Sapphire 5850 RMA Process, THUMBS UP!

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FaRKle0079

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With all the horrible Sapphire RMA experience stories and generally bad perception I'd like to post my recent experience with the process.

So on Sunday 3/21 my Sapphire 5850's fan started making a grinding noise. It was loud, obnoxious, and also prevented the fan from spinning up to higher rpms when loading the GPU. I thought I was screwed with all the bad stories of Sapphire's RMA process and the thought of going a month or more without my videocard weren't very comforting. I emailed Sapphire that evening about my problem and crossed my fingers.

Sapphire got back to me the next day (Monday) and didn't try and make me jump through hoops by testing every little thing, but instead flat out told me to contact their USA RMA contractor Althon Micro with a copy of my purchase information.

Once I contacted Althon Micro and sent them my documentation they told me to fill out an RMA form and send them electronic copies of my purchase information. After doing so they easily issued me an RMA number and had me ship them just the broken card. They didn't say I had to pay any extra processing fees or anything, which I had read about and was worried over.

I mailed the card to Althon Micro on 3/23 and they received it on 3/25. Their turnaround time in an email they sent me said it'd be around 1-2 weeks before I got my card back. On 4/1 I received an email from Althon Micro saying my new replacement 5850 was shipped out. I was very surprised at how fast they shipped me out a new card, and today (4/5) I received my new card.

The total turnaround time from when I shipped them my broken card till I received the replacement card was only 13 days. Their turnaround time was 11 days total or a minimal 6 business days till I received the new card.

Needless to say I am very pleased with Sapphire's RMA service and feel that all of the horror stories, while possibly true, do not represent the majority of cases. Sapphire's warranty service is good to go in my book.
 
Nice. I'm waiting on some price drops.

Still not sure what brand to go with, but this gives Sapphire some edge
 
Good news :D I might be getting a couple of Sapphire HD 5870 2GB Toxic Editions soon.
 
Eh, I've had a bad enough experience with them in the past that I'm not buying sapphire again anytime soon. Had an X1900XTX that I RMA'd, the turnaround time was 2 months, and even then they sent me an X1900XT rebranded as XTX (it had the 1.2ns memory rather than the 1.1)
 
Good to hear. I'm going to have to rma my 5850 toxic here after I try it in a different system. Hopefully I have just as good of luck as you!
 
FaRKle0079 said:
With all the horrible Sapphire RMA experience stories and generally bad perception I'd like to post my recent experience with the process.

So on Sunday 3/21 my Sapphire 5850's fan started making a grinding noise. It was loud, obnoxious, and also prevented the fan from spinning up to higher rpms when loading the GPU. I thought I was screwed with all the bad stories of Sapphire's RMA process and the thought of going a month or more without my videocard weren't very comforting. I emailed Sapphire that evening about my problem and crossed my fingers.

Sapphire got back to me the next day (Monday) and didn't try and make me jump through hoops by testing every little thing, but instead flat out told me to contact their USA RMA contractor Althon Micro with a copy of my purchase information.

Once I contacted Althon Micro and sent them my documentation they told me to fill out an RMA form and send them electronic copies of my purchase information. After doing so they easily issued me an RMA number and had me ship them just the broken card. They didn't say I had to pay any extra processing fees or anything, which I had read about and was worried over.

I mailed the card to Althon Micro on 3/23 and they received it on 3/25. Their turnaround time in an email they sent me said it'd be around 1-2 weeks before I got my card back. On 4/1 I received an email from Althon Micro saying my new replacement 5850 was shipped out. I was very surprised at how fast they shipped me out a new card, and today (4/5) I received my new card.

The total turnaround time from when I shipped them my broken card till I received the replacement card was only 13 days. Their turnaround time was 11 days total or a minimal 6 business days till I received the new card.

Needless to say I am very pleased with Sapphire's RMA service and feel that all of the horror stories, while possibly true, do not represent the majority of cases. Sapphire's warranty service is good to go in my book.
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I've done 2 RMA's through Althon Micro. People blow stuff out of proportion when they talk about Sapphire RMAs. Pure non-sense most of it.
 
How can I RMA my Sapphire 5850 without an original receipt? I bought it 2nd hand from a member on these forums. Its starting to grey screen anytime I launch a game now :\.
 
Probably by either saying you don't have the receipt any longer or being up front about it being second had.
 
By not buying Sapphire stuff to start with I can avoid RMAs. Not at all impressed with the quality of their products... :/
 
my fan started to die so i RMA'ed my 5850 as well. hopefully i get my replacement before march. I'm using a gts 250 while i wait.
 
I dont think sapphires RMA is all that bad. ive had to use it in the past & I think they are just as good as everyone else. Fast turn around times. The one thing that does suck is the 2 year warranty
 
neokeelo said:
How can I RMA my Sapphire 5850 without an original receipt? I bought it 2nd hand from a member on these forums. Its starting to grey screen anytime I launch a game now :\.
Click to expand...



i would ask the other member if he can ask for an RMA, and just have the RMA sent to my address lol. :p
 
I have a new Toxic 5850 that will be delivered Wed. :)
So far I can't complain about Sapphire's RMA process other than the $15 charge I had to pay. Still not that bad though.
 
samuelmorris said:
By not buying Sapphire stuff to start with I can avoid RMAs. Not at all impressed with the quality of their products... :/
Click to expand...
Not sure if this changed, but Sapphire made ALL of AMD's reference cards for awhile, if not still.
 
