RTX 5060 Ti survives car crash after being bent in half — short PCB saves the day, single memory chip resolder restore full performance
What happens when a graphics card gets in a car crash? If you're lucky, the damage is limited to just cosmetic scars that can go away over time with no serious damage under-the-hood.
An unexpected customer in China bought the AX Gaming RTX 5060 Ti and soon after experienced a serious car crash that not only totaled their vehicle but also severely damaged the GPU. Remarkably, the driver emerged unharmed and the GPU survived the ordeal, bent in half but intact. Brother Zhang, a technician, took charge of repairing the GPU and was met with a visually unrepairable exterior.
The backplate and cooler were completely destroyed, leaving only the PCB as the sole viable component. Thankfully, this particular iteration of the 5060 Ti utilized a short PCB that managed to survive the impact. After inspecting the power rails for any short circuits, Brother Zhang successfully tested the GPU with its bare PCB, confirming its functionality.
To keep the card cool during the repair process, he devised a makeshift cooler using the bent fin stack and two 120mm fans strapped on with zip ties. However, when attempting to install drivers, the system crashed, indicating instability. Brother Zhang inspected the PCB further and discovered that the memory module near the edge of the board had been compromised due to torque.
After resoldering the memory module, the card was recognized as a 5060 Ti with its full 8GB of VRAM. Brother Zhang conducted a series of stability tests, including Furmark and a 3DMark loop, and the GPU performed admirably, running at 67°C with no visual artifacts and achieving a high stability score of 98.9% during PCIe 5.0 x8 link speeds. The RTX 5060 Ti had indeed survived its traumatic experience.
Written by urgent.news from Tom's Hardware's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
