I have to burst your bubble here, unless something REALLY weird happened to the card, then the resistors aren't missing, they're just not populated.

If any only if you see up close evidence of ripped solder joints and obvious missing parts, and that the empty resistor/capacitor pads are not domed over (Like they have no solder on them at all, and that pads are actually missing, or it looks properly mangled) then they are not missing and it's supposed to be like that.

And in the event that this is the case, you will need skill and tools in order to get this done. Unless you know what you are doing, and have already done it before, you do not have the skills necessary, and by the fact you are asking here, it seems that you do not have the skills and knowledge to re-solder these. Trust me, I have tried and I've mangled a GBA motherboard worse than it already was trying to short a dead fuse.

And in the event of missing/ripped pads, you might as well throw it in the bin, as that is impossible for most people to fix unless you want to spend thousands of dollars in man hours repairing it.

It's not worth it, spend the time you would be repairing it to get a few extra bucks and buy a new RIVA TNT 2 Pro. I know this seems like a dick thing to say, but it's true.

Nothing weird happened to it. It was simply stored in a box full of other cards instead of being stored in a seperate bag or box.
Minor scratches on the PCB and the missing SMDs are a testament to that.
I have inspected the card under the microscope and I am absolutely certain it is a case of missing / damaged components.
I can tell the difference between the pads that are not being used and the ones that had components ripped from them.
Unfortunately the microscope I own does not have an attachment allowing me to take pictures.

Sure I could buy a new card but I don't want to. I'd give it a go and try to repair it instead. If it works great, if not I'm sure I won't be loosing any sleep because of that.
Thank you for your input.

blackmasked wrote:

Nothing weird happened to it. It was simply stored in a box full of other cards instead of being stored in a seperate bag or box […]
Show full quote

Nothing weird happened to it. It was simply stored in a box full of other cards instead of being stored in a seperate bag or box.
Minor scratches on the PCB and the missing SMDs are a testament to that.
I have inspected the card under the microscope and I am absolutely certain it is a case of missing / damaged components.
I can tell the difference between the pads that are not being used and the ones that had components ripped from them.
Unfortunately the microscope I own does not have an attachment allowing me to take pictures.

Sure I could buy a new card but I don't want to. I'd give it a go and try to repair it instead. If it works great, if not I'm sure I won't be loosing any sleep because of that.
Thank you for your input.

Normally SMD components aren't weak things. It's not easy to just rip them off.

Either way, it's your time, spend it as you wish. I suggest a reflow oven, a cheap toaster oven can be converted to one, as your never going to solder tiny SMD caps onto a board. They are impossibly small (As you know)

Ampera wrote:

Normally SMD components aren't weak things. It's not easy to just rip them off.

Either way, it's your time, spend it as you wish. I suggest a reflow oven, a cheap toaster oven can be converted to one, as your never going to solder tiny SMD caps onto a board. They are impossibly small (As you know)

According to OP's description of the package he got, I'd say it's quite likely to have SMDs being knocked or shoveled off. I had experience with that and I hate careless packaging from the sellers.
To OP, the resolution of the picture is too low to say whether the SMDs are missing or not soldered by the factory. Nevertheless I don't see much value in a TNT2 Pro AGP card; or you may ask the seller for a refund if you think otherwise.

Ampera wrote:

blackmasked wrote:

Nothing weird happened to it. It was simply stored in a box full of other cards instead of being stored in a seperate bag or box […]
Show full quote

Nothing weird happened to it. It was simply stored in a box full of other cards instead of being stored in a seperate bag or box.
Minor scratches on the PCB and the missing SMDs are a testament to that.
I have inspected the card under the microscope and I am absolutely certain it is a case of missing / damaged components.
I can tell the difference between the pads that are not being used and the ones that had components ripped from them.
Unfortunately the microscope I own does not have an attachment allowing me to take pictures.

Sure I could buy a new card but I don't want to. I'd give it a go and try to repair it instead. If it works great, if not I'm sure I won't be loosing any sleep because of that.
Thank you for your input.

Normally SMD components aren't weak things. It's not easy to just rip them off.

Either way, it's your time, spend it as you wish. I suggest a reflow oven, a cheap toaster oven can be converted to one, as your never going to solder tiny SMD caps onto a board. They are impossibly small (As you know)

I see it all the time - broken off missing SMD components. They are remarkably easy to break off. The soldered sides are very strong, but the middle ceramic part is weak and it will shatter if enough force is applied.

