A UK owner of an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition says the company denied a warranty claim because the serial number on the card's metal bracket had faded. The Redditor, Willing-Avocado-4830, had reported black-screen crashes under heavy load and sent the graphics card to Nvidia for repair. After 30 days without word, the owner received an email stating the RMA request was rejected with no explanation given.
When the user asked Nvidia for clarification, the Redditor recounted that support cited the faded serial number on the bracket as the reason. The owner says the card was never modified or tampered with after installation. Other owners have described similar experiences in the same Reddit discussion, suggesting the fading is not an isolated case.
The bracket on a graphics card is exposed to dust, oxidation and corrosion over time, which can leave it dirty, stained or discolored. The serial number is printed in ink on the bracket surface rather than etched into the metal, so those conditions can affect its legibility. By contrast, the previous-generation GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition carried a laser-etched serial number on its metal bracket.
One Redditor said a person in the Nvidia Discord channel suggested cleaning the area with isopropyl alcohol to make the serial number visible again. That may not help if the ink is gone, since earlier reports suggest hot air from the Founders Edition cooler can erase the serial number. Another Redditor, hawok, reportedly sent a GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition for RMA two months ago with a partially visible bracket serial number, and support apparently accepted the claim after receiving photos of the packaging that matched the number.
Nvidia rejected the claim even though the same serial number appears on a sticker on the card's modular PCIe connector, which technicians can check when disassembling the card. The number can also be pulled from a working card through the command prompt using Nvidia SMI. Willing-Avocado-4830 still had the original packaging and the original invoice from Nvidia U.K., which would allow the serial numbers to be cross-referenced easily. It is unclear what Nvidia's policy is or whether it handles each case differently, and Tom's Hardware said it reached out to Nvidia for clarification.
Some Redditors have suggested photographing the card's serial number next to the packaging's serial number, while others have joked about covering the serial number with tape. Heat-resistant tape, such as Kapton tape, would be needed. GeForce RTX 5090 stock has nearly vanished from the U.S. market, with few units starting at $6,500, which is 3.25 times the Blackwell flagship's MSRP. Owners already face concerns about the 16-pin power connector melting, and now also have to worry about fading serial numbers.
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