Intel recommends "4 Spring" 12VHPWR power plug instead "3 Dimple" design

Oct 12, 2023

The company has recommendations for the high-wattage power cable for graphics cards.

12VHPWR power cable recommendation by Intel, Source: Intel

With the introduction of the GeForce RTX 40 series, one topic took the headlines for weeks was the design of the new power connector. Some issues were reported in respect to the new 12+4-pin design that allows up to 600W of power to be transmitted to the GPU. Users were reporting melting power connectors and cables often rendering their cards useless.

It was later confirmed by the media and NVIDIA that main problem causing such issues was incorrect insertion of the cable and lack of space for the cable to bend. Needless to say, the cable design itself has been proven problematic for some users who would not understand what the full insertion really means and how too much of space is required to even use such a cable design. The fact that NVIDIA and board partners were using different adapters or sometimes even rotated power connectors on their cards didn't make things any easier.

Intel has not developed any consumer graphics card with the new "12VHPWR" connector, but chances are this will eventually be the case. After all, the cable is part of the ATX 3.0 specs which are defined by Intel. The company is not standing idle though and Intel engineers are doing their homework. Intel's recommendations for the 12VHPWR cable suggest a use of a 4-spring design instead of the 3-dimple design:

Crimp Contacts inside of the cable plug are recommended to use the 4 Spring design instead of 3 dimple design (as shown in below figure) which will increase the contact area for electrical current flow inside the 12VHWPR connector and reduce the temperature rise of each contact.

— Intel

What might be interesting to notice is that Intel's recommendations follow the findings from Igor'sLAB on NVIDIA power cable adapter. It was reported that NVIDIA had two suppliers of the power adapter, either with 3 dimple and 4 spring version, the latter being more common and durable.

12VHPWR connector types, Source: Igor'sLAB/NVIDIA

Source: Intel via @harukaze5719