RTX 4090 literally melts as power cable fails

The RTX 4090 uses a brand-new 16-pin power cable. However, one user has reported that their GPU suffered a melting power connector and cable while gaming.

Redditor reggie_gakill suffered a nasty surprise after his RTX 4090 began to burn up during a gaming session. The Redditor posted pictures of the RTX 4090, along with a melted power cable and connector. Reportedly, the GPU began coming up in smoke during a gaming session in Red Dead Redemption 2.

Reggie_gakill is not too happy with the result and will be RMA-ing the card back to the manufacturer. He also reports that the adapter was the issue, as the card still works, but the adapter appears to have completely failed.

The GPU being used was specifically a Gigabyte-made model, which had other issues with its power supplies which were reportedly exploding last year. However, the actual fault is likely to lie with Nvidia’s 16-pin to 4x 8-pin PCIe power adaptor.

Why did the power adaptor fail?

The 16-pin to 4x 8-pin power adaptor is large. On our 4090s, the adaptor sticks out so much that we can’t put the glass panel on our case on. The adaptor is rigid, but if you bent them, it could affect the power connector heavily.

From the images, it’s clear that the contact points of the adapter into the graphics card’s port were at fault. This indicates that there was a possible connection issue between the card and the adapter.

On the 4090 itself, you can see significant burns on the top row of the 16-pin power port. The adapter itself suffered much more damage, as it totally melted itself, rendering it unusable.

Also on the images, the GPU appears to have been mounted in a vertical position. If the cable was unsightly, it’s possible that the user attempted to bend the adapter. With so much current going through an adapter, this could have affected the contact of the pins, resulting in damage. The adaptor is rated to take up to 600w of power, and through such a small port, it’s simple to see how something like this could have happened.

The damage seems to tell the story of what went wrong. For those looking to avoid the same results, it might be worth investing in an ATX 3.0 power supply. This way, you avoid having to use the clearly fallible adaptor cable included with all RTX 4090 GPUs.