Bought a used 980 - might be a re-clad 780, help!

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jeffler383

jeffler383

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So I ended up purchasing a 980 from ebay advertised as used/refurbished off a well established seller with thousands of positive reviews. They offer a return, so while i was a little aprehensive i figured I'd give it a shot.

Well, the card arrived and looked for all intents and purposes exactly like my current evga 980 sc acx 2.0 and i was looking forward to sli. it was advertised used so i wasnt expecting mint condition, but the first thing i noticed were the outputs on the back are a little different and the power connectors are a 6 pin and 8 pin, unlike the 2 6-pin connectors on my current one.

I couldn't find the sli ribbon that came with my mobo but i went ahead and plugged it in just to get the fit right and relocate my wireless adapter until i get a chance to get to my buddies shop tomorrow to grab a rinbon and an 8 pin adapter, but when i fired up my computer the wireless adapter was no longer working in the slot i moved it to. I open up device manager and i see the 980 listed but also a 780???? Keep in mind theres no power to this thing since i didnt have an 8 pin adapter.

I went back on my phone and looked at some pictures of the evga 780 sc with the acx cooler and it looks very similar to my 980, with the exception of the 6 pin plus an 8 pin connector, just like this one. Can the computer read the hardware just from being plugged into the pcie slot, without power running to it?

Thanks for any input. If i got ripped off this is going back and I'll be tearing that seller a new one.
 
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Use GPU-Z to get the device ID. That will tell you exactly what it is.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

 
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jeffler383

jeffler383

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good idea, I did and sure enough it's showing up as a 780.

It's weird though - it's still shows 4gb of memory and the clock speeds are different.
 
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jeffler383

jeffler383

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I'm at work at the moment but I'll definitely get some later. I got one on my phone of the first page that I'll try to upload on the mobile site.

I had a thought - because there's no power plugged into the second card, could gupz recognize it as a 780 because it's plugged into the PCIe slot but still show the rest of the specs that were previously shown from the 980?
 
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junkeymonkey

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this goes on at like ebay for a long time called ''gray market cards ''

[example ]

http://forums.evga.com/EVGA-Precision-Reporting-a-Different-Card-Model-m2443493.aspx

http://wccftech.com/fake-nvidia-graphic-cards-flood-world-markets/

that's the risk you take from ''unauthorized'' sellers nothing new here its just you got hosed

take old or lesser cards and ''convert'' them to what seems a higher end / models .. goes on all the time
 
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jeffler383

jeffler383

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That's some very good info and something I'll keep in mind the next time I decide to go used. I know scams happen all the time, which is why I picked a seller with a very high rating, read a lot of their reviews and offered returns. Hopefully they'll accept the return with no fuss, and if not I have Ebay's money back guarantee and I paid using paypal, so there's a few layers to go through if they press the issue.

Next time I'll just buy new, or refurbished direct from someone like Newegg. for something as important as a GPU it's not worth taking the gamble.
 
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jeffler383

jeffler383

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They included a little strip of paper saying thank you for the order and had a number to call for any customer service issues, left a message and submitted the return request on Ebay. Apparently Ebay wont step in until the 29th, hopefully it wont take that long. Seems to me written communication would be better so there's a record of it, I'll post updates as I get them.

Who woulda thought, that seller has been in business for 4 years and has almost 100% positive feedback over 1000+ reviews. I thought I did my research but you never know, live and learn.
 
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junkeymonkey

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''has been in business for 4 years and has almost 100% positive feedback over 1000+ reviews''

was this not a thing at ebay on how that get manipulated..

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Archive-Feedback/Can-a-seller-fake-positive-feedback-ratings/qaq-p/3791991

with something like this I can make my ebay store look real good fast

http://www.feedbackgenerators.com/

''and low and behold, the seller had gone back to 100% positive''

Read more: http://www.city-data.com/forum/shopping-consumer-products/903500-ebay-removed-my-negative-feedback-seller.html#ixzz46x6I4BWw


I going to add this to my old post here

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2963880/buying-bay-risk.html
 
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jeffler383

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You couldn't be more right - I just got a return message from the seller offering a partial refund and letting me keep the card, claims they buy these second hand from returns to major retailers and someone else must have swapped everything out before they got it (yeah right). At least they're responding.

A buddy of mine is telling me not to fret too much since Ebay almost always sides with the buyer; he's run into people trying to pull stuff like this before and he's always got his money back. I sure hope so.
 
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jeffler383

jeffler383

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Good news! The seller accepted the return through Ebay and sent a return label to print, so I will be out 0 dollars.

He also (amusingly) asked if there was any way I could check the gigabyte rating and let him know so he doesn't re-list it again incorrectly, which at least gives me the impression they honestly didn't know what they were selling, or that they're trying to save face. I'll never buy from them again because they obviously didn't do their due diligence before listing an item for sale, but at least they're giving me my money back and not trying to fight it.
 
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junkeymonkey

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I guess like the windforce the only thing ti separate them is buy that sticker just above there golden fingers ?? [looking at these pics?] I don't know ?? maybe a mistake maybe you just caught him ??

