Sloppy QA on 2070s

dave343

[H]ard|Gawd
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QA was asleep the day my card was manufactured...

Did a repaste while I had it off... man did they go cheap on the thermal paste, repasted with AS5.

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I'm sure it could happen to any manufacturer, but in my experience Gigabyte hasn't been that great in the last few years in my experience, so much so they made me shift to MSI....
 
I'm sure it could happen to any manufacturer, but in my experience Gigabyte hasn't been that great in the last few years in my experience, so much so they made me shift to MSI....

yeah, I’m sure every manufacture has their issues here and there... just annoying but resolvable. At least it gave me the chance to repaste. I will say the heatsink is super easy to remove.
 
You do realize they don't inspect every card that goes through, correct?
 
ok, but they do plug in and test every card... so a quick visual inspection is off the table?


they plug it in, some lights turn on, it passes to the next station. that's all they do. they don't actually test whether it boots or any of that crap. my recommendation is watch the factory tour stuff gamers nexus did, you'll start to get an appreciation for when you actually receive a working card.
 
they plug it in, some lights turn on, it passes to the next station. that's all they do. they don't actually test whether it boots or any of that crap. my recommendation is watch the factory tour stuff gamers nexus did, you'll start to get an appreciation for when you actually receive a working card.

I'll check that video out... testing process sounds a little more scary than I had originally thought... I figured they tested each card fully, eg; booting it into some sort of testing software.
 
First of all, that doesn't look like an FE. You have to be more specific if you're going to dunk on a manufacturer.

Secondly, those are thermal pads, not "paste." Thermal pads don't stick to anything, so I imagine an automated assembly line might fudge this up every once in a while.

Thirdly, misaligned thermal pads like that are not going to have a discernible effect on the card's performance.

Fourthly, if there is now a problem with the card good luck trying to get a RMA after taking it apart.
I'll check that video out... testing process sounds a little more scary than I had originally thought... I figured they tested each card fully, eg; booting it into some sort of testing software.
That would take forever. Nothing scary about it. Electronics have vulnerabilities to be concerned about, but they're not as fragile as many people believe. I think you will be more shocked by how rough they handle the cards on the assembly line than you will be by the testing process.
 
First of all, that doesn't look like an FE. You have to be more specific if you're going to dunk on a manufacturer.

Secondly, those are thermal pads, not "paste." Thermal pads don't stick to anything, so I imagine an automated assembly line might fudge this up every once in a while.

Thirdly, misaligned thermal pads like that are not going to have a discernible effect on the card's performance.

Fourthly, if there is now a problem with the card good luck trying to get a RMA after taking it apart.

That would take forever. Nothing scary about it. Electronics have vulnerabilities to be concerned about, but they're not as fragile as many people believe. I think you will be more shocked by how rough they handle the cards on the assembly line than you will be by the testing process.

1) Gigabyte
2) When I said they were cheap on the thermal paste, I meant just that. Thermal paste, the stuff that's applied on the GPU, hence why I stated I would do a re-paste *while I had the cooler off*. I'm quite aware that thermal paste and pads are two different things ;) And as for the misaligned pads during an automated process, ok I can buy that (but thought each card was individually checked for quality, guess not)
3) I never stated misaligned pad's would create any issue.
4) I don't believe taking the card apart voids the warranty, I thought GPU manufactures abandoned that practice. If not, ok then.
 
First of all, that doesn't look like an FE. You have to be more specific if you're going to dunk on a manufacturer.

Secondly, those are thermal pads, not "paste." Thermal pads don't stick to anything, so I imagine an automated assembly line might fudge this up every once in a while.

Thirdly, misaligned thermal pads like that are not going to have a discernible effect on the card's performance.

Fourthly, if there is now a problem with the card good luck trying to get a RMA after taking it apart.

That would take forever. Nothing scary about it. Electronics have vulnerabilities to be concerned about, but they're not as fragile as many people believe. I think you will be more shocked by how rough they handle the cards on the assembly line than you will be by the testing process.

Right, they just power-on. There are thousands of Built-in-self-tests going on just by applying power, before they turn on the light. The same as your computer performing POST (power-on self-test)

They only do complete lot testing for random samples in a shipment. If enough of those those pass your threshold for QC, you assume the rest do.
 
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Right, they just power-on. There are thousands of Built-in-self-tests going on just by applying power, before they turn on the light.

They only do complete lot testing for random samples in a shipment. If enough of those those pass your threshold for QC, you assume the rest do.

I didn't think they would boot each card into a Windows session, test some games etc... but yeah I thought forsure each card was tested for a few minutes with some software suite. I get everything is automated, but you're paying $1200+ for a 2080ti that wasn't even fully tested...? or checked over for defects.
 
