If you plugged your RTX 5090 in with the 12V-2×6 cable that came with your ATX 3.1 power supply, you did what almost every PSU maker tells you to do. According to one owner’s support emails, PNY now says that choice cost him his warranty.
The owner, Reddit user Melodic_Initial_1767, posted the exchange to r/pcmasterrace. He says his PNY RTX 5090’s 16-pin connector melted while the card was sitting idle. He also says he was running the stock VBIOS with a power limit set below default, and powering it with the native cable from an ASRock PG-1600G, a 1600W ATX 3.1 unit.
The denial states that every PNY card needing a 16-pin input ships with a PNY-approved cable or adapter. It says that bundled cable is the only configuration covered under warranty. Any damage involving a third-party cable, adapter or PSU cable is rejected and pushed back onto the maker of that cable or power supply. The owner says a follow-up reply from a senior technician called the decision final and closed the ticket.
We pulled its current GeForce graphics card warranty (PNY-Rev 02.28.2025), which covers the GTX 16, RTX 30, RTX 40 and RTX 50 series. It says nothing about power cables, adapters or PSUs. The closest language requires the card to be installed “in accordance with the installation guide provided herewith.” It also carves out misuse, neglect and improper installation at PNY’s “sole judgment.” The owner says the RTX 5090 install guide references only 6-pin and 8-pin connections, not a 16-pin cable.
This lands in a month that has not been kind to the connector. Hardware Unboxed watched an RTX 5090 cable melt on its testbench. A few days later, a melted adapter was blamed on DLSS 5’s higher power draw.
Requiring owners to use an octopus adapter instead of a purpose-built native cable runs backwards from what the ATX 3.1 transition was supposed to deliver. If PNY wants that rule, it belongs in the warranty text, not in a support reply after the card is already toast. Right now the published document and the support desk are telling customers two different things. The only thing either confirms is that the “sole judgment” clause is doing a lot of work.
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