Say it ain't so - I "Bent" my 8GB MSI RX 570.

[VirtualLarry]

Well, I was trying to get a Gammaxx 400 heatsink on, and the stupid lever attachment really sucks. I was pressing down on it, and trying to attach it with my case vertically, with my two video cards below my CPU heatsink, and I ended up pressing on my card while it's in the slot.

The card on top (my primary) isn't dead, really, nor is the slot. But now I get "glitches" in the HDMI 2.0 output, and the bottom inch of the screen kind of flashes, sometimes there are lines that flash in the middle. Kind of basically like 2D static artifacting. I'm wondering, if I broke a VRAM trace, or most likely, damaged a trace or soldered connection on the HDMI output. Another possibility is, it was just the time for that (higher-end) HDMI 2.0 cable to go bad on me, and I just need to replace the cable. Hard to tell, at this point.

I guess that I'll try swapping in another cable, before I declare the card dead/damaged, but my hopes in that regard aren't good. The card does seem a little bit "bent" downwards. This is (I guess?) what happens when you don't have a back-plate, like my XFX 4GB RX 570 cards do. (I think that the build quality of the XFX cards are generally top-notch.)

Edit: I did try unscrewing the bracket, removing the card (with power off), and plugged it back in and screwing it back down, it still does the artifacting, and looks slightly bent, compared to the bracket.

 

[ao_ika_red]

Well, I was trying to get a Gammaxx 400 heatsink on, and the stupid lever attachment really sucks. I was pressing down on it, and trying to attach it with my case vertically, with my two video cards below my CPU heatsink, and I ended up pressing on my card while it's in the slot.

The card on top (my primary) isn't dead, really, nor is the slot. But now I get "glitches" in the HDMI 2.0 output, and the bottom inch of the screen kind of flashes, sometimes there are lines that flash in the middle. Kind of basically like 2D static artifacting. I'm wondering, if I broke a VRAM trace, or most likely, damaged a trace or soldered connection on the HDMI output. Another possibility is, it was just the time for that (higher-end) HDMI 2.0 cable to go bad on me, and I just need to replace the cable. Hard to tell, at this point.

I guess that I'll try swapping in another cable, before I declare the card dead/damaged, but my hopes in that regard aren't good. The card does seem a little bit "bent" downwards. This is (I guess?) what happens when you don't have a back-plate, like my XFX 4GB RX 570 cards do. (I think that the build quality of the XFX cards are generally top-notch.)

Edit: I did try unscrewing the bracket, removing the card (with power off), and plugged it back in and screwing it back down, it still does the artifacting, and looks slightly bent, compared to the bracket.

First rule of installing Gammaxx 400 is remove everything nears it (DIMMs, GPU, fan cables, etc). Its retention system is so ancient, brute force is the only solution.

 

[VirtualLarry]

First rule of installing Gammaxx 400 is remove everything nears it (DIMMs, GPU, fan cables, etc). Its retention system is so ancient, brute force is the only solution.

Yep. Learned that the Hard Way.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Curiouser and curiouser... either I "bent" both cards, or I scratched the mobo around the socket area, or I'm just not having good luck with HDMI 2.0 on this particular PC. (Maybe my TV's input is damaged?)

It doesn't appear that the visual anomalies appear only with the top card. And I would have had to really have mangled the top card, to have bent the card below it, I think.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I'm not so sure that this was in fact some sort of physical damage. I'm now suspecting some sort of software or other RF noise issue, possibly from a strained and now failing PSU (ground-plane noise?).

I move that PC, from one 40" 4K UHD "station" (desk with cubby) to another. Same brand/model APC "pure sine" 1350VA battery-backup, same model display.

One thing about these "Avera" 4K TVs, is that you have to set HDMI to "Enhanced" to allow for the greater bandwidth (HDMI2.0), and 4:4:4 Chroma sub-sampling @ 4K60, at least with my RX 570 cards. Otherwise, they default to 4:2:0 @ 4K60, in the Displays page in Radeon Settings app.

I checked, and before changing the input setting, it was NOT doing this (this being the HDMI noise) in 4:2:0 mode / "HDMI: Standard". With "HDMI: Enhanced" and 4:4:4, it started doing it again.

So I'm not sure what's really going on here, if it's a design defect issue, or what.

I did notice, that it was doing it with BOTH cards, both the top and bottom one, when I switched the outputs and booted.

So, even if there was flexure of the top card, I don't think that it could have affected the lower one, and yet, it's showing symptoms that way too. But not if the TV's HDMI is set to "Standard" and not "Enhanced", in which case the AMD RX 570 is running in 4:2:0 Chroma mode @ 4K60.