this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2023
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Safe to buy used gpu with one video out port broken? (lemmy.ml)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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As per title. It has 2 DP ports and one hdmi. One DP out is broken. I know I won't ever need al 3 ports so it's not an issue for me. Only thing is, I have no idea what the cause of the issue could be and if it could "spread" in the future to all ports and render the gpu unusable. Maybe if someone has had experience with this situation before and could chime in? Or if you know the usual causes of this issue and if they could likely worsen or that's unlikely.

Thanks

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's not safe. The fact that it's already broken, beyond repair, increases the risk that there is some other issue that you haven't noticed yet.

So you need to factor in that risk into your pricing of the card.

How much of a discount makes the risk worthwhile? That's up to you. But if this card dies, and you sell it for parts, how much are you left with on the hook for?

The types of faults that could lead to a port not working:

  1. Mechanical, the pins are mangled
  2. Electrical, there was an over voltage on the output, a fuses blown, a capacitor's blown. Visual inspection may be useful here
  3. Water damage, some moisture got into the system which caused shorts and other circuitry damage.
  4. Heat damage, the card has gotten too hot and suffered some component failures. Maybe there's caps blown elsewhere
  5. Bad solder, bad joins, manufacturing defect, there's some electrical fault caused by improperly applied soldering

Regardless, if you buy the board, you should tear it completely apart, do a full inspection of it, take good photos, clean everything, apply new thermal paste. Put it back together. And enjoy

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And get new pads.*

Can't forget that for the VRMs!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Great point!

If you have a volt meter check the voltage rails while you have it open

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Wow, thank you for the detailed response! Unfortunately I can't inspect the card before buying, so I'd have to take the risk. I'll ask the seller for how long the port has been broken and if he can pinpoint any particular events after which the port stopped working.