I didn't think they would boot each card into a Windows session, test some games etc... but yeah I thought forsure each card was tested for a few minutes with some software suite. I get everything is automated, but you're paying $1200+ for a 2080ti that wasn't even fully tested...? or checked over for defects.

Nope, with the complexity of today's digital systems, it takes too long to perform complete tests on every piece of equipment built, and the test equipment is more complicated than ever, so building enough COMPLETE test units to handle testing at the rate on manufacture is simply impossible (for the price the consumer is willing to pay, anyway).

So they compromise and power it on, and assume that if you can see the light, a ton of components just passed a test in firmware.

That said, if it powers on, it's likely to work. This happens because they perform the same lot testing on the components used to build the video card PCB, so there's a high level of quality already n the chain of parts.

It's only when you have a mistake on your end or a misreported number in the chain of parts that you have QC problems. That is why every step in the process does lot testing.
 
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Gotta agree with Armenius and defaultluser, QA checks for the "basics" on every card (take that how you will), and a few additional cards are surely grabbed for additional QA checks, but you seem to have gotten one that slipped through.

I'd say good on you for the due diligence on spotting the misaligned thermal pads, and then digging deeper.

You got an oddity no doubt, it does happen, no mass manufacturing process like this is 100% perfect. If it were, and all cards were 100% tested in any way you could imagine before leaving X company, the cost of ALL the additional would absolutely be passed on to you, the consumer.

I work IT for a company that produces industrial valves, I see the cost of this 100% full function/verification everyday (for obvious reasons... the PSI running through these things... we do steam valves too *shudder*) trust me, we'd rather deal with a dud/missed QA oddity/the RMA process and save a few pennies overall :)

EDIT: clearly a different kind of market, but it still applies to an extent.
 
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That is common in any mass production facility. Same with failures. Lets say you produce 100 items and 10 fail QC (failure rate of 10% or greater in this case), the entire batch is condemned and basically thrown out or sold off for cheap, likely to a different brand or sold without warranty with a cheaper price tag. Stuff are tested in batches.

So yes, a defective item can and will slip through just like good product will be thrown out. In this case, it looks like the card works fine although the QC isn't superb on this particular item.
 
Right, they just power-on. There are thousands of Built-in-self-tests going on just by applying power, before they turn on the light.

They only do complete lot testing for random samples in a shipment. If enough of those those pass your threshold for QC, you assume the rest do.

AQL tables! Yeah, generally if you pass the threshold you do 100% inspection. Depends on the product cost of course... and customer.

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1) Gigabyte
2) When I said they were cheap on the thermal paste, I meant just that. Thermal paste, the stuff that's applied on the GPU, hence why I stated I would do a re-paste *while I had the cooler off*. I'm quite aware that thermal paste and pads are two different things ;) And as for the misaligned pads during an automated process, ok I can buy that (but thought each card was individually checked for quality, guess not)
3) I never stated misaligned pad's would create any issue.
4) I don't believe taking the card apart voids the warranty, I thought GPU manufactures abandoned that practice. If not, ok then.
Depends on the manufacturer, but if there is any damage and there are indications that you took the card apart then they can deny you warranty by saying the damage was caused by you. Technically they can't deny your warranty for taking the product apart, but they are going to find every excuse legally allowed to get around that pesky limitation.
 
Depends on the manufacturer, but if there is any damage and there are indications that you took the card apart then they can deny you warranty by saying the damage was caused by you. Technically they can't deny your warranty for taking the product apart, but they are going to find every excuse legally allowed to get around that pesky limitation.

yeah, true. I think evga is more forgiving. Anyways thankfully the card is super easy to take apart, 7 screws and the heat sink pops right off. 2 seconds to fix the pads, repaste the gpu, good as new :)

*sidenote* how do you have 18'000 posts in 5 years, I have 10% that in almost 20yrs haha
 
yeah, true. I think evga is more forgiving. Anyways thankfully the card is super easy to take apart, 7 screws and the heat sink pops right off. 2 seconds to fix the pads, repaste the gpu, good as new :)

*sidenote* how do you have 18'000 posts in 5 years, I have 10% that in almost 20yrs haha

He is... Very good with his mouth...
 
yeah, true. I think evga is more forgiving. Anyways thankfully the card is super easy to take apart, 7 screws and the heat sink pops right off. 2 seconds to fix the pads, repaste the gpu, good as new :)

*sidenote* how do you have 18'000 posts in 5 years, I have 10% that in almost 20yrs haha
That's only an average of about 9 posts a day for the 2,093 days I've been here. I have opinions that I must share :cool:.
 
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