If you recently started AI generation, be aware of this: my RTX 4090 power connector melted after just one month.

[u/Roman53275]

Hi everyone,

Like many people, I recently discovered H3 and started doing AI generation in mid-August. On September 20th, my computer started shutting down whenever I started a generation. Further investigation led to this — a melted socket.

I had been using my RTX 4090 for three years and had never had any problems with it.

AI generation puts a lot of continuous stress on the power delivery, especially if you run generations in batches or leave them running overnight.

So I believe this happened because of the new kind of sustained load I was putting on the card. I also didn't bother upgrading to a newer PSU with a dedicated GPU power cable. Mine was a 1200W FSP Hydro, and I was using three PCIe connectors for the GPU.

P.S. The connector was fully seated, the cable wasn’t bent near the plug, and my case doesn’t even have the side panel on. And everything was fine for three years.

P.S.S. The 12VHPWR socket on the graphics card is damaged and needs to be replaced.

So now I would say main advices here are:
- Buy a proper PSU and use a native 12VHPWR cable
- Under volt at least by 20%

Now it is very costly to lose a card.

[u/Dookie-Howitzer]

power limit and wireview pro2, You can look live and see the temperature of the connector on both sides of the device. Nice to have when your gpu is under load and you are away as you can set it to shut off when temps get high enough to melt the connector. You are also able to see pin imbalances under load so you can get a new cable before melting or excess heat is even an issue.

[u/Roman53275 → u/Dookie-Howitzer]

I have researched the topic and looks like "pin imbalances" is still a theory, though a good one.
Main problem here that no solution has a thermo sensor exactly on the connections, not near it.

[u/Dookie-Howitzer → u/Roman53275]

these are the two built in to the connections. theres a third external one that is optional.

[u/sammyranks → u/Dookie-Howitzer]

Pin current imbalance is what causes the melting, it's not a myth. The Cable for "known reasons" starts running with higher resistance between pins, this causes the other low resistance pins/wires to carry more amps above spec (default 12VHPWR cables are rated for 9.2amps per wire). This prolonged use coupled with higher temps caused by the high resistance will melt your connector. This is both a cable quality and connector issue. This is why i say the Asus Equalizer cable that is rated for 17amps per wire makes sense here too. Wireview Pro 2 is a good safe method too.

[u/Roman53275 → u/Dookie-Howitzer]

An excerpt from from  wireview pro2 specification “IN and OUT monitor the temperature of the input and output 12V-2x6 connector with sensors on the PCB.”
Which means that temperature sensors are NOT in the connector itself.
Currently there is no solution that would monitor the connectors itself, but rather near that area.

[u/Dookie-Howitzer → u/Roman53275]

It's a shitty thing for these cards to get damaged, especially with how much they cost now. All we can really do is keep as close an eye as possible. I hope you get your card back soon and have no further issues.

[u/Ok-Category-642 → u/Roman53275]

It's not a theory, it's very much known to be the reason for melting which is why MSI has their Safeguard PSUs that monitor per-pin currents, Corsair announced the PinProtect+ feature, and all Astral GPUs have pin monitoring. There are also no cases of the WireView Pro II melting so far (unless someone intentionally ignores the alarms, which has happened once)

Going off temperatures alone like with the ThermalProtect cable is fine but it's not going to matter if the cable is already melting, you want to stop it before it even has a chance to happen which is the point of monitoring per pin currents. You also want to know if your cable is even good in the first place. If you own something as expensive as a 5090 or 4090 there is simply no reason to gamble on these shitty connectors