Gadgetory

MSI's video card and motherboard factory in Shenzhen China complements the company's taiwan-based headquarters that we previously toured which handles most of the product engineering radiation EMI and compliance testing that's done for MSI the Shenzhen Factory meanwhile has some unique tool like a socketable GPU testing machine and host 15 service Mountain Technology lines that are responsible for manufacturing a combined total of 2.6 million motherboards and video cards per month this video looks at the video card section of MSI's at Shenzhen Factory before that this video is brought to you by thermal grizzly and their high-end thermal compounds thermal grizzly makes cryo not paste for high thermal performance and conductivity without being electrically conductive so you don't have to worry about shorting components Crona is particularly good for replacing stock GPU pastes as cryo not is a non curing compound learn more at the link in the description below the most interesting tool in MSI's video card manufacturing plant was a socketable GPU tester we only grabbed a few quick shots of this one but the rig is used for testing actual GPUs in the same board to validate that the GPU itself is good this is mostly part of the Quality Assurance department but in theory one could also use this tube in GPUs before ever mounting them to a PCV when we visited it was being used to test individual GPUs for quality control and to see if there was anything defective on the GPU is coming through that section of the factory the board is a custom PCB made by MSI with four vrm fan mounts directly atop the MOSFETs inductors and the rest of the vrm the goal is for this rigsby hot suavo and fast to work with so exposing the card is important technicians use hooked up probe connectors for multimeter measurements to ensure all the voltages are showing with additional debug LEDs on the board for indicating if any specific parts of the PCB like different VRMs are having trouble coming online the block mounted to the PCB has pins exposed for a GPU of all grid array or BGA making it similar to socketable CPUs but more difficult to align and harder to make the top of the mechanism turns to lock into place securing a cold plate directly to the GPU dot this what water cooling solution is used for ease and reproducibility of testing as it will fit all cards and accommodate all GPUs with the same Z height the PCB is swapped out in some instances like when working with different architectures but for the most part MSI can stick with the same base PCB for an entire generation tests run include function testing frequency testing and ensuring that all parts of the GPU are working like the memory controller for instance GPUs that pass validation can be sent back into the SMT line for installation onto a board although anything that fails is discarded MSI says it doesn't use this configuration to bend GPUs for the current lightning model but a sufficiently high end card could use this setup for bidding the GPU before the dies mounted to the PCB the trouble is that once a die is mounted to the PCB it's really not worth reclaiming it if found to over perform or be a golden sample this socketable solution would allow chips to be pre sorted for installation only on high-end cards the cost to do such a thing is still exorbitant time cost is high machine and equipment occupancy is high and technicians would get bogged down looking for Holy Grail GPUs for this reason a Messiah doesn't presently use the contraption for bidding but instead uses it for QC it could though the product warranted such use this is completely custom made and unfortunately unavailable in the market but shows one of the coolest utilities we've seen and answers the question of what's required to make a socketable GPU video card testing and validation is another interesting aspect of MSI's Factory this area is at the end of the SMT line or the service mount technology line which follows mostly the same process as gigabytes Taiwan factory that we already showed although MSI has some additional automation in place that wasn't at the gigabyte plant once the video card goes through the SMT line and is assembled it spit out two function testing and goes through some of the benchmarking or pre testing of the factory this area is configured such that a single technician can control up to 12 computers with video cards being fed down a conveyor belt so that each operator can pull new cards for his or her station there are several stations on each side of the floor each with its own conveyor belt hooked up to the end of the SMT line of which there are five total each card is to get checked in then plugged into one of the pre-built test machines the test benches are configured in such a way that the technician only has to plug the card in and then press a button at which point the system takes complete control and automatically tests itself start to finish this is next level test automation the system uses Windows 10 for some tests and tiny Linux 18 for others each video output port is individually tested on every single card that comes off of the production line software from Nvidia and AMD does a lot of the testing and is largely black box its secretive test software to the extent that MSI's technicians actually have no idea what Nvidia's utilities are even doing just that Nvidia mandates them function tests stress each part of the GPU for functionality hence the name and will throw error codes if any defects are found if an error crops up the operator scans a barcode located on the bench there's one barcode for each type of error so the individual card is tagged with its error and then put into a tape top area for defects and sent back to the QC team on the other side of the lab each of these 12 systems for each operator also does thermal testing looking for performance within range of the coolers acceptable variants each cooler has a different tolerance for variants tests include temperature range fan speed PA state testing to ensure the GPU hits p8 p1 and so forth and the PM latency testing on the different motherboards that are relevant for this section frequency is also validated during function testing this is where some binning or pre-sorting comes in if a card on a gaming X PCB tests with a chip that has relatively low frequency the card can instead be swapped with an armorer cooler and sold as a lower-priced model while still using the same PCB so you don't have to desolder the GPU color image our tests are also run on each of the cards validated against Nvidia or AMD color specs as the card progresses through testing it is checked further for LEDs for BIOS flashing and is then sent down the conveyor belt to the next station as for manufacturing itself the steps are identical to motherboard manufacturing in fact the same exact lines can be used they just have to be reconfigured msi manufactures 1 million video cards per month at this facility enya factor 1/4 way the 1.6 million motherboards per month made in the same building MSI runs 5 VGA lines and 10 motherboard lines with mostly the same equipment that we saw in our gigabyte factory tour video you can check that video for more detail on the step by step process but we'll show just a few of the new pieces of equipment here GPU loading is one of the cooler sections where operators load entire trays of GPUs to be slotted onto the video card PCBs by machine the start to finish manufacturing time for the average video card is approximately three to four hours from SMT to packaging with 30 minutes of testing in between approximately 5000 people work at this facility but that number is cut in half from before automation had spread so widely the factory operates at peak efficiency as one of the largest sources of motherboards and video cards in the world alongside some factories from Asus and gigabyte that's it for this factory tour we'll have another piece on MSI is a motherboard testing facility as that uses some special machines that automatically builds computers for validation subscribe to catch that and if you want to help us fund future expensive factory tour trips like this one please consider purchasing a GN mod mat on store gamers nexus net the mats are back in stock and available in four foot by two foot large versions or 32 inch by 16 inch medium sizes perfect for system build projects offering wiring diagrams and screw trackers and including proper anti-static grounding thanks for watching we'll see you all next time