Nvidia’s RTX 30 series keynote was excellent. The RTX 3080 is the flagship card of the RTX 30 series with the RTX 3090 ascending to the Titan Realm with its 24GB VRAM. But not everything about the launch of the RTX 30 series went clean.

First, the Scalpers were hoarding all the graphics cards creating a problem in supplies. The early adopters also faced issues with their graphics cards, frequent CTDs, and black screen problems.

Nvidia has finally released a driver update but hasn’t conveyed the real problem of the crashes. But according to Igor lab, the crashes are caused due to use of cheap POSCAPs capacitor and the positioning of the POSCAP capacitor and MLCC capacitor.

The POSCAPs used in the partnered cards are inexpensive and don’t sustain the voltage. The instability caused due to the POSCAPs capacitor kept failing the GPU.

The AIB partners didn’t get time to test the drivers thoroughly before the launch. The untested product and the driver both created a spew of error in the AIB cards. This doesn’t mean all the POSCAPs GPU will fail. But the statistics show a higher failure rate, which does mean that POSCAPs is a bust.

It is also the AIB tendency to release higher-performing drivers, but it later dialed down after the months of the cards release. The capacitor usually fails when it hits over 2GHz, the leading cause of the CTDs and Black screen error.

Company Statements

ASUS

“All retail ROG Strix and TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3080 and 3090 graphics cards use only MLCC capacitors for decoupling close to the GPU.During development, we discovered the improvement this makes to RTX 3090 and 3080 overclocking headroom, so we made specification changes before we started shipping cards to reviewers and customers. Please note that some of the product images used on etail sites and our product pages were from early development samples, so are not final. All images will be updated soon.

Please bear with us!”

Zotac

Hello,

What you said is recognized by both us and the head office.

We have been informed that we are aware of the current situation and are working with NVIDIA on a solution.
If a countermeasure is available, we will notify you through a notice immediately.

We apologize for any concerns.

Thank you.

—Posted via tagtag.co.kr (Zotac Korea)

EVGA

Hi all,

Recently there has been some discussion about the EVGA GeForce RTX 3080 series.

During our mass production QC testing we discovered a full 6 POSCAPs solution cannot pass the real world applications testing. It took almost a week of R&D effort to find the cause and reduce the POSCAPs to 4 and add 20 MLCC caps prior to shipping production boards, this is why the EVGA GeForce RTX 3080 FTW3 series was delayed at launch. There were no 6 POSCAP production EVGA GeForce RTX 3080 FTW3 boards shipped.

But, due to the time crunch, some of the reviewers were sent a pre-production version with 6 POSCAP’s, we are working with those reviewers directly to replace their boards with production versions.
EVGA GeForce RTX 3080 XC3 series with 5 POSCAPs + 10 MLCC solution is matched with the XC3 spec without issues.

Also note that we have updated the product pictures at EVGA.com to reflect the production components that shipped to gamers and enthusiasts since day 1 of product launch.
Once you receive the card you can compare for yourself, EVGA stands behind its products!

Thanks

EVGA

Gigabyte

“In response to the recent reports speculating that the use of POSCAP capacitors on the GeForce RTX 3080/3090 graphics cards could lead to stability issues and crashes, we would like to clarify the issue with the following statement:

“It is false that POSCAP capacitors independently could cause a hardware crash. Whether a graphics card is stable or not requires a comprehensive evaluation of the overall circuit and power delivery design, not just the difference in capacitor types. POSCAPs and MLCCs have different characteristics and uses, thus it is not true to assert that one capacitor type is better than the other.

“The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 30 graphics cards are designed in accordance with NVIDIA specifications, and have passed all required testing, thus the product quality is guaranteed. GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 3080/3090 GAMING OC and EAGLE OC series graphics cards use high-quality, low-ESR 470uF SP-CAP capacitors, which meet the specifications set by NVIDIA and provide a total capacity of 2820u in terms of GPU core power, higher than the industry’s average. The cost of SP-CAP capacitors is not lower than that of MLCCs. GIGABYTE values product integrity highly and definitely does not reduce costs by using cheap materials.

“NVIDIA has released a driver (version 456.55) on September 29, 2020 that improves stability. Users are advised to update to the latest driver for optimized performance. For users who encounter power-related issues with GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 30 series graphics cards, GIGABYTE will provide product replacement, free of charge.
“GIGABYTE has been constantly improving and optimizing product quality, especially in terms of thermal designs, to provide the best gaming experience to the consumers for decades. For the latest AORUS GeForce RTX 30 graphics card series, we have also paid extra attention to the cooling performance and introduced industry-leading solutions such as MAX-Covered Cooling to ensure that the operation of each component is stable.”

-Via Kit Guru

Inno3D

Short notice by @Inno3DHK:

„To all current users and prospective buyers,
 
Please be rest assured, and we hereby declare that INNO3D/ICHILL GeForce RTX 30 Series products do not have any instability problems.“

— Andreas Schilling (@aschilling) September 28, 2020

Most of the companies have replied to the current issue and are looking to resolve the problem with Nvidia. Till now Nvidia has released a stability patch but hasn’t publicly said about the patch notes. All the cards are under revision and will ship as soon as it is tested for stability.