Nvidia’s RTX 4090 flagship has an issue beyond simply sizing up its large dimensions and hefty nature, with a company having produced a custom connector in order to get around a gremlin relating to squeezing the PSU adapter cable in.
Okay, let’s start from the beginning here. The RTX 4090 is known to be a beast of a graphics cards, and would-be buyers have to consider a number of factors: not just the massive cost of the GPU, but also other elements like having enough space to fit the thing in a PC case.
Now that may seem like a matter of checking the dimensions of your PC case against the measurements of the RTX 4090 graphics card you intend to buy – which is pretty long and wide, whichever way you dice it – but there’s another consideration that comes into play if you need to use a power adapter.
That applies to the numerous folks who don’t have an ATX 3.0 power supply (16-pin), and so have to use an 8-pin to 16-pin adapter plus cable setup to get the GPU to work with their ATX 2.0 PSU. The problem being that the adapter cable can be very stiff indeed, so connecting it to the side of the board and then bending it round to fit the inside of the case can be tricky (with the RTX 4090 being so wide in the first place, and not leaving much clearance in some cases).
This has led to some posts on Twitter (observed by Sebastian Castellanos (opens in new tab)) showing frustrated RTX 4090 owners who are unable to actually fit the adapter without leaving off the side panel of their case. That’s not a great situation, of course, as it leaves the PC exposed to dust and perhaps worse, vulnerable to a spillage of some kind maybe, or a thrown object gone astray as another example. (It also looks bad, on top of that).
Step forward CableMod (as spotted by Wccftech (opens in new tab)) with a 90-degree angled 16-pin connector (opens in new tab) that allows for the adapter setup to fit snugly at a right angle, removing the stiff cable not bending round issue, and allowing that side panel to be put back on for affected users.
Analysis: A boat-load of considerations for a modern flagship
It’s good to see a solution pop up to this one pretty swiftly, although do note, you can’t buy the accessory just yet (it’s going on pre-order come the end of October).
This whole episode just underlines the problems of huge, power-sucking flagship GPUs which leave buyers with a lot more to consider than the simple eye-watering cost of the product.
There’s a growing checklist of things such as having a powerful enough power supply to run the RTX 4090 (and your other components), fitting it in your case, ensuring the adaptor fits as we see here, plus considering the thermals of the case with the heat the GPU kicks out. And of course another potential gremlin is card sag – the sheer heft of the RTX 4090 pulling down on the PCIe slot it’s installed in.
The latter issue is something a European graphics card maker has recently tackled with its Gallardo RTX 4090, with a very novel solution indeed: an integrated spirit level on the side of the board to show if it’s staying level in the slot, or not. Before long, we’ll have an entire niche industry dedicated to making sure high-end GPUs fit and work okay in your PC case (well, maybe not, but you get the point).
