This is my life now - or how My Radeon R9 380 died

[Bigun]

So, I have two identical setups for me and the Mrs.  We both have a Radeon R9 380 in each of our machines.  They are a little older, they are a little slower, but for the gaming we do, it's enough.... up until yesterday afternoon.

 

My wife was watching some Netflix when she said her screen went black.  When I got home I saw some BSOD screen (see attachment).  For the purpose of googling it was a Stop code: VIDEO TDR FAILURE.  What failed:  amdkmdag.sys.  

 

It kept rebooting into a cycle of black screen for a while, BSOD, then an option to either troubleshoot or reboot.

 

Going into BIOS I saw a yellow stripe artifact across both screens.

To put the nail into the coffin, I swapped the cards between me and my wife's machine - at that point mine started exhibiting the same behavior, while hers booted and started working as expected.

So now, I'm left with a choice.  Pay scalper prices for a new GPU or not game... right?  Oh hell no, I'm trying to fix this, besides, I'm single income with kids and still married - I have no extra money to speak of.

I removed the front cooler, backplate, heatsinks on the top, and anything insulating the card.  Cranked the oven to 370F (convection on), propped the card on aluminum balls inside of a cast iron skillet, and put it in for 20 minutes.

 

After baking I pulled it out, put everything back together, and put it in the PC - it worked.

 

Then this morning, I boot it up and it stopped working again - same behavior as before.

 

Story isn't over - since I have nothing to lose, I'm going to do 390F for 22 minutes.  Will report back.

Just documenting progress just in case someone else goes through this and wishes to fix their Radeon card of a similar model.  I'm hoping for success.

 

edit:

(SPOILER WARNING - it's dead)

 

[Bad5ector]

I mean best of luck, but the oven only helps if there is a poor solder joint. What you are describing sounds like bad GPU or VRAM. Something that no matter how much baking you do will fix. 

 

Hopefully though I am wrong here and you are successful with 390.

[Levent]

• Temperatures are too low to make any difference.
• Reflowing is a precise operation, cranking your oven to maximum and letting it sit there only burns the plastics, believe me I know.
• If you want this card to work, just send it to someone who repairs cards and has knowledge, experience and tools to do so.

 

[Bigun]

4 minutes ago, Levent said:

• Temperatures are too low to make any difference.
• Reflowing is a precise operation, cranking your oven to maximum and letting it sit there only burns the plastics, believe me I know.
• If you want this card to work, just send it to someone who repairs cards and has knowledge, experience and tools to do so.

 

I have a heat gun for doing board level soldering, I just have no idea where I need to attempt to reflow on the board.  So I was attempting a "shotgun" approach.

So I guess the RAM chips and the processor?  What temps should I aim for?

[Bad5ector]

5 minutes ago, Bigun said:

So I guess the RAM chips and the processor?  What temps should I aim for?

Don't think you need to reflow, but hey my only experience is with PS3 yellow light of death repairs. It either worked or it didn't. If your card is working but has artifacts when in BIOS, I don't think a reflow will fix as in my limited experience, if the solder joint is broken and not connecting on any of the GPU/RAM chips, it will just not work.

[Bigun]

2 minutes ago, Bad5ector said:

Don't think you need to reflow, but hey my only experience is with PS3 yellow light of death repairs. It either worked or it didn't. If your card is working but has artifacts when in BIOS, I don't think a reflow will fix as in my limited experience, if the solder joint is broken and not connecting on any of the GPU/RAM chips, it will just not work.

What gives me some pause was the initial re-flow attempt and that fact it booted, and started a 3D accelerated game with no issues.  Again, you may be right, but the card is garbage anyway.

[Bad5ector]

Really, you have nothing to lose at this point eh?

 

Worst case Ontario, I have an old AMD 280x I think it is? 2GB, that is just collecting dust. If you want it and pay the shipping, she's yours.

[Bigun]

2 minutes ago, Bad5ector said:

Really, you have nothing to lose at this point eh?

 

Worst case Ontario, I have an old AMD 280x I think it is? 2GB, that is just collecting dust. If you want it and pay the shipping, she's yours.

I honestly may take you up on that anyway, even if I get my card working.  My little girl plays Minecraft and would love it.  PM me please.

[Bigun]

Ok yeah, I did it proper this time.  Some "no-clean" flux, a surface level soldering heat gun, etc.  I went over every RAM chip and the CPU at 260C then at 400C just to make sure and...

Nothing worked, same exact issue.  The card is dead.

 

If anyone can figure out how to fix this issue (and to clarify, this is a hardware issue), I'd love a walkthru.

[Bigun]

So I'm running @Bad5ector's old card, and it works close enough for me to play some DbD.  Many, many props to him. 

Also I'd like to point out that I have record of me buying my card in 2015, and to re-purchase the card today, used, on eBay, would have cost just as much as it did in 2015.

 

With a functional card in my computer, I'm going to be a little more ballsy with the fix on my old card this afternoon.  Going to attempt to reflow the memory chips and the GPU.... again.

[Bad5ector]

Glad it was good enough as a stop gap solution!! Cheers. 

[Bigun]

Yup, tried multiple times to revive the card - it's effectively dead.  Are dead GPU's worth selling for parts in this market?