If you think youre having a bad day....

[FreedomEclipse]

This guy lost 22TB of data because his replacement power supply from evga had a different pinout to the old one. He reused the old modular cables and it murdered all his hard drives when he hooked everything up and powered on

EVGA power supply allegedly kills 22TB of customer storage — revised model from RMA had a different pin layout and killed all SATA-powered devices

The vendor changed the SATA pin layout on the EVGA GQ 1000W, which isn't compatible with previous power cables.

www.tomshardware.com

 

[dgianstefani]

This guy lost 22TB of data because his replacement power supply from evga had a different pinout to the old one. He reused the old modular cables and it murdered all his hard drives when he hooked everything up and powered on

EVGA power supply allegedly kills 22TB of customer storage — revised model from RMA had a different pin layout and killed all SATA-powered devices

The vendor changed the SATA pin layout on the EVGA GQ 1000W, which isn't compatible with previous power cables.

www.tomshardware.com

To expand on this, the replacement PSU was the same model, and EVGA's own guidance on warranty returns tells the customer to keep and reuse the cables, as they will not return sent in cables with the replacement PSU.

Posted about this in the staff chat, shocked me too, considering how respected EVGA is in the community.

 

[LabRat 891]

To expand on this, the replacement PSU was the same model, and EVGA's own guidance on warranty returns tells the customer to keep and reuse the cables, as they will not return sent in cables with the replacement PSU.

Posted about this in the staff chat, shocked me too, considering how respected EVGA is in the community.

If eVGA literally instructs this, then the poor guy is 100% not at fault.
Seems to be a lawsuit even an ambulance chaser might take and win.
Which, could still be 'cheaper' for eVGA vs. paying for data recovery on 22TB of nuked SSDs/HDDs.

Guess eVGA is gonna 'fade out' w/ a bang.

Update:
https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/comments/1bjsvkm

Yeah... eVGA is not handling this well. They are 110% responsible and liable, and are trying to push-off responsibility to "warranty" on the drives.
Which, is downright malicious: eVGA is literally asking the affected customer to violate warranty terms and commit fraud!

 

[thesmokingman]

Yea EVGA is at fault via proxy. Their supplier changing pin outs for cost or x reason and not announcing said change, then EVGA not being proactive about it. Eh, middle management and the awesomeness of suppliers. I wonder if EVGA has plastered this warning out on their site yet or are they gonna be lazy ass and let a bunch of users get burned first?

 

[LabRat 891]

Yea EVGA is at fault via proxy. Their supplier changing pin outs for cost or x reason and not announcing said change, then EVGA not being proactive about it. Eh, middle management and the awesomeness of suppliers. I wonder if EVGA has plastered this warning out on their site yet or are they gonna be lazy ass and let a bunch of users get burned first?

I'd put my money on:
"The odds of another RMA scenario like this are so low, we'll just ignore it"

Fact is, this event is very indicative of eVGA 'falling the F apart':
-Left Hand's not talking to the Right Hand. -Completely incompetent management and support training, etc.

 

[Jetster]

I could see how this would happen. Especially when they RMA the PSU and do not want the cables back. Just the PSU (this is the policy)

But who has 22Tb and doesn't back up?

 

[thesmokingman]

But who has 22Tb and doesn't back up?

Some like to learn lessons the hard way.

 

[LabRat 891]

Some like to learn lessons the hard way.

Not Wrong.
However, if it's 22TB of Video Games and streaming/let's play Footage, it was likely considered 'non-vital' (replaceable) data.

 

[Jetster]

If it just fried the PCB on the drive you could still get the data? Just use a new board, maybe

 

[LabRat 891]

If it just fry the board on the drive you could still get the data? Just use a new board

A. with HDDs, that's still very expensive work.
B. with SSDs, power-related 'failure' can have downstream consequences for the NAND. (Esp. QLC w/ its insanely sensitive R/W voltages)

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Well it's not like the new one came without cables so somewhere along the line it's the users fault for not using the pretty new cables.

Who changes an outpin for a sata or hdd cable lol seems pretty silly change to me or correcting a defect but then again GQ wtf I never got into evga psu labeling frankly.

 

[LabRat 891]

Hi,
Well it's not like the new one came without cables so somewhere along the line it's the users fault for not using the pretty new cables.

Who changes an outpin for a sata or hdd cable lol seems pretty silly change to me or correcting a defect but then again GQ wtf I never got into evga psu labeling frankly.

EVGA's own guidance on warranty returns tells the customer to keep and reuse the cables

Can't be the dude's fault, if he was merely following instructions from eVGA.

eVGA told him to re-use the cables.
eVGA is now telling him to defraud the manufacturers of his drives.

