Gigabyte GTX460 SoC RMA

[chronidus]

I thought I would rack all your brains while my card is away for an RMA (ocuk).  I bought the card back in Nov 2010 and since then it has been running absolutely amazing.  However I recently got rid of my MSI-p67-C45 for a Z68 board from Asrock, the Z68 Pro3.  Upon installing the card into the motherboard and installing everything like you should do with a new motherboard ( aka fresh install of windows 7, drivers etc ).  I noticed that the score in the Windows 7 WEI was at 6.7.  Thinking nothing of it, I proceeded to try and play my games but unfortunately the performance of the card seemed to indicated that the WEI was indeed correct and I had lost a significant amount of performance.

I tried firstly reseating the card and then reseating the 6 Pin connectors at the end of the card, this actually caused the performance to go down to 5.5 according to the WEI and my games performance began to suffer even worse.  Figuring that the motherboard may be at fault, I sent the motherboard back to OCUK and bought a replacement MSI-p67-G45 (B3 stepping) as I knew I had no problems with the P67 chipset with this card.  However to my horror, the cards performance remained constantly low like with the Z68.  It was at this point that I figured that the card itself must be damaged in some way.  I checked the card for signs of damage but could not even find a scratch on the card.  I did notice that under any sort of graphical load, no matter how minor, the card exhibited a constant low pitch whine which disappeared when under just the desktop.  It sounded a lot like the noise a graphics card can make when it is under extreme stress.

I have had several suggestions on what it could be, the general consensus right now is that its suffering from weak/unstable voltage, not enough to kill the card but enough for the performance to degrade.  Another suggestion is that there was a compatibility problem with the Lucid Virtu software which has caused this particular problem.  The final suggestion is that the 6 Pin power connectors may be faulty and not supplying the full amount of power to the card to allow it to run at full speed.  Hopefully OCUK will determine the card is faulty and will issue a replacement card but if not, I will RMA it to you guys where I will hopefully have better luck.  Question is however, any idea what it could be, trust me when I say that I have tested this card in several different machines, all with decent PSU's and motherboards and the card exhibits the same problem in every PC I have put it in.

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome to the Gigabyte forum.

Obviously a bit of guesswork at this juncture but I would go fopr the fact that it maybe needs the firmware updated and the voltage tweaked.

[chronidus]

Could have the Lucid Virtu software have affected this then, it deals with switching off the dedicated card etc.  But anyway thank you, I will try that if they return it to me saying there's nothing wrong with the card.  Honestly however I cannot see them doing that, the consistent performance degradation of the card is pretty obvious and if it were me working there, I would consider the card faulty and issue a replacement.  I believe I am understanding where your coming from, are you saying its possible the bios on the card is corrrupt?

[Dark Mantis]

Yes possibly. I wouldn't hold out a lot of hope for a decent outcome from your retailer though as I have seen some of their work in the past.

[chronidus]

I know, I just want to get this card back up and running ASAP.  Without that graphic's card I am up crap creek without a paddle.  Sometime did suggest sending it directly to gigabyte and I probably will end up sending to Gigabyte providing they dont replace my card.  But I cannot be waiting months for the card to be repaired and will probably just end up buying a new card in a couple weeks time, maybe 2 weeks.  So you have dealt with OCUK RMA's before, why would you consider them bad?....have they refused to replace obviously faulty cards?

~Update: I have read some old re views of OCUK and well its quite shocking, honestly I have never had a problems with them before and I even RMA'd a motherboard to them before and they refunded me the full price of the motherboard.

[chronidus]

I see what you mean about OCUK's rma.  I contacted them today and they said they are in the process of testing the card.  I will know tomorrow but by the tone, im guessing its going to come back as @No Fault Found@ and they will charge me for RMAing it.  So question, when I get the card back, where can I grab the bios for this card and how can I flash it?

[Dark Mantis]

If there is a new BIOS available for this card it should be on the website for download.