GPU Repair - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / repair

author: BadeBhaiya
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 14, 2025, 10:52:01 am
content: Hello all, hope you're wellI have a Zotac NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB which has been lying broken for about a year. It doesn't power up when put in. It was supposed to be under warranty but the repair centre folk want me to physically bring it to them two towns over (I guess they don't want to deal with mail ins?). It also seems like they just give you another refurbished card when you approach them for warranty so I'm reallly not sure if I even want a card which will have other issues soon.Anyway, I have opened up mine, it seems like the 12V rail is shorted (PCIe 12V pin to GND). Could be a bad cap, could be anything. Any easy way of figuring this one out? Injecting current limited 1V or whatever and looking for alcohol evaporation?

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 14, 2025, 11:01:40 am
content: Almost certainly shorted power stage IC or MOSFET (depending on faulty rail) and more likely than not destroyed GPU chip or/and RAM as well.QuoteYou'll need one hell a lot of current for alcohol evaporation to work.

author: BadeBhaiya
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 14, 2025, 11:22:07 am
content: Quote from: wraper on June 14, 2025, 11:01:40 amAh man, didn't want to hear that but I half anticipated it anyway. Do you know of any way to confirm this (besides current injection and looking for heating)Anything less...fire hazard-ly let's say

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 14, 2025, 11:34:01 am
content: You can check RAM power rail resistance to GND. If it's almost short instead of tens to hundreds of ohms, then it's RAM VRM that failed (unless GPU blew up enough to short its RAM controller power rail). As of GPU Vcore, it should be less than 0.1 ohm normally AFAIK, so will be next to impossible to judge without a 4 wire resistance measurement. IR camera works great on other hand as it can catch a tiny temperature increase when injecting the voltage.

author: kripton2035
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 14, 2025, 12:28:00 pm
content: build yourself a shorty-with-disply (link in my signature) and you can pinpoint a 0.1mΩ short very precisely.

author: bte
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 15, 2025, 09:45:57 pm
content: If you don't know already, the Northridge Fix channel on youtube regularly deals with GPU repair. In some of his videos, he measures resistances of various voltage lines and mentions ballpark figures of what is acceptable. Here's one example from his latest video:https://youtu.be/2GWkGh-6MxA?t=122I know this is not the same as your card but the figures he talks about might be useful in diagnosing your card as well.However, his usual trick is using a thermal camera and injecting voltage so if you can get hold of one, that would most likely speed-up the diagnosis.

author: Haenk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2025, 09:32:01 am
content: Also check Northwestrepair on Youtube - lots and lots of GPU repair videos (while Northridge does all kinds of repairs).

author: coromonadalix
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2025, 09:44:05 am
content: @OP what make you think you're gonna have isssue(s) with an exchanged one .... just return it, be doneif you try to repair it, for sure you'll loose all the value left in it, and repairs could be costly or not, you need to send it to a repair ... get estimate .... time lost

author: MathWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 23, 2025, 02:34:51 am
content: Stuff like this is not easy to work on, from a soldering perspective. You should have a hotair gun, and even pre-heaters and/or bottom heaters. And it's so hard to get at some parts, and just finding where all the rails go, is hard. And there's so many little parts without clear labels or anything you can find online.I tried to diagnose 1 GPU, but in the end I only did more damage, by lifting traces/pads with test wires I had solder on. I suspect it core is toast, and tried to desolder it, but my hotair gun was not enough. At least I didn't seem to burn anything on the PCB.

author: mkinn
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 25, 2025, 04:22:01 am
content: Freeze spray will tell you with voltage injection which MOSFET/DRMosFet or other components are shorted, as well, but I'm with the last reply, send it to someone with LOTS of experience and EXPENSIVE hot air rework equipment so as not to RUIN it forever, IF it's even savable. I recommend Northwest repair, he's the best in the US. KrisFix in Germany is the best in the EU, but a little too far for shipping GPU's. They charge a diag fee plus shipping. If you want to avoid damage to the GPU or memory, solder an actualgroundedAWG14 wire to ANY V-core or memory inductor's output, and you can inject even more than the 0.7VDC or 1.3VDC that supplies the core or memory rail. You should check for shorts from 12V to the inductor's input as well as to GND. If you have a GOOD ESR meter, you can locate a bad high side mosfet quickly on any VRM for that kind of short. See Learn Electronics Repair channel on YouTube for more on that. Having said that, they're ~$100.00 on eBay, so...