[780]
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4621#ov

[980/970]
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007709%2050001314%20600536050%20600536049&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&CompareItemList=48%7C14%2D125%2D696%5E14%2D125%2D696%2C14%2D125%2D685%5E14%2D125%2D685%2C14%2D125%2D684%5E14%2D125%2D684&percm=14%2D125%2D696%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24%3B14%2D125%2D685%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24%3B14%2D125%2D684%3A%24%24%24%24%24%24%24


as long as he giving you full satisfaction I guess its good ??

let us know how well the evga and the gigabyte card sli together if at all ?? [just can be ''funny'' mixing brands and 900 cards ]

 
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jeffler383

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I'd really rather get 2 of the exact same cards - I wouldn't be worried about using SLI with 2 different brands but 1: I'm kind of showing off this build so I want it to look nice and 2: the EVGA 980 that I've been using has already blown all my expectations away so I'd like to stick with the same kind.
 
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junkeymonkey

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I was just going to add this for like a example

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/sli-cannot-be-enabled-with-980gtx-of-different-brands.211043/

[figures crossed ]

and why true sli guys use reference cards as well .. NVidia reference is NVidia reference no matter what brand aftermarket don't have to adhere to full NVidia specs
 
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jeffler383

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I'd like to see your source on that info stating aftermarket manufacturers dont have to adhere to full nvidia specs. In the meantime I'll direct you to this thread here where the differences between reference and non reference are discussed in detail:

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2145935/difference-nvidia-reference-card-reference-card-780ti.html

it's been demonstrated over and over that 2 cards with the same chipset from different manufacturers can be sli'd together. the example you linked could have been a number of different things and was never definitively resolved in that thread - there are also plenty of instances where 2 cards of the exact same type dont function in sli because something is broken somewhere.

 
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junkeymonkey

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Furthermore, as we mentioned in our GTX 980 review, GTX 970 has been a pure virtual (no reference card) launch, which means all of NVIDIA’s partners are launching their custom cards right out of the gate. A lot of these have been recycled or otherwise only slightly modified GTX 700/600 series designs, owing to the fact that GM204’s memory bus has been held at 256-bits and its power requirements are so low.
[Anandtech .com]


dude its all over and why there aftermarket that don't mean NVidia reference ?? come on then whay so many with that issue like I linked from techpowerup ?? plenty like it out there

but all you can do is what you feel is best and if it works , hay great reference stays reference after market can change with out notice even in the same model memory bios's pcb layout any of that can affect how your sli may work or not work

and this aint the ''good old days'' anymore and lot of 900 cards fall in to this


good luck

In my personal experience, no. Maybe it was another fault but I couldn't find it.

I have two EVGA GTX 970 SCs now but before Christmas I bought an MSI Twin Frozr V 970* and when I tried to SLI them it wouldn't recognize the SLI bridge.

Each card worked separately fine and although I couldn't test the SLI bridge at the time I know now it wasn't the bridge as it works on my two identical cards. Wasn't the drivers either as I tested multiple drivers and the driver I was using at the time worked on the EVGA cards.

I've heard that Nvidia didn't keep all the IDs the same across 900 series cards and that's why this happens. It might work for you, all I can tell you is it didn't for me.


''I've heard that Nvidia didn't keep all the IDs the same across 900 series cards''

its not NVidia its the aftermarket cards venders not NVidia reference thay stay the same so your covered

you know soon enough and why you see guys using that diffsli program to make them now work

I know what I see know and would do falls under been there done that 900 cards are ''funny'' and they may do this to help insure you buy ''there'' 2 cards --


as I say you can only do as you feel is best for you

good luck

one more for you

'' they're reference designs then there should be no problem. The issue comes in when mixing cards that use custom PCBs and power profiles. As I said, the timings on Maxwell are a lot tighter than they used to be, so any variation in power design is going to cause issues.''


https://hardforum.com/threads/2-gtx-970s-sli-wont-work.1837444/

 
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Vellinious

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The EVGA 970s had issues with SLI compatiblity with other manufacturer's GPUs. Even their own. The ACX 2.0 970 wasn't SLI compatible with the ACX 2.0+. This isn't usually the case, but with the redesign midstream on the EVGA GPUs, because of the design flaws around supplied power it caused issues.

This wasn't a problem before, and likely won't be an issue again....unless NVIDIA comes out with Pascal and claims extremely low TDP and power limit thresholds, only to find out, their microsecond flashes into very high power ranges, were causing huge problems. Like with the first run 970s.....

If you're basing your opinion on SLI with custom PCBs on the 970s, specifically the EVGA 970s, your thought process is flawed. = )
 
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Vellinious

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I bought 2, actually. They're great cards...just takes some coaxing and some know how. I also have owned a 980, and now have an 8GB 290X. I overclock them, run them to the ragged edge and then move on. I just haven't updated my sig in a while. lol

The 980s shouldn't have a problem with SLI. And certainly not an issue if you buy the same model. Why you'd put different models of GPUs together in SLI is beyond me anyway, but....eh. To each their own. My point, however, still stands. The reference model cards have a "special place" in the market....usually, it's with people that don't know any better, are early adopters, or aren't overclocking.
 
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