Tearing Down the AMD RX 7900 XTX Reference GPU
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Date: 2022-12-13
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Comments and reviews: 15
Nitton
Something I have seen no one point out ever since we found out the layout of the components is the 4 ram chips between GPU and PCI-E.
RTX 2080ti has the same layout but only 3 out of 4 chips are soldered to the card.
But the most common failure mode on the RTX 2080ti from what I read is the fact that solder balls crack or even rip pads from the chips located at the PCI-E slot.
And its seems isolated to the chips between PCi-E and GPU and is probably due to the boards flexing.
There are many repair videos on YT from professionals on this and its a common failure mod so WHY AMD decided not to rotate the GPU/RAm 90 degrees to get the ram away from the point of most flex of the PCB I do not understand because they might and up with the same failure RTX 2080ti is suffering from.
I would be wary of 7900XT and XTX cards failing due to cracked solder joints and broken ram chips just like RTX 2080ti.
AMD reference card do seem to use a thick backplate and a frame BUT even my broken RTX 2080ti with this very fault has a thick dam backplate too and that did not save that card.
Maybe a board partner will make a 90 degree rotated GPU/ram to get away from this, but they might also not do that and also not stiffen up the cards enough and the cards might end up failing with cracked balls and ripper pads of the ram chips down the line.
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Something I have seen no one point out ever since we found out the layout of the components is the 4 ram chips between GPU and PCI-E.
RTX 2080ti has the same layout but only 3 out of 4 chips are soldered to the card.
But the most common failure mode on the RTX 2080ti from what I read is the fact that solder balls crack or even rip pads from the chips located at the PCI-E slot.
And its seems isolated to the chips between PCi-E and GPU and is probably due to the boards flexing.
There are many repair videos on YT from professionals on this and its a common failure mod so WHY AMD decided not to rotate the GPU/RAm 90 degrees to get the ram away from the point of most flex of the PCB I do not understand because they might and up with the same failure RTX 2080ti is suffering from.
I would be wary of 7900XT and XTX cards failing due to cracked solder joints and broken ram chips just like RTX 2080ti.
AMD reference card do seem to use a thick backplate and a frame BUT even my broken RTX 2080ti with this very fault has a thick dam backplate too and that did not save that card.
Maybe a board partner will make a 90 degree rotated GPU/ram to get away from this, but they might also not do that and also not stiffen up the cards enough and the cards might end up failing with cracked balls and ripper pads of the ram chips down the line.
reply
Tommy
19:21 I wish gaming laptops would start to receive aftermarket attention and get such giant coolers to enable gaming laptops upgrades and tuning.
This relies on gaming laptop manufacturers to build them accordingly so that the GPU and CPU are much closer to the desktop versions in terms of construction and components used.
99% of us gaming laptop users aren't using them on planes or trains or during a commute, but are using them at home then at the hotel and ten at another hotel, plugged in. So we don't care much about the form factor, as the laptop will be taken with a backpack or inside the luggage. Having a thick cooling area protuding won't be an issue quite a benefit because as it is right now, gaming laptops are recommended to have the rear suspended for better airflow.
And as usage, with the stock cooling the laptop to be using similar level of performance as current gaming laptops offer (or future development), but when you plug in an aftermarket serious large cooling like at the caption time, to open up a boost menu and really unlock the potential, with clock speeds etc..
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19:21 I wish gaming laptops would start to receive aftermarket attention and get such giant coolers to enable gaming laptops upgrades and tuning.
This relies on gaming laptop manufacturers to build them accordingly so that the GPU and CPU are much closer to the desktop versions in terms of construction and components used.
99% of us gaming laptop users aren't using them on planes or trains or during a commute, but are using them at home then at the hotel and ten at another hotel, plugged in. So we don't care much about the form factor, as the laptop will be taken with a backpack or inside the luggage. Having a thick cooling area protuding won't be an issue quite a benefit because as it is right now, gaming laptops are recommended to have the rear suspended for better airflow.
