The 16-pin (12VHPWR) power connector has experienced meltdowns on some of the best graphics cards. Nevertheless, these unfortunate incidents have predominantly been reported on Nvidia’s graphics cards — until now. Reddit user Savings_Opportunity3 has reportedly documented what appears to be the first case of a 16-pin meltdown involving an AMD graphics card.
Not many mainstream AMD graphics cards use the 16-pin power connector. The Radeon RX 9070 XT, leading the AMD Radeon RX 9000-series, is a 304W card that comfortably relies on two standard 8-pin power connectors. Nonetheless, some AMD partners, such as ASRock and Sapphire, have adopted the 16-pin connector for some RDNA 4 models, possibly as a design choice or to differentiate themselves from the competition.
In the case of Savings_Opportunity3, the affected graphics card was a Radeon RX 9070 XT Taichi OC, originating from ASRock’s line-up. The same Redditor had posted on Reddit a month ago, asking for advice after noticing discoloration on a few pins inside the 16-pin power connector during a motherboard swap. Fortunately, only one pin from the 16-pin power cable appears to have melted, and the graphics card may have remained functional, as only one pin on the power connector appears darker than the others.
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While ASRock doesn’t disclose the TDP for the Radeon RX 9070 XT Taichi 16GB OC, the company does recommend users use a power supply with a minimum capacity of 850W. The official recommendation for a reference Radeon RX 9070 XT is a 750W unit; therefore, ASRock’s version should pull somewhere between 340W and 360W under regular operation.