Piece broke off my 8800 GTS

[locherbread]

Ok my MSI gfx cardwas so large it was a tight fit into the tower I have, when I took it out 6 months later just to give it a dusting | noticed a part was slack, not sure what you call it, a capacitor I think in this pic its the tubular bit bottom tight next to the fan

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/fullimage.php?image=6596

after I tried to get the card back in it fell off but when I booted up everything ran as normal, tried a few games & all still worked, the solder pads are still on the card, can I get this capacitor soldered back on, will it run perfectly ok for another 6 months without it on..

any advice would be appreciated

 

[agentsmith957]

If the card is still under warantee, RMA it immediately! Dont mess with it further. If the RMA is up, and you feel like your soldering skills are up to par enough, then you might want to try to solder it back on. Otherwise, I wouldn't reccomend running it without the capacitor. The reason it still runs in working order is most likely due to the fact that this capacitor is used as a voltage stabilizer or some other non-(immediate)-essential function, however running the card without it may put stress over time on other parts of the card and damage it further. Getting the card repaired now will make it more likely that it wont fail beyond repair later.

 

[crusoe74]

Definitely RMA it. If it wasn't needed they wouldn't put it there. You're just asking it to go bang at a later date otherwise.

I've heard a few of these comments before, interesting that Nvidia now totally encloses all their top cards with a plastic sheath. Maybe this is quite common?