More Fake GPUs are circulating online marketplaces, which use plastic chips to imitate NVIDIA RTX GPUs and scrap memory dies.
You Need To Be Extra Cautious of Graphics Cards Being Sold Online As NVIDIA RTX Graphics Cards Have Been Spotted With Glued Plastic GPUs
Over the years, we have seen several instances of fake graphics cards appearing online. Most of these graphics cards are sold through online marketplaces, & the region most affected by such products is the Asia Pacific. Previously, we have seen graphics cards with missing components and different GPUs, but this time, scammers have gone an extra mile.
Spotted by a Bilibili tech channel, Chinese scammers are now using fake components on graphics cards, and by fake, we don't mean a dead GPU or an older chip; the entirety of the GPU is made out of plastic. The user was surprised to see such a tactic being used by scammers these days, and it looks real for the most part, unless you tear apart the cooler and take a closer look at the GPU.
The graphics card was an ASUS GeForce RTX 4090, which should've featured the AD102 "Ada" GPU. The chip marking suggested that it was real, and the majority of gamers who can't even take the cooler apart themselves would never notice this. But those who have disassembled a cooler before can clean up the thermal grease off the GPU to reveal that something isn't right.
First of all, the markings aren't of the same font style used by NVIDIA, and even worse is the date of manufacturing, according to which the GPU was produced in 2030. Yeah, this thing came from the future. The user compared the die and its surroundings with a reference "real" image of the chip and found some major discrepancies, such as the missing QR code, and capacitors around the die being in the wrong position.
Upon touching the die (You should never touch a GPU die unless you are sure the GPU is dead), the user felt a difference in the smoothness. And the GPU die itself felt off, which turned out to be correct as the entire chip was made out of plastic, and the labeling was etched over the plastic. Even the memory dies, which looked real were scraps and weren't of any use. This goes on to show just one of the many ways scammers are taking advantage of gamers.
We know that component prices have hit sky-high due to rising AI demand, and everyone is trying to get the latest gaming hardware at lower prices. The user said that the RTX 4090 was listed at 1500 RMB, which equals around $220 US. The price alone should be a sign that something isn't right, as 4090s, even being a year old, are still selling above their $1500 US MSRP. So a word of advise to never trust these low-price deals, and always refrain from buying stuff that doesn't make sense on online marketplaces.
Even official retailers have been shipping dead and fake graphics cards. We have seen several cases of how the graphics card box didn't include the GPU, but had detergent, rocks, and other materials inside. Several scammers have been detained in China, but there are plenty more that are working on such tactics in the shadows.
About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
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