I heard someone else say that, unless it was you, couldn't find a single ounce of proof. Last thing I heard was that foxconn had been a manufacturer of reference cards for ages.
 
samuelmorris said:
I heard someone else say that, unless it was you, couldn't find a single ounce of proof. Last thing I heard was that foxconn had been a manufacturer of reference cards for ages.
Click to expand...
Back in the day Sapphire made most of ATI's cards IIRC. When ATI was bought by AMD, I wouldn't be surprised if things were switched around/shaken up, but the point still stands that their quality is fine.
 
Not sure if this changed, but Sapphire made ALL of AMD's reference cards for awhile, if not still.
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Sapphire didn't make "ALL" reference cards, they made/make all the cards marked "Built by ATI."
 
IIRC The "built by ATI" brand hasn't existed for years? Back in the middle of the 00s, Sapphire made some reasonable products. It's just recently that the quality of their products is utterly bottom-tier. My non-ref X1600 from them still works (although the fan is on the way out), but it all went rapidly downhill from there.
 
IIRC The "built by ATI" brand hasn't existed for years?
Click to expand...

I had a BBATI 5850.

Back in the middle of the 00s, Sapphire made some reasonable products. It's just recently that the quality of their products is utterly bottom-tier. My non-ref X1600 from them still works (although the fan is on the way out), but it all went rapidly downhill from there.
Click to expand...

I disagree that Sapphire cards are "utterly bottom tier." Considering the volume of them sold, of course you're going to hear of issues. I've seen more people complaining about their XFX 69XX cards in various forums than Sapphire ones as of late, and let's not forget the problem-prone XFX 4890.
 
The HD6970s are all reference, so I don't really see how that's any more than just coincidence.

The issue is obviously with non-reference, as it's the cards sapphire actually build that are terribly unreliable. I know various people with Vapor-X cards and not one of them lasted more than a few months. Nobody I know who bought a modern sapphire non-reference card in fact, ended up with a working card.
The $1000 4GB HD5970s weren't even tested before they left the factory.
 
After testing the replacement card for about 3 weeks they sent me, I am sending it back. It is also defective and giving me grey screens of death and solid white screen crashes while sitting in Windows. This is very frustrating...
 
I've had a number of Sapphire cards.
I do believe they are still the #1 supplier of AMD cards worldwide.
As far as being THE reference card builder for AMD, I don't know.

My Sapphires have all been fine: 3870,4870,4870X2,5870s,two 4890 VaporXs.
Yes one died.....here's my RMA story: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1537380

Still running in my HTPC just fine....and before RMA it was running fine for over 18 months.

Sorry about your troubles there OP.:D
 
A not fully complete list of my experiences with Sapphire.

Reference:
X800pro AGP (Sep04): Working.
X1900XT (July06): Working, but cooler was upgrade in 2007 to HR-03.
HD4870X2(Dec06, used): Working as of retirement in January, but weakened fan bearing.

Non-referece:
X1600 Pro low-profile (Jan07): Working. Imminent fan failure.
HD3870(Jan08): Failed after 2 days (short circuit)
4GB HD5970 (Jun10): DOA (short circuit)
4GB HD5970 (Jun10): DOA (unstable)
HD5750 (Apr10) [friend's]: DOA (severe artifacting)
HD4870 1GB Vapor-X [friend's] (Jun09): Failed after 9 months (unstable)
 
That's a good experience though. They improved over the years, and dropped the fees..

A $25 processing fee that I had to pay will always hurt. Never Sapphire though unless they give me my money back.
 
This is getting old.... I just received my 2nd RMA # so I can send this one back as well. I flashed the bios to a newer one they sent me and while that did help in games, Now I am getting grey screens and crashing in Windows. Should I replace my motherboard or power supply or is the without a doubt the video card?
 
FaRKle0079 said:
I had a BBATI 5850.



I disagree that Sapphire cards are "utterly bottom tier." Considering the volume of them sold, of course you're going to hear of issues. I've seen more people complaining about their XFX 69XX cards in various forums than Sapphire ones as of late, and let's not forget the problem-prone XFX 4890.
Click to expand...

my *best* guess is due to simply more XFX cards being present :p
 
got my replacement card a while ago. It seems to be a superior cooler, but it is a rev.2 so no voltage controls :(
 
TigerLord said:
XFX alone has three 6970 models and two of them aren't reference.
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XFX is owned by Pine which actually manufactures stuff and has for twenty-five years.

The market has moved on. RMAs used to take a while but nine days from receiving to shipping isn't a thumbs up in my book. I have had some RMAs with ASUS for motherboards that took that long and didn't mind but it wasn't good. I have seen from XFX turned around in two days from receiving. I don't know if that is their norm but nine days isn't a thumbs up for me. It is a year 2003 RMA. It isn't a thumbs down RMA but that isn't tier one support. On the AMD side only XFX seems to have that and on the NVIDIA side only EVGA seems to have that. Those are the two companies who seem to actually go out of their way to make sure that they look good and get it done for me.
 
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