Repairing graphics cards

[gsteemso]

I've been trying to work out how to fix a stack of graphics cards I've got. The most urgent are a pair of Nvidia GeForce 6600s (just 6600, no following letters).

Alas, every thread on the topic seems to already have an obvious starting point, in the form of dodgy caps or heat discoloration or, in extreme cases, a trail of scraped-off components from the scrapping process. What do I do when there's nothing apparently wrong with them, apart from the failure to function as expected?

One of the other cards works, but has a cooling fan that sounds like a wood chipper. Where in the heck do you look to find a replacement for something so absurdly model-specific? Is there a way to fix the old one instead? (Not sure I'd trust it if there was, mind you.)

Any advice will be gratefully received.

 

[Byrd]

Hi,

What cards are they - Apple branded or generic? Cooling on these cards could be pretty average and without decent airflow and cooling the core burnt out on a lot of these cards. You may also read about "bump gate" for Nvidia GPUs of the era but this was mostly 7x00/8x00 models. Also check for damage as in clearly missing caps and other components on your e-waste cards.

You can strip down fans to lubricate and renew.