Question What's your thoughts on the new RTX 4090 PCIe power cables melting?

[Hecticon]

Thoughts on new RTX 4090 PCIe cables melting?

 

[hotaru.hino]

The way I understand it is most of the industry experts say that it's user error. The connectors have to be firmly plugged in, otherwise not enough contact is made between the pins, which causes issues.

A major concern is it can be hard to tell if the plug is fully seated to be safe.

 

[Hecticon]

The way I understand it is most of the industry experts say that it's user error. The connectors have to be firmly plugged in, otherwise not enough contact is made between the pins, which causes issues.

A major concern is it can be hard to tell if the plug is fully seated to be safe.

Yeah i hope no one makes those silly mistakes.

 

[ohio_buckeye]

I kind of think that the cables could have been avoided altogether. Even my Corsair rmx 850 can provide 4 8 pin plugs. Instead of nvidia coming up with a proprietary connection why not just utilize more 8 pin plug inputs that are already an industry standard? One video that I saw a while back they said the 8 pin plugs went easily into the back of the nvidia cable with an audible click ,but that to plug the cable into the card there wasn’t an audible click and they just had to push and push as hard as they could and hope it was seated correctly.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Instead of nvidia coming up with a proprietary connection why not just utilize more 8 pin plug inputs that are already an industry standard?

To quote Johnny Guru:

First off, PCIe 5.0 and the 12VHPWR connector are not Intel spec. It was developed by the PCI-SIG for a spec sponsored by Nvidia and Dell. It appears in the Intel spec after the fact because Intel had to make it part of the spec since the PCI-SIG were requiring consumer to use the connector for powering graphics cards.

So no, it's not a proprietary plug. It's an industry standard. Yes it had sponsors, but so did basically every industry standard made in the past 20 years.

 

[ohio_buckeye]

Interesting. Just seems they could have used something known. If nothing else at least make it so there’s an audible click on each end when the cable seats so the user knows it is engaged.

 

[little_me]

Also as noted on GN youtube, where they were able to reproduce the melting issue, it requires more than not properly connected connector.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig2px7ofKhQ&t=1467s


namely, connector has to barely make contact AND has to be bent really heavily for it to happen.
only either one of those two wont cause it to happen, you need BOTH.

the main problem with connector is that unless it's in place and locking mechanism has locked, slight back and forth wiggling, like when you do cable management, can cause connector to wiggle out.
so while it is 100% user error, the connector could/should have had some better safety features so that loose connector wouldn't draw/deliver power.