause instant failure - its conductive you see, and if it hits anything like a capacitor on the card then its almost instant death, you have to be so careful. The only other thing is maybe both cards were from the same batch?

 

[Frunk]

ouch sounds expensive - its possible if you got AS on any part of the card other than the intended surfaces that youve shorted something...

It will be if I don't succeed in an RMA

Nah... been applying the stuff for years. Its was only on the surface of the silicon and the surface of the smaller lump to the south of the main core (whatever that is) Not much in the way of "squidge" out the sides on inspection afterwards.

The only reason I asked is that I have never applied AS directly to the silicon core (which is what you get here) - its usually to the encapsulation. But I assume its pretty safe as other folks have done it lots.

I think it may just be extreme bad luck... again!

What i need is a visual inspection of a virgin card to check mine has been re-assembled exactly right

Frunk

 

[Frunk]

Hello Frunk, so sorry to hear about this, what with the first chilly1 going up in smoke as well you havent had a lot of luck.

It does indeed sound like AS5 has spilt over onto the caps? Its quite common, and can cause instant failure - its conductive you see, and if it hits anything like a capacitor on the card then its almost instant death, you have to be so careful. The only other thing is maybe both cards were from the same batch?

Nah - nothing like that - its all clear of AS - first thing I checked. And I think it would have failed weeks beforehand. And it would not have failed quite so gently

The cards were sequential serial numbers so it could be just a very bad batch.

Yeah - this machine has been VERY hard work - slow progress. Hopefully it will be worth the effort - one day!

Frunk

 

[fatty]

Sorry to hear mate when I rma'd my x800 it was bios hacked to 16 pipes and it had a cracked core also a lot of the ink markings had been removed as I covered the card in dialetic grease and then had to clean it all off but I still got a new card in return

 

[Master_G]

Sucks to be left like that, good luck with the RMA.

What happened to the chilly1?

G

 

[Frunk]

Sucks to be left like that, good luck with the RMA.

What happened to the chilly1?

G

Yeah - the conversation here made me think about flushing the card totally with solvent to get rid of any conductive residue that may have been left behind with one of the previous washes when cleaning off the Ceramique - I reckoned that was not conductive so I did not flush it all away as well as I could have. No harm in trying... so I will see how that goes.

The Chilly1 I have back - a brand new one replaced by Phil. He got the cash to replace it from my house contents insurance! There is this little clause I noticed that said I was covered for "accidental damage to computer equipment". Put in the claim and they sent me the cash within the week! Okay I lost my no claims bonus - but that was £10... not much compared to a new Chilly1

So if these GFX cards do not get replaced under RMA because "I damaged them" there is an alternative route to get them replaced using insurance as I certainly did not damage them on purpose - and by definition I must have "damaged them accidentally"

So far I have done 2 motherboard replacements and the new Chilly 1 is still chugging - and getting colder! I did nothing less to it than I did last time but have had no problems. I think i was just unlucky last time.

Regards,

Frunk

 

[Frunk]

It does indeed sound like AS5 has spilt over onto the caps? Its quite common, and can cause instant failure - its conductive you see, and if it hits anything like a capacitor on the card then its almost instant death, you have to be so careful.

Actually it is not that bad... from their site:

[font=verdana, arial, helvetica]Not electrically conductive.[/font]

[font=verdana, arial, helvetica]Arctic Silver 5 was formulated to conduct heat, not electricity.[/font]

[font=verdana, arial, helvetica](While much safer than electrically conductive silver and copper greases, Arctic Silver 5 should be kept away from electrical traces, pins, and leads. While it is not electrically conductive, the compound is very slightly capacitive and could potentially cause problems if it bridges two close-proximity electrical paths.)[/font]

So it could cause the artifacting and strangeness but unlikley to kill a card outright!

Nice fact to know.

Frunk

 

[Phil Stanbridge]

hmmm very interesting thanks for the link; actually that goes against everything I have been told about AS5..

 

[Psykotik]

I was gonna say something earlier, but was browsing (naughty!) at work.

It's capacitive, which means it can store up electrickery and then fzap your components, which does have the same effect (I've ********ed an Athlon Mobile with some AS5)

Edit: Weee! Senior member at last!

 

[Vrykyl]

yup - wont bridge something instantaneously...but give it time and itl bugger stuff up nicely

 

[Frunk]

yup - wont bridge something instantaneously...but give it time and itl bugger stuff up nicely

Yup and to this end I decided I would try and wash one of the GFX cards in electrical solvent. Went over it with a cotton bud, lint free cloth and enough environment destroying chemicals to create a new hole in the ozone layer above Aberdeen.

Re-assembled the heat sinks and popped it in the machine.

Success!!!!

Yup - ressurected one of the cards.

So from discussion here (thanks for all your help folks) and my own observations it looks like the following happened:

As I twice cleaned off heat sink compound I did not do a thorough enough job and I had accidentally created a fine film of the stuff. Some of it may well have built up under the chips - a pretty inaccessable place unless you can squirt A LOT of electrical solvent cleaner around the back. This film had built up a slightly conductive/capacitive affect that fritzed the card...

However the effect was not bad enough to permanently damage the card and some thorough washing cleared away the problem.

Now to see if I can save the other card! <<<update - nope - still no output Well 1 out of 2 is not bad>>>

HUZZAAAHHH! About time I had a break - but this one was my fault, I now realise.

So this will go down in the annals of history... you don't often manage to "fix" a graphics card. However I do feel sorry for the ozone layer - slightly more difficult to fix

Frunk

 

[Phil Stanbridge]

Congrats on fixing the 1 card mate, that doenst happen all that often. Its a massive learning experience all this isnt it. Unfortunately its a very expensive learning curve as well.

 

[Frunk]

Congrats on fixing the 1 card mate, that doenst happen all that often. Its a massive learning experience all this isnt it. Unfortunately its a very expensive learning curve as well.

Yeah - you live and learn!

At least now I can start OCing the memory/CPU and hopefully at some point the second card will turn up to start getting some good 3Dmarks - PI tio 4 milluion places is not so useful

However I have been trying to contact XFX but their support so far seems pitiful! Anyone dealt with them before? Got a secret phone number that actually works?

Alex