A user in China captured the exact moment his brand-new MSI GeForce RTX 5090 Gaming Trio OC erupted into flames just seconds after powering on his system for the first time.
The video, uploaded to Bilibili by user “Staying up late is equivalent to dying early” on February 11, shows sparks, smoke, and visible flames shooting from multiple areas of the graphics card immediately after startup, forcing the owner to shut down the PC instantly.
The incident occurred during the card’s very first boot after installation. The user had just assembled a new build featuring the RTX 5090 paired with a 1,300W power supply, using the official cables bundled with the PSU.
As a precautionary habit, he recorded the startup sequence of every major hardware upgrade, a decision that ended up documenting one of the most dramatic GPU failures caught on camera.
What happened
According to the owner’s pinned comment on Bilibili, the problem was confirmed as a graphics card defect. After removing the charred RTX 5090 and swapping in an RTX 5060, the system booted normally with no issues, confirming that the 1,300W power supply and its cables remained functional.
The motherboard shows visible burn marks near the chipset area, but the owner reports no damage to other components. The flames appeared to originate near the power stages rather than the 12V-2×6 power connector, suggesting an internal fault within the card itself.
The video shows sparks and flames erupting from multiple locations simultaneously, leading to speculation that the failure may have involved a short circuit in the VRM area, possibly related to VRAM power delivery. Without an official teardown or manufacturer investigation, the exact cause remains unclear.
The warranty nightmare
Here’s where the situation gets worse: the RTX 5090 isn’t officially sold in China due to trade restrictions. Nvidia only offers the RTX 5090D and RTX 5090D V2 variants in the Chinese market, both with reduced specifications.
The owner purchased the full RTX 5090 through a gray market proxy, meaning there’s zero local warranty support. Any attempt at repair or replacement will require contacting the third-party seller and potentially shipping the card overseas after the holiday period.
This marks the second recent high-profile MSI GPU failure caught on video, following a previous RTX 4090 Gaming Trio incident that also generated smoke during startup.
While GPU failures of this magnitude remain rare, the dramatic nature of the flames and the lack of warranty options make this case particularly troubling for the owner, who’s now stuck with a charred $2,000+ piece of hardware and limited recourse.
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