A pair of Brazilian modding teams have turned a battered Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 Ti into a leaderboard-topping monster, coaxing record-class scores from a card that had literal holes in its PCB and no functional power delivery of its own.
In a marathon livestream, veteran repair and overclocking specialists Paulo Gomes and Enzo Túlio strapped an RTX 2080 Ti onto the wounded 5070 Ti as an external power-delivery donor, then wove a dense network of bodge wires, new grounds, and shunts to restore signal integrity and reduce voltage droop under load. The result was as improbable as it was fast.
From Scrap to Scoreboard: A Franken-GPU’s Rise
According to coverage highlighted by VideoCardz, the team’s Franken-GPU started the session performing roughly in the RTX 3060 class. After hours of incremental fixes—reworking display signal paths to stabilize 1080p output, reinforcing power rails, and tightening grounding—the card surged to elite territory.
Running Unigine’s Superposition, a staple of GPU benchmarking, the 5070 Ti posted 11,150 points in the 8K Optimized test—about 70 points above the top entry currently listed on HWBOT’s community rankings. In the 1080p Extreme preset, it hit 16,972 points, a number that would place just outside the top 10 globally. The team did not formally submit the scores to HWBOT, so the achievement remains unofficial, but the raw performance speaks for itself.
The feat is even more notable given the hardware constraints. The donor 2080 Ti wasn’t contributing compute; it served as a high-quality external VRM, with its robust multi-phase design repurposed to feed the 5070 Ti core. That let the modders push frequency and power targets far beyond what the mauled onboard circuitry could safely supply.
Engineering a Win Against the Odds in GPU Overclocking
Why did this work? Modern GPUs are often limited by power delivery long before they hit architectural ceilings. By offloading the heaviest current draw to a separate, higher-capacity VRM—then carefully minimizing resistance and inductance across the spaghetti of wires—the team reduced voltage sag during transient spikes, a common stability killer in high clocks and heavy loads.
Superposition’s 8K Optimized preset is brutally GPU-bound, making it ideal for showcasing gains from improved core stability and sustained boost clocks. With better-fed rails and cleaner signaling, the 5070 Ti could hold frequencies that a stock or wounded VRM would have dropped under thermal and electrical stress.
None of this was gentle on the hardware. The modders reported some wires exceeding 100 degrees during testing—an indicator that, absent further refinement or active cooling on the makeshift power network, longevity would be limited. It’s the price of experimentation, akin to subzero overclocking sessions where hardware is pushed past everyday operable limits for a single validated run.
A Second Resurrection and a Trend in Power Modding
This wasn’t the card’s first resurrection. In a previous attempt, Gomes brought the same 5070 Ti back online using an AMD Radeon RX 580 as an external VRM—proof that the method isn’t tied to a single vendor’s power design. Swapping to the 2080 Ti provided more headroom and cleaner power, enabling the team’s latest score surge.
For the enthusiast scene, the build underscores a broader point: power delivery remains the unsung limiter of modern GPUs. From the industry’s own 12VHPWR connector saga to community shunt mods and VRM swaps, the fastest results often come from mastering the electrical layer, not just chasing silicon lottery wins.
What It Means for Overclockers and OEMs Today
Unofficial or not, topping HWBOT’s charts with a card that started the day half-dead is a potent reminder of what methodical engineering can unlock. It also hints at opportunities for board partners: stronger VRM stages, tighter transient response, and better thermal monitoring can translate directly to sustained performance, not just headline boost clocks.
For hobbyists, the takeaway is equal parts inspiration and caution. The seven-hour livestream showed the grind of diagnosis and the real risks—heat, signal noise, and the ever-present chance of failure. But it also showcased the community’s ingenuity. With careful power engineering, a supposedly finished GPU story can still get a plot twist.
Whether the team pursues official validation next or attempts an even bolder donor VRM, this improbable 5070 Ti has already earned a place in overclocking lore. It didn’t just come back to life—it came back swinging.