And as usage, with the stock cooling the laptop to be using similar level of performance as current gaming laptops offer (or future development), but when you plug in an aftermarket serious large cooling like at the caption time, to open up a boost menu and really unlock the potential, with clock speeds etc..
reply
Kayaala
Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
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Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
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Daniel
Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
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Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
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Clare
Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
reply
Steve, let me tell you a story about screws. If you think its easy to strip out those screws, you haven't changed brake rotors on a honda. At first glance, the rotor is screwed in using 2 phillips screws. Firstly, WHY, when the lugnuts and eventually, rust, hold the rotor in place. Second, they aren't phillips screws even though they look like it, in fact, they are JIS (japanese industry standard) screws. Not a single other screw in the entire car uses this style if phillips screw. Not only does the screw eventually corrode and rust to the rotor itself, making it literally impossible to take out (even with an impact), it is super easy to strip it by not having a japanese screw driver! WHY! The only solution for me was to literally hammer the bit with a regular phillips impact bit while also spraying it with rust remover. After about 15 minutes per screw per wheel...they came out. Funny enough, they are also called CrossPoint screws.
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MrArrmageddon
I'm not an Nvidia fanboy. But about eight years ago I switched away from AMD. I've already bough a 4080. I may go AMD again I take it on a gen per gen basis. But I admit I've watched this video as well as the benchmarks for the RX 7900 XTX. It's a beast of a GPU. And great value. Ray Tracing and Frame Gen are features I like. SO I'm happy I went with the 4080. And one positive of the oversized 4080 is that they are silent and have amazing thermals. And finally have better per Watt performance then a 7900 XTX. And yes wattage is very important to me. But the 24GB of Video Ram and 200 lower cost as well as some other things mean that the 7900 XTX is a really good GPU in my opinion. And it's a lot smaller then the 4080!
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I'm not an Nvidia fanboy. But about eight years ago I switched away from AMD. I've already bough a 4080. I may go AMD again I take it on a gen per gen basis. But I admit I've watched this video as well as the benchmarks for the RX 7900 XTX. It's a beast of a GPU. And great value. Ray Tracing and Frame Gen are features I like. SO I'm happy I went with the 4080. And one positive of the oversized 4080 is that they are silent and have amazing thermals. And finally have better per Watt performance then a 7900 XTX. And yes wattage is very important to me. But the 24GB of Video Ram and 200 lower cost as well as some other things mean that the 7900 XTX is a really good GPU in my opinion. And it's a lot smaller then the 4080!
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Tyler
There's no thermal pads on the back at all, that's terrible!! I guarantee these cards will fail 2 to 3 years within its lifecycle if someone does mid to heavy gaming. MOSFETS may generally have a TJ of 125, you really don't want to run them over 100C on sustained loads. This is a very common failure for modern cards that don't have proper thermal solutions with a backplate
Personally, i like having the stickers on the screws, because it tells me right away if someone has worked on the board, but I'm glad they're moving away from SOME of their greasy practices
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There's no thermal pads on the back at all, that's terrible!! I guarantee these cards will fail 2 to 3 years within its lifecycle if someone does mid to heavy gaming. MOSFETS may generally have a TJ of 125, you really don't want to run them over 100C on sustained loads. This is a very common failure for modern cards that don't have proper thermal solutions with a backplate
Personally, i like having the stickers on the screws, because it tells me right away if someone has worked on the board, but I'm glad they're moving away from SOME of their greasy practices
reply
Pandas
If the 4080 is a 700 like like 80 cards in the past. We wouldn t even think about an Amd card with the same performance at 999. And telling ourselves it s a deal when we are still losing as a customer. In today market a 4080 shouldn t make us think we are getting a deal when compared to another card that s at 999. Now if Amd did the 7900xtx at 700 like nividia 80 cards in the past that would break the internet.
