Date:
Thursday , May 25, 2006
Author:
Kyle Bennett
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GeForce 7900 Inferno – Burn Baby Burn

It seems that the demon art of vendor overclocking is pushing many GeForce 7900 video cards beyond their abilities and into an early grave. It's one thing when you overclock the card, and another when it comes out of the box overclocked with a warranty.

continued...

Conclusions

Coming away from this there are a few things that I know and a few things that I have an opinion on.

I know that there are an elevated number of GeForce 7900 failures in the field among overclocked retail video cards. I know that NVIDIA is firmly placing the blame on the retailers overclocking the cards “too far.” I also know that of all the major retailers selling the overclocked 7900 cards, none of them are backing off on their overclocking specifications they had on the cards previous to the problem arising. Only EVGA is changing the process for qualifying the overclocked 7900 cards.

I do know that BFGTech and EVGA have RMA procedures in place that I find to be reliable and swift adding a good bit of value to your video card purchase. By XFX's own explanation of their RMA process, I know I would be upset if it took two weeks to help me get a $350 video card back into my hands that worked right. At HardOCP we started being a lot more aware of warranties, support and service a few years ago. Situations such as this simply outline that having the fastest 3DMark score by a couple of points should not always be your top priority when investing so much money into a computer system.

The Bottom Line

There are some “bad” 7900 video cards out there right now if you are going to shop for the overclocked variety. Again, it seems to me BFGTech is catching less flack than EVGA and XFX, but that is not a scientific observation. Keep in mind that BFGTech does not overclock their cards as high as EVGA or XFX. If I were buying an overclocked 7900 card right now, I would be leaning towards BFGTech or EVGA simply because they have a much better reputation when it comes to warranty, support, and service.

If you have a card to RMA, return it to the card builder, not the retailer. Given the awareness level of this problem at this time I would suggest that you have a much better chance of getting a solid 7900 directly from the card builder.

Lastly, I would not let this scare me away from buying an overclocked GeForce 7900 series video card as all the players are very aware something is going on with the cards and trying their best to make sure the problem is solved. Then again, there does seem to be certain level of risk with buying an overclocked card so a non-overclocked 7900 from a reputable builder might be a smart option. Just remember that when you are buying a video card that you are paying for service, support, and warranty as well as the hardware.

Discussion

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After talking to BFGTech, they wanted to do something for [H] Enthusiast readers. If you are not satisfied with your EVGA or XFX 7900 GT or 7900 GTX purchase, they will give you a $50 mail in rebate towards a 7900 GTX OC purchased from Newegg.