Baking fixed my GFX card :D

Deucal · Post by **Deucal** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 8:26 am

I had been reading about this method for some time but was a little skeptical.

Then I had the unfortunate thing that one of my GFX cards stopped working

.

After a few day's of trying everything else I decided what the hell, it's dead anyway so might as well try it out.

Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures.

Following the instructions I've seen here and there I removed anything unnecessary from the card. Pre-heated my oven to 200CÂ°, made some aluminium foil balls to balance the card on the tray (with the gpu unit face down) and baked it for 10 minutes.

And prista! it bloody worked!

I'm a happy little camper now

.

edit: Also read that this should work for CPU and RAM sticks as well. If it's dead/faulty and can't be RMAed try at your discretion

bonestonne · Post by **bonestonne** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 9:40 am

I'm pretty skeptical, and would like to see some of the websites you used as references.

I actually do have a half dead ATI 4850 I'd be willing to try this on too.

PartEleven · Post by **PartEleven** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 10:05 am

This is the gallery forum. Pics or it didn't happen.

frostedflakes · Post by **frostedflakes** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 10:06 am

It's legit. I guess sometimes the BGA solder joints on graphics cards and other components fail (maybe due to flexing of the PCB and stuff like that, I'm not completely sure why). Baking them heats up the solder and allows it to reflow, fixing the joints.

I mean obviously it won't work every time, depends on why the card failed. If it's not related to the solder joints, this won't help. But if you have a dead, out of warranty card lying around and would just be throwing it away anyway, it's not like it could hurt to try.

Deucal · Post by **Deucal** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 12:03 pm

learned about it on http://forums.extremeoverclocking.com/ first

then you can see it on youtube as well

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_q ... +card&aq=0

Was skeptical at first as well but as frostedflakes said this is about fixing micro fissures in the soldering.

Just an ordinary rabbit · Post by **Just an ordinary rabbit** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 2:27 pm

Do you think this method would be likely to work with larger gaps in the solder?
I managed to stab my nvidia card with a small screwdriver when trying to take the cooler apart, resulting in a scrape through 6 tracks. 2 tracks are broken completely...

I might be clutching at straws a bit but does an oven at 200Â° melt the solder enough that it could join back together?

Lawrence Lee · Post by **Lawrence Lee** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 3:49 pm

What card was it?

frostedflakes · Post by **frostedflakes** » Sat Jul 03, 2010 8:42 pm

Just an ordinary rabbit wrote:Do you think this method would be likely to work with larger gaps in the solder?
I managed to stab my nvidia card with a small screwdriver when trying to take the cooler apart, resulting in a scrape through 6 tracks. 2 tracks are broken completely...

I might be clutching at straws a bit but does an oven at 200Â° melt the solder enough that it could join back together?

The traces are not solder and won't melt at any reasonable temperature. To fix that you'll have to actually add some solder. Best way I can think of is to scrape the lacquer off the traces near the cut and then just bridge them with solder. If they're very small, though, you'll have to do this without bridging adjacent traces, which could be difficult.

didi · Post by **didi** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 1:06 am

Did this in the past with an 8800 ultra and with a printer controller board. It's no joke, it can really work. Just make sure you don't over-bake (too hot and/or too long). Also let it cool before moving anything or you'll risk parts falling off because the solder has not "dried".

Vicotnik · Post by **Vicotnik** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 4:26 am

Just an ordinary rabbit wrote:Do you think this method would be likely to work with larger gaps in the solder?
I managed to stab my nvidia card with a small screwdriver when trying to take the cooler apart, resulting in a scrape through 6 tracks. 2 tracks are broken completely...

I might be clutching at straws a bit but does an oven at 200Â° melt the solder enough that it could join back together?

I'd like to second what frostedflakes said and also add that silver paint might work better than solder. Or a conductive pen. You can buy that from any good electronic component shop.

BlackWhizz · Post by **BlackWhizz** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 4:38 am

Just an ordinary rabbit wrote:Do you think this method would be likely to work with larger gaps in the solder?
I managed to stab my nvidia card with a small screwdriver when trying to take the cooler apart, resulting in a scrape through 6 tracks. 2 tracks are broken completely...

I might be clutching at straws a bit but does an oven at 200Â° melt the solder enough that it could join back together?

Partly true. With the heat your warming up the epoxy PCB. That PCB then gets a little bigger (just like cooked water takes up more space than cold water). When the PCB gets cooled (by that the pcb gets a little smaller) traces are making better contact again.

bonestonne · Post by **bonestonne** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 6:33 am

Alright, I had a frankenstein experience last night. I took my half dead, artifacting ATI 4850, took everything off it, pre-heated the oven to about 385 (oven doesn't have an exact 385, so I just had to go with whatever seemed to be close enough) and then I tossed the card in for exactly 8 minutes. Towards the end of the 8 minutes, after around 6 minutes, I started to crack the oven door, to accelerate the cool down period, and as soon as the card was cool enough to handle, I got the cooler back onto it.

Tossed the zombie into my computer, hit the power button, lo and behold, it's not fake. Computer started, no artifacts, no capacitors were bulging after coming out of the oven, and it fricken worked!

Granted I didn't do anything intense with it yet because I want to get an Accelero S1 and VRM cooling for it before I use it for good, but before the process, it had some nasty artifacting, and caused Windows 7 to BSOD constantly.

The funniest part about this is that it was out of a customers computer, and I took it home because it's not a reliable fix that could have been given to the customer, and there is lots of talk about the fix not always working after 5 weeks or so.

Lots of reading also led me to using Flux while performing this process, as it will basically make the fix near permanent, or until the flux dries out again (which is a pretty long time unless you're notorious for killing cards).

I'm going to be watching this 4850 closely, but I get to add it to my list of zombie/free parts that are in my computer.

Oh, and did I mention it's faster than my 9600GT?

BlackWhizz · Post by **BlackWhizz** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 8:04 am

I did it a while ago for a temp card (6200 TC) which goes around my clients when their videocard is on a RMA tour.

It really works.

bonestonne · Post by **bonestonne** » Sun Jul 04, 2010 1:18 pm

I successfully swapped my Accelero S1 onto the 4850, and temps are much lower. A little warmer than my 9600GT, but that was expected given the extra power. I had to get creative with the VRM cooling, but it appears to be working fine. No BSOD or problems installing the CCC/driver. Next up is playing American McGee's Alice, or maybe borrowing Oblivion from a friend.

I'm not in front of the same computer, but core temps are in the high 30's C, VRMs were in the mid 50's, and RAM was in the low 50's. I do have a 92mm 7v fan strapped onto the Accelero for safety as well.

Pretty good for a "dead" card.