I'm not sure if this is a production issue and multiple people are receiving them with missing pads, but the first Titan X was purchased through Nvidia and came with 5 memory pads missing. The odd part was that there was still oily residue on the cooler meaning the thermal pads had to have been on it at some point. In any case, the card began to act up and I returned it.
 
I decided to order an Evga branded Titan X and tonight I did a repaste only to see the card was missing 2 thermal pads for the memory with no oily residue. I have to say, I'm pretty annoyed right now.
 

Although not fun to find that pads are missing, the card should not fail/break at stock RAM speeds even though pads are missing.
The RAM chips on the back of the card doesn't even have any cooling.
 
Might take my cooler's off when i get my back plates to see if my cards have any missing pads too lol.

Okay, went ahead and opened a ticket. I have some pretty bad luck. I just bought a brand new car too and it has a loud rattle behind the steering wheel. A week later, they still can't find the cause!

xarot
So should everyone pop the cooler off and see if anything is missing? I am just thinking if someone at the warranty dept could blame the user for missing thermal pads even if he didn't ever remove the stock HSF?

My thoughts exactly. I got an extended warranty. If it fails I don't want to get screwed

Evga are going to try to send me some extra pads. If they can't he said they'll RMA it. I'm fine with either route as the card appears to work well all the way up to 1432 mhz in Valley. I had been running the memory around +450 (7900MHz) but not anymore. The only game that doesn't seem to like it when I OC is GTAV Online.

jhartnek28

xarot
So should everyone pop the cooler off and see if anything is missing? I am just thinking if someone at the warranty dept could blame the user for missing thermal pads even if he didn't ever remove the stock HSF?

My thoughts exactly. I got an extended warranty. If it fails I don't want to get screwed

Opening a EVGA card doesn't void the warranty on the card. Hell I've done all sorts of stupid stuff to my old cards and EVGA said none of voided the warranty as long as I could put it back to stock if I sent it in. Just make sure to replace the tim and not just close the card back up when you are done. 

Looks like shotty QC on there end.
Make me wonder how menny others are not right. 

I want to give an update. Evga come through as usual. They are shipping me a brand new Titan X that has been personally looked at before being shipped. Once I receive the new Titan X, I'll be emailed a prepaid shipping label to ship back my current Titan X (which has started to have the same issues the original from Nvidia had).
 
I noticed a lot of comments on the main Titan X thread about people saying it was silly to wait for an Evga branded Titan X. They couldn't be further from the truth. Evga's customer service and EASE of use when dealing with RMAs is top notch. I can't think of another card vender with this kind of service. The card I ordered from Nvidia/Digital River was an ABSOLUTE nightmare to get shipped to me and then returned upon the discovery of missing thermal pads. It took just over a month from time of order to getting my refund before being able to purchase an Evga Titan X.
 
 
Thanks Evga!
 

moosejaw
OP has had some terrible luck.

You have no idea.. lol.