Friday, February 28th 2025
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12V-2x6 Adapter with Monitoring and Shunt Resistors Appears for NVIDIA's GPUs
A monitoring adapter prototype for NVIDIA's problematic 12VHPWR/12V-2x6 power connectors has surfaced in Asian markets, potentially offering RTX 5090 owners a stopgap solution amid ongoing concerns about thermal issues and power delivery weaknesses. The prototype features a circuit board with individually routed +12V lines through shunt resistors, enabling precise current measurement across each power line while maintaining ground and sense pin functionality. The adapter incorporates voltage monitoring capabilities and an apparent alarm function designed to trigger during overload conditions. A USB port is present on the board for user-accessible data output to a custom display. Notably, the current design iteration appears to omit temperature monitoring functionality, focusing exclusively on current distribution metrics.
These monitoring solutions merely detect rather than resolve the fundamental design issues reportedly affecting NVIDIA's high-end graphics cards. NVIDIA has maintained silence regarding the reported thermal issues and power supply inconsistencies affecting their flagship GeForce RTX 5090 cards despite growing user concerns about connector safety and performance stability. The emergence of third-party monitoring solutions proves the demand for greater transparency regarding power delivery characteristics, particularly for cards operating at extreme power limits. The RTX 5090, with its factory power limit of 600 W, represents the most power-hungry GPU, getting its massive power through a single 12V-2x6 connector interface.
Sources:
BiliBili, via HardwareLuxx
These monitoring solutions merely detect rather than resolve the fundamental design issues reportedly affecting NVIDIA's high-end graphics cards. NVIDIA has maintained silence regarding the reported thermal issues and power supply inconsistencies affecting their flagship GeForce RTX 5090 cards despite growing user concerns about connector safety and performance stability. The emergence of third-party monitoring solutions proves the demand for greater transparency regarding power delivery characteristics, particularly for cards operating at extreme power limits. The RTX 5090, with its factory power limit of 600 W, represents the most power-hungry GPU, getting its massive power through a single 12V-2x6 connector interface.
33 Comments on 12V-2x6 Adapter with Monitoring and Shunt Resistors Appears for NVIDIA's GPUs
Switch from 3-dimple crimp connectors to 4-spring is the solution.
Can't wait for the CVEs. You could hack someone through their CPU fan, now you can hack them through a power cable.
www.wired.com/2016/06/clever-attack-uses-sound-computers-fan-steal-data/
That part of a job is on Nvidia side: it's their duty to fix faulty power connectors. I'm afraid it will never get any better if users got use to rely on 3rd party solutions to fix the manufacturers problems :shadedshu:
It needs to become a new standard.
A Shunt resistor is not a fuse.
Monitoring is not a safety feature.
A fuse is a safety feature.
that stuff also needs temperature measurement probes. Nope - Nope- Nope.
Really how do yo measure a current with a shunt - resistor? Maybe ohms law + shunt resistor + an analog / digital - converter in a microcontroller?
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they should have added some circuitry on the psu side, not on the graphic card site, to hardware limit the current per wire. Which should be in the power supply unit in the first place. That connector is only specified for 600 Watts not 750 Watts what some overclockers use it for.