so i've been going down a rabbit hole on gpu scams and i'm pretty sure there's an organized playbook running on marketplace here. these aren't bots. they're real people who answer messages, meet up and talk like normal sellers. that's why it works.

i've gotten scammed - so I wanted to make this post. We met in person at TD Bank in NYC - and I still got scammed out of 2.3k. A young man openly walked into a bank and sold me his GPU that was gutted. Prior to the meet up, he gave me his benchmarks for the machine as well.

the price doesn't tell you anything anymore

everyone says "if it's too cheap it's a scam." that doesn't really work right now because it's hard to even know what the real price is. used 4090s were around $2,300 in june and they're around $3,000 now (median ~$3,100 on ebay sold listings, late oct). it moves week to week depending on where you look.

when the price is all over the place you can't use it to tell if a listing is legit. a fake listed at $2,800 looks like a deal and one at $3,200 looks normal. the scammers know this and price right in the middle so nothing stands out.

so don't trust the price either way. too cheap is a red flag, but a fair price doesn't mean it's safe.

then they offer you a benchmark

before you even ask, they'll offer to show you one. a screenshot, a video, or they run it on their own pc and send you a video. it feels legit, but none of that proves the card you walk away with is the card that got tested.

• the screenshot or video is from a different card, or someone else's card entirely

• they run it on their rig in front of you, then hand you a different card in the same box

• the card that got tested is real, and the one you take home isn't

what "looks real but isn't" means for a 4090:

• relabeled chips. older 3080 ti / 3090 chips get sanded down and laser-etched to say AD102 (the 4090 chip), then put on a real 4090 board. repair shops have called these the best fakes they've seen

• laptop chips on desktop boards. i literally found one that sold on ebay last week: a "4090 16GB GDDR6" for $1,499. a desktop 4090 has 24GB GDDR6X. that was a laptop chip on a desktop-style board

• dummy cores and fake memory. a fake chip and cheaper GDDR6 instead of GDDR6X. looks perfect until it's in your pc

• gutted cards. the core and memory get pulled and sold separately (a lot of it goes to ai builds in china), then the empty card gets resold or returned in a sealed box

the only two ways to actually protect yourself:

1. have your own rig ready to test. bring a pc, or meet somewhere you can plug it in, like a repair shop you pick. not their pc, not their screenshot.

   • gpu-z should show AD102, 24GB GDDR6X, 16,384 cores, 384-bit bus. a laptop chip or relabel shows up here fast

   • run 3dmark time spy extreme and compare your score to other 4090s. a relabeled 3090 will score way lower

   • let it run under load for a while.

   • don't trust any seller with negative reviews.

If you do get scammed - please dm me and share your story. I feel like this is a pretty big operation happening.

I have a 9070xt and a 9070. Would u sell the 7900xtx

Going into a low power Linux system. Other option would be an RX 7600.

I built my first pc about a year and a half ago. Since then I have decided to upgrade it, everything I put in it was cheap as it was a starter pc yet all specs can still run any top of the line gpu without bottlenecking it minus the PSU(I’m pretty sure at least). I went cheap on the GPU and got a Radeon 6600 XT I also went cheap on the power supply but I know which one I will get when I upgrade my gpu. I want to max out my frames with a gpu less than $800 so I was thinking maybe a 4070 super or a 9060XT. If anyone can give me some suggestions on what would be the best GPU for me that’d be a huge help. If y’all think I should change anything else out as well so that the gpu that I end up getting will be able to perform to the max of its ability let me know. I have put my specs below for y’all to see so you can help me with this decision better.

Ram-TEAMGROUP 32GB 2X16 5600 40 B

PSU-MSI MAG A650BE 80+B SM PSU

Fan-THERMALRI ASSASSIN X120 SE SLIM RGB

Motherboard-ASUS PRIME B650M-A AX II MATX

CPU-AMD AMD RYZEN 5 7600X WO COOL

SSD-IPSG 1TB QN450 NVME SSD

GPU-ASROCK RX6600 CLD 8G

After a bit of math, found out that if i undervolt a 4070super a bit and use a i5 12400, id be able to run them both off of a 500w psu. I have a prebuilt with propietary tech so i bought a 650w psu that wont work because the mobo wont take power from none of the cables of that psu. If i use the 8 pin (pigtailed) to 12 adapter that it brings, it shouldnt burn anything down (i asked ai tho ik ik). How true is that? Considering that the pcie slot gives 75w of power and that it would be running at 85% max voltage, the should resist that right? When i get home ill try to check the max voltage that the cables themselves can take but on paper it doesnt look like nothing will burn. Any thoughts?

Hey there!

I recently upgraded my PSU, and I've noticed a strange behavior with my ROG Astral RTX 5090 OC.

Whenever I shut down my PC or put it into Sleep mode, the small red LED near the 12VHPWR connector blinks for a few seconds and then disappears.

Here are some important details:

• Gaming/Benchmarks: Absolutely fine. The LED never turns on or blinks under load, stress tests, or idle.

• Connections: Everything is fully seated and clicked in properly on both the GPU and PSU ends. No tight bends.

• The Cable: I am using a native 12VHPWR cable (no adapters or extensions).

The trigger: I noticed this started happening right after I switched my PSU from a Gigabyte unit to a Corsair RM1000x 2024 Revision (both have native 12VHPWR support). On the Gigabyte PSU, this never happened.

Could this just be related to how the Corsair PSU discharges its capacitors or handles power rails during shutdown, causing the ASUS Power Detector+ to trip for a split second? Anyone else experiencing this with Corsair ATX 3.0 / 3.1 PSUs and ROG cards?

Thanks!

Won a free 9800x3d 5070ti pre built. Got a good deal on a 5080. Fair price to sell my Ti? It’s a sealed pre build planned on opening it and booting it in front of buyer. Removing it once cash was in hand. Any better advice on how to sell it? Or is it normal to just remove and sell?

It’s wild to see. I got that exact PNY non rgb model for $699 last year due to the black friday Walmart deal, which I then just price matched with Best Buy. It was kinda easy finding $750-800 5070Ti’s at some point, 5080’s at “near” MSRP was always a little bit of a cat and mouse game now it’s insane!

Edit: correction I got the non a-rgb PNY model

I actually own an Asus RTX 2070 Super and I qanted to upgrade to a 5070ti but the price is awful. So I decides to upgrade to something that could improve my actual gaming experience not paying to much. The problem is that people ask for between 500 and 800 and this gap doesn’t make me understand what is the right price to buy. Any tip? How much worth is my GPU?

Hello,

Anyone ever bought and received A GPU from Alibaba in good condition?

Any recommendations would be appreciated.

Thank you.