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With used or older hardware, there can come issues, and the RTX 4090 has a long history of being involved in scams. Weโve seen an RTX 3080 Ti chip being fit on an RTX 4090 after being laser-engraved, and another instance where the GPU core and memory had been completely removed, rendering the card as just a brick.ย And now, another scam has been discovered.
While the RTX 5090 mightโve dethroned the RTX 4090 as the worldโs most powerful graphics card, many were waiting for a price drop via the pre-owned market. Unfortunately, you always have to be careful when buying high-end second-hand goods.
What is the new RTX 4090 scam?
In a YouTube video by @fydn (ไฟฎ็ต่็ๅผ ๅฅ / Zhang The Computer Repair Man), four 4090s that failed to power on were shipped to him for repair. Upon closer inspection, the core issues were revealed – three of the four weren’t 4090s at all.
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The first card was missing transistors, which are normally seen in the top right corner of the chip; the QR code placement was wrong, and the VRAM was fake. The placement is what is generally found in the RTX 3090 and RTX 3080, so this isnโt the first time weโve seen the GA102 chip being swapped out for the AD102 and the letters being added and removed using laser engraving.
The second GPU also had the QR code in the wrong place, and the polish of the core had been scraped, which likely indicates some tampering with the name on the chip. The third board also had the same issues with missing capacitors and wrong code placement; however, the one redeeming factor was that the board was short-circuited.
The fourth GPU was perhaps the most blatantly fake, as the PCB green, which weโre all familiar with, was of the wrong shade, and put side by side with another one, it was made clear that it is a fake RTX 4090.
Image source: @fydn on YouTube
Image source: @fydn on YouTube
Image source: @fydn on YouTube
So, after inspecting the bare card, three turned out to be RTX 3090 or RTX 3080 being passed off as an RTX 4090. Only one was expected to be real, but after attempting to fix it, there was still little progress: the power to the video memory wasnโt being supplied properly, among other issues.
What we can take away from this is that scammers are getting smarter and will go to extreme lengths to scam you out of your hard-earned money. So, what we recommend doing is to only purchase hardware from verified and trusted retailers and get a warranty so you can claim it in case of any issues.
Avoid shopping from third-party websites that seem shady, and you can also check when their domain was established. Also, if you see a deal that is too good to be true, then it probably is, and it is better to walk away.ย Since the hype for crypto mining has plummeted, there are tons of used GPUs flooding the market, and we wouldnโt be surprised if we see more reports of this type of scam. So, stay safe out there and buy from trusted vendors.
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