This is entirely on eVGA, not the end user.

As an aside this kinda F'up happens in the automotive industry, too.
Parts get revised mid-production for a model year or have undocumented changes within the same generation.

Ex.
(IIRC) There's a year-range of VW Jetta that mounts the Manual Transaxle at a different angle. The Technical Manuals dealers reference, do not note this change, and dealers underfill the Transmission.
-leading to premature wear/failure.

 

[KedsDead]

I currently have a 850GQ and had a 1000GQ in a server rig I donated to our local LAN party host, years back.. I have swapped that PSU out in this case a few times before giving it away. I think the drives issue might have been lingering from when the original PSU died.

 

[LabRat 891]

I currently have a 850GQ and had a 1000GQ in a server rig I donated to our local LAN party host, years back.. I have swapped that PSU out in this case a few times before giving it away. I think the drives issue might have been lingering from when the original PSU died.

The pin out is changed. He later verified w/ DMM

Most importantly, eVGA admitted they changed the pinout.

 

[natr0n]

When you're gonna use a new psu should remove drives and stuff always be cautious.

I have a bag of modular cables from TT i was tempted to see if they would work but now nope.

 

[dgianstefani]

Hi,
Well it's not like the new one came without cables so somewhere along the line it's the users fault for not using the pretty new cables.

Who changes an outpin for a sata or hdd cable lol seems pretty silly change to me or correcting a defect but then again GQ wtf I never got into evga psu labeling frankly.

The new ones do come without cables, it's a warranty replacement, not a full retail one.

 

[LabRat 891]

When you're gonna use a new psu should remove drives and stuff always be cautious.

Not wrong, but....

The new ones do come without cables, it's a warranty replacement, not a full retail one.

When you're both instructed and restricted by the Responsible 1st Party (that's brand is all over the product) against 'good practice', what is someone to do?

Most people are of the mind: "Well, they engineered/sold it, they must know best."

 

[ThrashZone]

The new ones do come without cables, it's a warranty replacement, not a full retail one.

Hi,
I've done evga rma on a 1200P2 and it came with new cables in sealed box just as though I bought new.

 

[Dragam1337]

Not Wrong.
However, if it's 22TB of Video Games and streaming/let's play Footage, it was likely considered 'non-vital' (replaceable) data.

Indeed, i only backup vital data... which is a fraction of the total amount of data i got.

 

[Jetster]

Hi,
I've done evga rma on a 1200P2 and it came with new cables in sealed box just as though I bought new.

You got lucky, sometimes they don't have a refurbished unit available

 

[damric]

hah my stepson was lazy and toasted his new EVGA PSU because he didn't change the modular cables like I told him to. I fully expected it to be a problem because he was going from a SUPERFLOWER-based 550W EVGA to an FSP-based 750W EVGA. On further examination I saw that he also managed to hammer the different shaped pins into the wrong shaped holes on other end. I did not help him after that, and he even tried to RMA it to EVGA but they rejected him like they could smell that he was a dumbass through his email message. I've still got the Platinum 750W unit in a box in my office but it would obviously need a new fuse soldered on if anyone wants to give it a try.

 

[cvaldes]

PSU warranty replacements do not come with cables. When you send in a PSU for warranty repair, they instruct you to just send the PSU and to keep your cables.

It was EVGA's responsibility to know that the warranty replacement unit was a revved model with a different pinout, provide new cables, and explicitly instruct the warranty claimant to discard the old PSU cables.

There really shouldn't be any debate about this. There are consumer protection laws that cover this sort of thing and not just for PC components.

If your car's engine blows up after your mechanic replaced the spark plugs, that wouldn't really be considered acceptable, would it?

 

[ThrashZone]

You got lucky, sometimes they don't have a refurbished unit available

Hi,
IDK the full evga warranty replacement terms deal maybe so as you say but refurbished are sold as B-stock at a discount to the public as far as I do know.

 

[cvaldes]

Again, consumer protection laws prevent companies from downgrading you when issuing a field replacement. But this incident is not that situation.

It's about a replacement unit that was revved to require new cables that weren't included by EVGA.

 

[R-T-B]

If it just fried the PCB on the drive you could still get the data? Just use a new board, maybe

I'm going through this process right now.

$3000 + a month or two is about my estimate for my data being restored. I declined because it wasn't worth that much to me.

This is for a 2TB nvme drive.

BTW circa 2012 or so evga sent me a messed up Pascal card that killed my z170 mobo of that era. After some painful whining from me, they made it right with a hefty store credit I used to buy one of their mobos as well as replacing the faulty gpu. So, sad to see this scenario here.