Just how important is warranty?

[kitnoman]

I never really thought about it until now. I have two stores that can offer me the same brand/model of gpu, the price difference is around $16, but the cheaper one only has 1yr of store warranty and the one with the higher price is 2yrs. I never had any experience that I needed to RMA pass the warranty period yet. But that's point of warranty right, you never really need it until you do. I would be getting 3, so it adds up. Is $16 for another 1yr of warranty worth it?

[Chris Pratt]

Probably not. 1 year warranties are so common in consumer electronics precisely because it is almost always sufficient to cover actual manufacturing defects. While there's exceptions to every rule, if your graphics card survives a year, it will continue to thrive, as long as you don't use or abuse it in such a way that would prematurely end its life. However, such usage almost certainly wouldn't be covered by a warranty anyways.

 

[dilpickle]

No one can predict the future. Warranty/insurance feels like a waste of money until you need it.

 

I know that doesn't answer your question because there really isn't an answer.

[BiotechBen]

The way it was taught to me:

How much do you bill your time at hourly: C

Cost of extra: V

Time spent resolving issue or worrying about issue because you didn't get extra: B

If V<B•C, get the extra.

[kitnoman]

Personally, I view the warranty as a feature. I bought used gpus before that does not even have warranty, but cheaper. So I guess I'm just contemplating if a $16 extra for an additional year of warrant is worth it. I RMA cpus, mouse and headset before, but it was all under the 1st year period. I mean as you guys pointed out, almost everything that could break a gpu due to poor usage, has a high possibility of not being covered by the warranty. So my question now is if you guys had any experience where a manufacture defect or design flaw only showed up or discovered after a year, specifically for gpu?

[Robchil]

In Norway it is 5 years consumer warranty on production failures by law, more or less, i've used that on a GPU before and got full refund, and since i bought 2 cards, if 50% or more than a deal is returned due to manifacturing failure, the complete deal can be refunded and returned, so i got both cards refunded .. 

not saying that is what you have there, but the failures came after almost 2 years, i would go for the 2 year warranty. 

[kitnoman]

1 hour ago, Robchil said:

In Norway it is 5 years consumer warranty on production failures by law, more or less, i've used that on a GPU before and got full refund, and since i bought 2 cards, if 50% or more than a deal is returned due to manifacturing failure, the complete deal can be refunded and returned, so i got both cards refunded .. 

not saying that is what you have there, but the failures came after almost 2 years, i would go for the 2 year warranty. 

Thanks, I guess $16 isn't that much, even if I end up not needing it. ahahah but now I have a different issue. The store listed another brand, that's $20 cheaper. So now I'm researching reviews to compare the two models, as I really want to buy one tomorrow. lol

[jones177]

Before the 30 series I had 1 in 10 cards fail and had to be RMAed.  Both were between 2 and 3 years from new so I need a 3 year warranty.