Question Let's say this happened to you: Dead GPU

[killster1]

- Nearly the exact same thing happened to me with a Pixel 3a phone I purchased for my wife's birthday.

Bought it a month in advance from the retailer. She opens it up, loves it, goes to go through the set-up... dead screen. Retailer says its outside of the two week in store return policy, so now I have to go through Google. Luckily they authorize a repair on the phone from a local repair shop, but it now has a 90 day refurb warranty, not the 1 year new manufacturer warranty.

Granted the phone has worked for over a year at this point without issue, but this whole incident reminded me why I actually like buying used parts: they're confirmed working and you tend to actually get more buyer protections through something like e-bay and paypal than you do buying something new through a retailer.

Can read my saga here: https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/pixel-4-for-499-or-pixel-3a-for-399.2580078/

i wonder what country you are in. i feel like there is 90 days return here (but maybe its a California thing?) anyway repairing the screen from a local repair shop is not a acceptable outcome for me as they don't ever use the same quality screens (if they can help it). I have learned from my own mistakes and reading these posts over and over about not testing a new item and then worrying about the warranty 3 years later. the Op did purchase from a shakey site if they have since gone down (online has grown not shrank right?) you mention you bought the phone from "the retailer" what store was that?

 

[AnitaPeterson]

[...] the Op did purchase from a shakey site if they have since gone down (online has grown not shrank right?) [...]

Actually, wrong guess. It was a reputable brick-and-mortar independent store, with almost 20 years in the neighbourhood.
It closed because - like many other mom-and-pop operations! - the pandemic killed them.

 

[aigomorla]

It was a reputable brick-and-mortar independent store, with almost 20 years in the neighbourhood.

reputable isnt authorized...
Im a reputable loan bank to my friends, doesn't mean they can report me to the IRS as being a authorized loan broker.

Sorry to hear your loss here OP, i hate ASUS with a passion which is why i stopped buying products from them because there RMA just straight up sucks horrible dog dookie.

But on a good note, its better then Gigabyte, as they would probably have said sure, send the card in, and then physically throw it in the RMA pile in hopes some kind of physical damage will occur and deny your RMA and CHARGE you for the return on top... oh wait.... ASUS does this also.

But seriously, they are going by records of distribution which means your vendor source was denied and not accepted, hence they are going by manufacture date.

Also in cases of COVID, expect more shady RMA practices from 90% of PC parts vendors.
At least its not MSI, where they have even more questionable practices with service, as well as price hiking everything on the bases of "because they can".

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Well, now... An unexpected update!
I just found the following e-mail in my inbox this morning:

"Dear Anita,

My name is XXXX, and I am reaching out to you from the Corporate Customer Care team in the Canada Office. [...]

After reviewing the case with the team, we will accept the warranty service as a one-time courtesy; however, as the product is end of life, we do not have the same model in stock. We are currently checking with the associated department for the possible model suggestion. Meanwhile, can you please provide your mailing address so that we can provide a return material authorization (RMA) to send in the product for the further test?

I will be taking ownership of your case from here until resolution, so should you have additional questions and/or concerns in the meantime, please do not hesitate to contact me directly and I will be more than happy to assist you.

Regards,
XXXX
Team Lead of Customer Service | ASUS Computer International"

 

[aigomorla]

Make sure you DOCUMENT the card with lots of pictures and include them when you mail it in.
I would not hold ASUS unaccountable if they say your card mysteriously came with physical damage.
This can all be rectified if you include pictures of how the card was sent along with the card itself so no monkey business happens in receiving.

 

[Shmee]

Good news! Hopefully you get a good replacement. What GPU was the original?

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Thank you all for the encouragement and good advice!

As to the card model, I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but such is the sorry state of the market... it's a Radeon HD5450.

I know, I know...

But would you believe they're still sold new, even today?

 

[Fallen Kell]

That's alright, I think I have a PowerColor HD5750 SCS3 (passive cooling via 2 slot heatsink) around here somewhere (it was in a HTPC, but I upgraded to a Nvidia 1060 Ti a couple years back). I think I have an AMD R7 250 2GB GDDR3 around somewhere as well (which is basically a HD7750, but with crappier memory).

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Hello everyone,
A much-awaited follow-up.

I received today a replacement for the old card.
And even got a bit of an upgrade in the process: ASUS sent me a silent 6450 instead.
All is well that ends well. Hopefully it shows that persistance pays, if you're in the right.

 

[GodisanAtheist]

Hello everyone,
A much-awaited follow-up.

I received today a replacement for the old card.
And even got a bit of an upgrade in the process: ASUS sent me a silent 6450 instead.
All is well that ends well. Hopefully it shows that persistance pays, if you're in the right.

- You might have just triggered that guy that was complaining about not getting his 5850 upgraded when he sent it in for warranty 12 years later again.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

- You might have just triggered that guy that was complaining about not getting his 5850 upgraded when he sent it in for warranty 12 years later again.

I actually posted the update after I read his rant... and that whole thread made me feel better about my situation.