While scams often target individual users, sometimes it’s professionals who fall victim to dishonest practices. On eBay, we have the case of a reseller who, after a customer return, received a Zotac RTX 5090 stripped of its memory and GPU. This is a well-known scam, and right now, it’s not impossible that the missing components are currently running in an AI server in China.
After a customer return, the seller gets back their RTX 5090 with noGPU or memory chips!
In a nutshell, an eBay seller sells a Zotac RTX 5090, and at the time of shipment, the card is fully functional. The user receives it and then returns it. This is a common practice, and there can be several reasons for it:the GPU isn’t suitable for their use, the card is too big and doesn’t fit in their case, etc.
However, it’s upon receipt that the reseller realizes the deception, when testing the component. Surprisingly—note the sarcasm—the card just doesn’t work anymore. So he sets about disassembling the card to see if it’s been damaged and discovers that the GPU and memory chips are missing. The seller simply took a heat sink and a PCB stripped of its main components.
Obviously, the loss is enormous since the PCB and power phases account for only 15 to 20% of the card’s total value. Furthermore, de-soldering GPU and memory chips requires specialized equipment and soldering expertise. Given the price of the components, it’s not unreasonable to assume that these parts were resold and that the GPU is now running in an AI server somewhere in China, for example. It’s worth noting that GPU refurbishment factories have sprung up to circumvent U.S. sanctions.
