Friday, June 16th 2023
be quiet! Dark Power PSU Owner Reports Melting of 12VHPWR Connector
A member of the amusingly named and low populated r/4090Burning subreddit has reported a strange incident where the PSU side of his 12VHPWR connector had melted. Shiftyeyes67k shared his equipment's plight two days ago and included two photos with his story: "Started noticing a smell coming from my PSU (be quiet! Dark Power 13 1000 W) recently that smelled like burnt plastic. Decided to swap it out and noticed that the 12VHPWR cable was burned...From everything I've read this generally happens to the connector on the GPU side so I'm wondering if anyone has seen this yet?" His feedback shows that the relatively new connection standard has ongoing reliability issues, even though most 16-pin connector problem cases have affected beastly GPUs such as NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4090.
The be quiet! Dark Power 13 1000 W PSU has native support for the 16-pin cable standard, and no type of adapter was used in Shiftyeyes67k's example. Tom's Hardware reported on this sole incident recently, and a be quiet! representative responded to the article's content (updated today): "This is a unique case and we already have reached out to the customer to learn more." The company statement continues: "As our brand is known for highest quality standards, we treat this seriously and have initiated an investigation." be quiet! recommends that any customers experiencing similar issues should contact their support team directly. Tom's Hardware has attempted to get a comment from NVIDIA about the latest problem, but "an Nvidia spokesperson said we may not hear back for a few days due to a company closure."
The article's author, Aaron Klotz, signs off with this reckoning: "This issue couldn't have come at a worse time with more RTX 4090 16-pin connector melting reports still coming in. NVIDIA claims that all of the 16-pin issues are related to user error, with the connector not being seated properly. But it's hard to believe that all of the errors were due to user error since some of these latest reports come from people who claim to be veteran system builders. Hopefully, this power supply issue with the 16-pin power connector does not extend to more users. But if it does, this could become an even more serious problem for the graphics card and power supply industries."
Sources:
4090Burning Subreddit, Tom's Hardware
The be quiet! Dark Power 13 1000 W PSU has native support for the 16-pin cable standard, and no type of adapter was used in Shiftyeyes67k's example. Tom's Hardware reported on this sole incident recently, and a be quiet! representative responded to the article's content (updated today): "This is a unique case and we already have reached out to the customer to learn more." The company statement continues: "As our brand is known for highest quality standards, we treat this seriously and have initiated an investigation." be quiet! recommends that any customers experiencing similar issues should contact their support team directly. Tom's Hardware has attempted to get a comment from NVIDIA about the latest problem, but "an Nvidia spokesperson said we may not hear back for a few days due to a company closure."
98 Comments on be quiet! Dark Power PSU Owner Reports Melting of 12VHPWR Connector
The connector could have been better designed / manufactured, that's easy to agree to, hec just painting the part of the connector that should all be inside once it's latched a fluro colour would be a start, if you see the colour, it's not all the way in. But it does seem like at least the vast majority of issues was improper insertion.
And for those wishing it, don't hold your breath for it being backpedaled and going away, if anything it'll get minor revision/s to iron out cases of this happening, but it's extremely unlikely to be rolled back/unlaunched now. After all there are hundred's of thousands, perhaps even millions now with ATX 3.0 PSU's and/or cards using the 12VHPWR connector.
Just compare that to the standart 8-pin PCI-E power connector: 4 Amperes per pin (150Watts/12Volts/6pins).
There is no miracles in the field of the physics, just bare consequences...
P.S. But, of course, new shiny 12VHPWR connector is looks so good! And, of course, no more mess with a lot of connectors and messy, thick wires...
Maybe...
Additional reason, why those 12VHPWR connectors are melted can be wire gauge.
I have no idea which AWGs used in this 12VHPWR cabling, but I'm will not surprised if it's 18AWG.
16AWG and over is way too chunky to put in this tiny "engineering marvel".
According to this resource:
www.engineeringtoolbox.com/wire-gauges-d_419.html
maximum permissible current per wire in this case is 4.9 - 4.2 Amperes (7-24 - 25-42 cores).
Add to this that fact that those pins aren't welded or soldered to wires - they are crimped.
It's ok for 110 - 230 Volts, or just signalling, but for 12 volts, over 5 Amperes?
Hmmm, isn't there is place where Ohm law starting to have a huge workout due to resistance?
18AWG, crimped connection, over 8 Amperes per that - aren't we are witnesses of just pure marketing idiocy over engineering?
Or additional super-duper couple of cents economy?
Why I'm not surprised...
Prior to this, Nvidia was / is following Intel's guidelines with the RTX 30x0 FE series and RTX 3090 Ti and with the RTX 40x0 FE series with the 4 spring female pins in the connectors (cable) that comes with the GPU, some Nvidia partners on the other hand did not and they used the female pins with dimples for some reason, this is also evident here with this PSU where the 12VHPWR cable is using the WRONG FEMALE PINS per the specs / guidelines.
All good tho.....
We also don't have an exact number of cases with reference to these connectors melting, we only know about the ones that get posted on forums / social networks like Reddit etc.
Also, on top of this, I have yet to see an Nvidia RTX 4080 / 90 FE model with this melted connector other than those that have been tested like Igorslab, GamersNexus and a few others that did controlled tests.
I have not seen any RTX 30x0 FE series or RTX 3090 Ti with this melting connector issue either, they all use the 12VHPWR connector (1st gen connector).
*Most seemed to be under the impression that this connector was Nvidia's design, it's not the case, they was just the first company to use it.*
Example - the cable that came with my RTX 3090 Ti (see image below which is using the 1st gen version of this connector - missing the small 4 pins on the connector, same with the Nvidia 30x0 FE cards)
Rows 1 & 2 here in the image, these are the connectors that come with the RTX 30x0 FE / RTX 3090 Ti cards, none of the female pins have dimples.
Row 3 These are the cables that came with the RTX 4090 cards that have the melting issue, they have dimples on the inside of the pin, the other thing is the gap top and bottom of these female pins, they are different.
Nvidia's 4090 FE / 4080 FE, the cable that comes with these cards, the female pins in the 12VHPWER connector do not have dimples on the inside (the ones I've seen that is).
But, what about wires thickness?
Did all 12VHPWR cables strictly follows AWG16 recommendation by Intel ATX specs?
I doubt so, but can't deny or confirm, mine 3080 is by good old 3x8 PCI-E connectors.
These things are extremely sensitive.
gpu_power_supply_cable_melted_using_3090_hof
forums.tomshardware.com/threads/melted-pcie-from-psu-to-gpu.3594049/
linustechtips.com/topic/1400805-my-pcie-cable-melted-inside-my-gpu-socket/This isn't a problem since you could have 2x PCIe to new connector adapter make by manufacturer going right from PSU. The problem are the distributed GPUs out there.
www.bequiet.com/en/accessories/3959
Even a car can randomly be set on fire or even explode (the electric ones) it doesn't mean we should jump to conclusions and stop using all of them.
If there was real or high fire hazard I'm sure proper safety certification organization wound ban selling those PSUs. An bequit or any other company would have to recall them.If this is not a joke you actually increased fire hazard since super glue is flammable.
I really don't get why we do not get lower power rated cables with those PSUs or GPUs. I mean only 4090 actually needs 600W cable.
Other cards could use 450W or 300W cables and therefore power would be limited by PSU itself and GPU driver.
Lower power, lower electric current, lower heat on connector, lower fire hazard.
WTH happened with this idea?