How a dead GFX Card is made alive professionally

How a dead GFX Card is made alive professionally.

In this article I will show you how a dead graphics card is repaired. No oven baking, no do-it-yourself type trikes, just a pure professional repairs.
Meet the victim, my old no display, dead ATI-Radeon X1650 graphics card.

*i.imgur.com/SI8zWca.jpg

Removing the heat sink.
*i.imgur.com/CLn2O4k.jpg
*i.imgur.com/ut9h8t7.jpg
*i.imgur.com/NhpdqQx.jpg

Thermal compound on the chip cleaned.
*i.imgur.com/9jmUOhY.jpg

Now circuit board is installed on a BGA chip reflow machine.
*i.imgur.com/6tk9uJW.jpg

Heater head mounted properly.
*i.imgur.com/5H3zvqN.jpg

Machine in action
*i.imgur.com/cG0T5Ji.jpg

Within a minute chip is out.
*i.imgur.com/CEt9EJO.jpg

There is very little space between chip and circuit board approx. 0.1mm still you can see their is dust under the chip. This dust, heat and moisture together sometimes oxides and breaks these fine connection resulting a GPU failure.
*i.imgur.com/AWkM6NW.jpg

Chip is mounted on a reballing mount.
*i.imgur.com/NkbxtO0.jpg

You can see many connection pins have gone black due to dust and oxide layer.
*i.imgur.com/mc7vRX6.jpg

Heat cleaning the chip connection terminal.
*i.imgur.com/F7EYxVq.jpg
*i.imgur.com/6uhe1nJ.jpg
*i.imgur.com/WbBtM7P.jpg
*i.imgur.com/ybGFuqj.jpg

Preparing the chip for new BGA soldering balls. Flux, 0.6mm lead free soldering BGA balls and grid.
*i.imgur.com/VBTOEcs.jpg

Some close look on BGA soldering balls
*i.imgur.com/xV5utqN.jpg
*i.imgur.com/S93ofI0.jpg
*i.imgur.com/4G0kjfs.jpg
*i.imgur.com/VlHrz9H.jpg

Grid aliened, chip ready for reballing.
*i.imgur.com/z2zsxPC.jpg
*i.imgur.com/gj3nyLn.jpg

Ball properly falls into place.
*i.imgur.com/y1t0iNc.jpg

All missed holes are carefully populated with a ball using a fine needle.
*i.imgur.com/Nm4WXkd.jpg

Perfect. New shiny ball are in place. Looks nice
*i.imgur.com/FF6uUNP.jpg
*i.imgur.com/yoDPr7a.jpg

Little heat for removal of any excise flux applied during the ball placement stage.
*i.imgur.com/GcnvL5p.jpg

Now chip is carefully placed back on the circuit and controlled heat is applied for re-soldering.
*i.imgur.com/VOL9EOP.jpg

Perfect chip re-soldering
*i.imgur.com/zhcSpwL.jpg
*i.imgur.com/wPLqIj7.jpg

New thermal compound is applied and heat sink installed.
*i.imgur.com/cGABFAM.jpg
*i.imgur.com/D5oAsXv.jpg

Test system ready. Now is the time that will show whether the GPU is back to life or gone forever.
*i.imgur.com/hlghiZY.jpg

It’s live.. Success.
*i.imgur.com/rtekl9T.jpg
*i.imgur.com/kpUJtA2.jpg

Some GTA san andreas run shows that GPU is 100% fine.

Hope you like this article.

Regards
Rakesh Sharma

Source / More Info

R

Nice educative article ,
From which place similar repairs are done ?
what was the expense ?
Are you working in this field?

B

Great stuff mate! Is this your job or hobby?

By profession I am a Software Developer. But this is my hobby.

This looks like a very old card.
how old is this article?

So the reason gpu dies is because of dust ? this , this changes everything

Nerevarine said:
So the reason gpu dies is because of dust ? this , this changes everything

Oxidation and quick change in temperature with time, sometimes breaks these fine connection. Dust increases this process.

Dust also reduces the thermal efficiency of heatsink.

This is according to my experience. what i have personally seen and fixed.

You did this in Jodhpur?

Good article for repairing dead GPU

but not everyone will have the required machines for DIY

btw u own the repair machine ?

harshilsharma63 said:
You did this in Jodhpur?

Yes in Jodhpur.

R

What is the expenses you incurred for this?
Normally whom should I contact for similar works

Where in Jodhpur did you do this?

I dont own this machine, But have a full access to it. that too on Sundays only.

So, will it be possible to repair out of warranty graphics cards like this in any commercial place ?

Yes Only if problem is not with the chip If chip is kaput than nothing can be done.. Cos Nvidia and AMD sell their chips to OEMs only, no replacement chip is available in market.

impressive :clap2: