Linus Tech Tips (LTT) has tried to clear the misperception of purchasing used crypto-mining graphics cards which might be as good as used GPUs.
Is purchasing a used crypto-mining graphics card a bad idea? Linus Tech Tips thinks that it may not!
Over the last few years, it was mostly reported that graphics cards that were used to mine crypto were overstressed and came with an increasingly shortened lifespan. It was consistently warned to stay away from any miner’s GPUs. However, LTT tried to prove this theory wrong by putting to test roughly 25 mining cards against the team’s reference cards which had been used normally.
Linus Tech Tips anonymously purchased used crypto-mining graphics cards over the last year and were some of the higher used GPUs for mining. Several NVIDIA partners’ RTX 3060, 3070, and 3080 GPUs, along with AMD partner Radeon RX 5700 XT graphics cards, were used for the test.
Two cards were omitted from the testing almost immediately out of the nineteen cards purchased. The two removed were the Gigabyte Eagle RTX 3060 OC graphics card and the Sapphire Pulse RX 5700 XT GPU. The dismissal of these two cards was due to incredibly low clock speeds, which, in turn, created high temperatures in both cards. The temperatures of the two graphics cards were above 100°C. However, Linus further tested the cards by checking the VRAM on the Gigabyte Eagle RTX 3060 OC GPU, and the result was poor. The Sapphire RX 5700 XT failed the Kombustor test but performed well during gaming benchmarks against all other used GPUs.
All cards performed well against the LTT’s own cards proving that purchasing used crypto-mining cards is not a terrible option. The video not only showed that the graphics cards were no different from GPUs used by gamers but also was an educational video on what to look for, how to approach it, and why purchasing a used graphics card is a better option than paying corporations large amounts of money for graphics cards that would have eventually ended its life in a landfill.
Several steps were suggested by Linus, such as checking return policy information if purchasing in person, shaking the cards to see if anything is loose, looking the graphics cards over for damage, and even testing the cards on the spot if you are purchasing in person from someone of a local online marketplace, such as Facebook Marketplace. Then he discusses the effect of purchasing used compared to new, which could be looked at in various ways. Questions of environmental dangers of throwing away products and not reusing technology to keep our planet cleaner, to not giving giant corporations more of our money.
An overly used AMD Radeon RX 6000 GPU in mining ended up cracking its silicon die. (Image Credits; Kris-Fix)
Despite all of this, there are crypto miners who are offloading old stock as new by using clever deceiving tactics like painting memory dies to make them look new or flashing the BIOS of completely different GPUs on inferior products. Recently, it was reported that several AMD graphics cards were showing up with broken GPU silicon and that only turned out to be the cause of mining as the cards had been kept in a very humid environment which led to the issue. So even if a certain mining card runs fine for a few days, it is entirely possible that it won’t last long.
Regardless of which side you stand on, if you are considering purchasing a used graphics card in the future, watch the video and follow some of the steps taken by Linus Tech Tips, as the information is quite valid. Always ensure that you, as the consumer, do not end up losing hundreds of dollars by being a more intelligent and educated consumer.
The post LTT Shows Mining Graphics Cards Are (Mostly) As Good As Used Gaming GPUs But Buyers Should Still Be Catious by Jason R. Wilson appeared first on Wccftech.