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If the 4080 is a 700 like like 80 cards in the past. We wouldn t even think about an Amd card with the same performance at 999. And telling ourselves it s a deal when we are still losing as a customer. In today market a 4080 shouldn t make us think we are getting a deal when compared to another card that s at 999. Now if Amd did the 7900xtx at 700 like nividia 80 cards in the past that would break the internet.
reply
blue-steel
I miss the external vent cards. Used to have 2 140mm fans blowing up from the bottom of my case right into the card that ten exhausted outside the case. Then I would have the front fans also blowing forward and the graphics card size would kinda create a natural block where half the front fans just blew into the upper part of the case and either out the rear fan behind the cpu or up and out the top fans.
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I miss the external vent cards. Used to have 2 140mm fans blowing up from the bottom of my case right into the card that ten exhausted outside the case. Then I would have the front fans also blowing forward and the graphics card size would kinda create a natural block where half the front fans just blew into the upper part of the case and either out the rear fan behind the cpu or up and out the top fans.
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Hunter
I miss the external vent cards. Used to have 2 140mm fans blowing up from the bottom of my case right into the card that ten exhausted outside the case. Then I would have the front fans also blowing forward and the graphics card size would kinda create a natural block where half the front fans just blew into the upper part of the case and either out the rear fan behind the cpu or up and out the top fans.
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I miss the external vent cards. Used to have 2 140mm fans blowing up from the bottom of my case right into the card that ten exhausted outside the case. Then I would have the front fans also blowing forward and the graphics card size would kinda create a natural block where half the front fans just blew into the upper part of the case and either out the rear fan behind the cpu or up and out the top fans.
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Tommy
11:59 EXCELENT mention.
Also:
- I would use some mat or something instead of the glass table
- i would keep around of those plastic trim removal tools instead of pulling with your hands. You know slowly pry open and not abusive torsion on the PCB
- i would keep around pliers and long thin picks or miniature screw drivers to help work out the tabs of the connectors in those tight spaces
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11:59 EXCELENT mention.
Also:
- I would use some mat or something instead of the glass table
- i would keep around of those plastic trim removal tools instead of pulling with your hands. You know slowly pry open and not abusive torsion on the PCB
- i would keep around pliers and long thin picks or miniature screw drivers to help work out the tabs of the connectors in those tight spaces
reply
spaz
So instead of making cooler running chips it's become a ridiculous race to overclock the most and enlarge the air cooling as much as possible? They used to make them moderately and leave it up to the end user to try and overclock if they want. I guess there was just too much profit in sucking up that sliver of value, and so now we get a space heater out of the box and no choice.
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So instead of making cooler running chips it's become a ridiculous race to overclock the most and enlarge the air cooling as much as possible? They used to make them moderately and leave it up to the end user to try and overclock if they want. I guess there was just too much profit in sucking up that sliver of value, and so now we get a space heater out of the box and no choice.
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Thomas
Can't wait to see a water block, overclock results. I hope the rumor isn't true about the hardware limitations of the die for frequency. I love to see people have options no matter the manufacturer. Personally already watercooled 4090 3ghz but.... Competition it's great! Intel just needs to step up the game for gen2
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Can't wait to see a water block, overclock results. I hope the rumor isn't true about the hardware limitations of the die for frequency. I love to see people have options no matter the manufacturer. Personally already watercooled 4090 3ghz but.... Competition it's great! Intel just needs to step up the game for gen2
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Krisz
Can anyone run an AI benchmark out of curiosity. I would be really glad to push NVidia off of its hegemony along with the insane pricing practice, and for that AMD definitely needs support, but if the difference gap is too great than I might have to reconsider this idea.
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Can anyone run an AI benchmark out of curiosity. I would be really glad to push NVidia off of its hegemony along with the insane pricing practice, and for that AMD definitely needs support, but if the difference gap is too great than I might have to reconsider this idea.
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Ganiscol
With all the two+ slot designs, I just wondered if current top of the line cards are in any way limited by PCIe bandwith and therefore could benefit from using that thickness by actually populating two slots for double the bandwith? Perhaps with older PCIe spec mobos?
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With all the two+ slot designs, I just wondered if current top of the line cards are in any way limited by PCIe bandwith and therefore could benefit from using that thickness by actually populating two slots for double the bandwith? Perhaps with older PCIe spec mobos?
reply
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