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Repair Specialist at KrisFix channel says that GeForce RTX 2080 Ti – one of the best video cards of 2018 – usually fails at the end of the service due to severe deformation during sagging.
A technician demonstrated this on a damaged RTX 2080 Ti, showing how the bottom of the GDDR6 memory modules can detach at their respective solder points on the PCB after years of use under severe bending.
It is assumed that it is because of this problem that the 2080 Ti models begin to fail more and more often. Even though they are 5 years old, the cards remain fully functional and many of them are resold as used when their previous owners upgrade to something newer and faster, like the RTX 4070.
Considering the root cause, in a few years you might even see this problem occur in the triple-slot RTX 30 and RTX 40 graphics cards, and the larger Radeon RX 6000 and 7000 won’t be immune either. An anti-sag bracket or vertical installation may be required to prolong the life of the graphics card.
Problem with RTX 2080 Ti related to the bottom of the memory modules GDDR6, closest to the PCIe x16 slot. The author says that this area of the PCB is subjected to the most PCB flex due to heavy GPU cooler solutions, which stresses the PCB and memory components in this area.
In addition to PCB bending in daily use, the thermal runaway of graphics card operation for many years under heavy sag conditions causes GDDR6 contact points to break as the curved PCB pulls on the memory chips in an undesirable manner.
The video shows a bent RTX 2080 Ti that seems to have failed due to the side effects of sagging. After removing the bottom three GDDR6 memory modules from the PCB, the user had oxidation problems on several chip contact points (BGA balls) coupled with bad solder joints on the PCB itself.
KrisFix was able to repair the damaged RTX 2080 Ti by successfully replacing the memory chips. However, the underlying issues are certainly a concern, as they continue to crop up in newer, larger, heavier graphics cards over the next few years as they age. This can be seen on RTX 40 and RX 7900 series cards with three slots weighing 1.5kg and above released in the last 6 months.
The best way to counter this problem is to buy an anti-sag bracket or mount the card vertically with a mount. Alternatively, and probably because card manufacturers realized this was a problem many years ago, many custom graphics cards now include “stand”which you can place under the video card to reduce the load.
Asus has a short kickstand for some cards, like MSI, Colorful, Galax, Gigabyte, PNY, and various other designs to support it.
It is important to prevent the PCB from bending and to operate the card perfectly straight if you want to extend the life expectancy. Otherwise, this could potentially lead to an early breakdown of the video card.
