A Chinese hardware repair YouTuber has recently revealed a shocking GPU scam after getting four supposedly defective RTX 4090 graphics cards sent to him by a customer. After examination, the technician found out that three of the cards were in fact fakes, older RTX 3090s and 3080s that had been altered to resemble the newer and much more powerful RTX 4090s. The customer is said to have paid approximately 1,394 dollars (10,000 yuan) per unit and obtained them through an overseas supplier.
The counterfeiting method was to use the same Ampere-based GA102 chip and alter external identifiers like laser engravings and cosmetic parts. Unfortunately, none of the three counterfeit cards worked, and they had to be discarded.
To prevent other people from falling into the same trap, the YouTuber described some of the main distinctions to distinguish between real RTX 4090s. One of the easiest methods is to check the GPU die’s QR code location: on real RTX 4090s, it’s positioned at the very bottom-left corner of the substrate, while on 30-series cards, it sits slightly above that point. Also, 30-series GPUs have a small capacitor sticking out of the top-right corner of the substrate, which is not present on the 4090.
Every counterfeit card had obvious defects. The former had lost QR codes and counterfeit VRAM. The second had a damaged die marked as “AD102” but bore the same QR issue. The third was the worst, with a green substrate, an abnormally thin plate, and a frame that was not seated properly.
One of the four GPUs was genuine. The repair technician managed to revive the card after replacing defective GDDR6X memory chips and broken rear capacitors.
The case demonstrates the increasing issue of GPU counterfeiting, particularly on popular cards such as the RTX 4090. Although no fake RTX 5090s have been confirmed yet, analysts caution that such scams are bound to happen as the GPU market remains in a boom.
