AMD has simply joined Nvidia within the unenviable membership of graphics playing cards with burned energy connectors, with studies that an AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT graphics card’s energy socket has melted underneath load. Whereas Nvidia GPUs have confronted scrutiny on this concern up till now, that is the primary time a card with a brand new AMD GPU has demonstrated the identical concern.
The cardboard in query is an ASRock Taichi OC 9070 XT, which we examined for our AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT evaluate, and which we discovered to be extraordinarily energy hungry when its overclocked mode is enabled. In contrast to many playing cards primarily based on AMD GPUs, this one additionally makes use of a 16-pin 12VHPWR connector, which is similar socket present in all of the melted RTX 5090 tales, with a 3x PCIe 8-pin adapter equipped within the field.
The story of this burned RX 9070 XT plug got here by way of Reddit, the place consumer Savings_Opportunity3 posted within the r/radeon subreddit about their failed connector. Posting a month in the past that the 12VHPWR port on their ASRock RX 9070 XT appeared a bit blackened, they up to date Reddit with information that the port had lastly melted since.
Regardless of reader issues about utilizing an inexpensive 700W energy provide, the Redditor would not imagine this was the issue, given the RX 9070 XT’s low energy calls for. Nevertheless, in our personal checks, our Ryzen 7 7800X3D rig drew 525W from the mains with this graphics card operating at full load – just one graphics card has drawn extra energy, and that is the RTX 5090.
Even so, this Redditor’s PC solely used an AMD Ryzen 5 5700X3D CPU, with a TDP of 105W, so the ability provide should not have been pushed too onerous right here, however we might advocate utilizing no less than an 850W PSU with this graphics card, simply to be sure you have sufficient headroom. Both approach, even when the PSU is underpowered, it is unlikely to be the reason for the cable melting, which is extra more likely to be right down to an insecure connection between the plug and the socket.
Most AMD Radeon playing cards are designed to make use of customary 8-pin PCIe connectors for energy, however some third-party card producers have begun to make use of the one 16-pin 12VHPWR connector on playing cards with AMD GPUs, dropping from two or three energy cables to only one in consequence.
There have not been every other studies of burned RX 9070 XT energy connectors up till now, however we have seen loads of failed 12VHPWR ports throughout Nvidia GeForce RTX 40 and 50-series playing cards. When you’re planning to put in a graphics card with one in all these connectors, then be sure you triple-check that it is totally plugged in and safe earlier than you hit the ability change.
Neither AMD nor ASRock has publicly commented on this case thus far, however we’ll be hoping no additional AMD playing cards fail this manner. If you wish to keep away from the drama completely, you may be finest served by a card that makes use of customary PCIe 8-pin connectors as a substitute.
One high quality instance is the AMD Radeon RX 9070, which has a spot on our greatest GPU shopping for information, however you may also purchase Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 playing cards that use these older energy connectors.
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