In fact, the graphics card promoting tricksters don’t use opaque ‘paint’ to recoat the reminiscence IC, as that will make the inscriptions unreadable—making potential consumers much more curious. As a substitute, they’ve utilized a really skinny coating of a tinting substance. At round 18-minutes and 20-seconds into the video you’ll be able to see this extraordinarily skinny layer eliminated utilizing a sizzling air station and scalpel. It comes away in ultra-thin flakes. At first you would possibly assume the lettering can be being scratched away, however a brief polish after the tint is eliminated reveals the inscriptions are there and stay extremely legible.
In the course of the course of the video, watchers are supplied with some extra telltale indicators to look out for with used graphics playing cards which may have had a tough life down the crypto mines. If the used graphics card has been completely cleaned there in all probability received’t be mud and grime deposits to examine for, however you’ll be able to search for indicators of use like; guarantee sticker breakages, lacking screws, screw heads with contact put on, oxidised electrical contacts, and apparently the substrate across the GPU will likely be a a lot darker inexperienced with warmth and age (see picture beneath).
One in all our most up-to-date tales relating to the perils of used and ex-mining GPUs involved a batch of used AMD Radeon RX 6900 and 6800 GPUs which had a really excessive price of bodily GPU silicon failure. Please readers, watch out on the market, and if you’re tempted by used merchandise attempt to get them from an institution which gives some form of assure.