Question Damaged PCIe 8-Pin - Hazard?

Feb 18, 2021
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I recently acquired an RTX 3080. However, it arrived with a damaged PCIe power connector - one of the pins inside the connector was damaged. Specifically, the top-right pin on one of the connectors. While I successfully inserted the 8-pin, this ended up embedding the connector deeper inside the slot (instead of the pin 'merging' into the hole in the 8-pin connector like it usually would). I'm not 100% sure, but I'm pretty sure that it's making contact with the metal receiver inside the 'male' connector - just not merging. I've tested the card with great results - it benchmarks pretty much exactly where an RTX 3080 should (it's a little on the low side, but I assume that's because I have a Ryzen 3600 CPU).

I took photos before attempting to insert the power connector and sent these to the retailer I purchased the card from, asking whether I should RMA the card (in my country, it's normal to RMA to the retailer, not directly to the company). The retailer stated that since the card worked fine, there was no need for an RMA.

Having done some research, it seems that the top-right pin is a Ground - one of three Grounds pins on the PCIe pinout. Specifically, the layout on a PCIe 8-pin is 3 Ground + 3 Voltage + 2 Sense.

Am I at any risk of damaging my GPU, PC, or potentially even starting a fire due to this pin damage? Or should I treat this as purely aesthetic? Any guidance would be greatly appreciated!

(I'm obviously somewhat disinclined to RMA the card, since I'd likely be without a GPU for weeks and weeks.)
 
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