There's no real way to tell what values SMD capacitors (white / yellow / brown - no markings) are unless you take them off the board and measure them - try to find high res pics of the board online, and look at what color the missing capacitors are supposed to be - then remove a capacitor of the same color from another place on the card and measure it with a capacitance meter. You can replace capacitors with ones of the same or higher voltage, exact size size and same or slightly higher capacitance - never smaller. SMD resistors (black, marked) have numbers indicating the value. If you find high res pics you can see what size the missing resistors are supposed to be. They need to be replaced with identical parts.

Here's a huge picture of your card with all parts where they should be: http://hattix.co.uk/hardware/tnt2_anon_big.jpg

lazibayer wrote:

To OP, the resolution of the picture is too low to say whether the SMDs are missing or not soldered by the factory. Nevertheless I don't see much value in a TNT2 Pro AGP card; or you may ask the seller for a refund if you think otherwise.

Anyone have any idea why there is a watermark in the pic? Mine don't.

Blackmasked, you mention your TNT2 (which looks similar to a M64 btw which is nice in a way, don't remember ever having seen that) is dead. When you try to use your TNT2 card in a test rig, what symptoms are you getting?
Beeps? Just no screen? Continuous reboot loop? System remains completely dead? Have you attempted to clean the AGP contacts?

And just to be sure and in case you haven't, trying out your AGP card in several different test rigs is something I got myself used to do and most times this actually resulted in the card actually not being dead, even though it appeared to be so at first attempt.

I think I have that card. OP can you upload a better picture please?

Tetrium wrote:

Anyone have any idea why there is a watermark in the pic? Mine don't. […]
Show full quote

lazibayer wrote:

To OP, the resolution of the picture is too low to say whether the SMDs are missing or not soldered by the factory. Nevertheless I don't see much value in a TNT2 Pro AGP card; or you may ask the seller for a refund if you think otherwise.

Anyone have any idea why there is a watermark in the pic? Mine don't.

Blackmasked, you mention your TNT2 (which looks similar to a M64 btw which is nice in a way, don't remember ever having seen that) is dead. When you try to use your TNT2 card in a test rig, what symptoms are you getting?
Beeps? Just no screen? Continuous reboot loop? System remains completely dead? Have you attempted to clean the AGP contacts?

And just to be sure and in case you haven't, trying out your AGP card in several different test rigs is something I got myself used to do and most times this actually resulted in the card actually not being dead, even though it appeared to be so at first attempt.

You see a watermark because the picture I've attached is a pic of exactly the same card that I have found online, not an actual pic of my card ;]

I get a number of beeps that correpsond to 'video adapter is bad or is not seated properly'. It's already been tested in other rigs and the contacts cleaned with isopropyl alcohol.

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

I think I have that card. OP can you upload a better picture please?

I'll take a couple of pics and upload them asap. There are very few marking on this card, nothing indicating brand and/or model. The only thing that was useful was a sticker at the back that says 'LRI 2811'. LRI is Leadtek's old numbering system apparently.

Some of you have suggested to get rid of it, return it, etc. I got it for free. Paid for 2 cards, ended up with another 4 free of charge. It's not like I don't have any other retro cards I could use. Quite the opposite. The thing is though, I enjoy fixing things. Not everyone gets it or has the patience for it, but there is nothing more satisfying for me than investing time in something that others would consider to be a lost cause, and getting it to work again. ;]

If you can supply us with a good quality pic of your card (preferably front and back, and I do mean pics of the card itself that you physically own), then we can put our eagle eyes to work again 😁

Some of the most important stuff is all about the details that others might have missed 😀

There you go. The quality is not fantastic but it should be decent enough. Third picture shows the area around the core with the damage clearly visible.

The R31 and R52 are still somewhat readable, but R95 is completely gone and board has no repeating components pattern to even guess its value, caps can basically be ignored as they are used there for decoupling/bypassing, card should work w/o them, just solder resistors first and make sure that card at least is being detected by PC.

Lack of decoupling usually makes circuits unstable - considering the chip runs at what? 100mhz? This can get extremely critical.
Also: Looking at the remaining caps ... why would they use different values (color) across the card? Doubt they're just decoupling anyways.

Resistors shouldn't be too hard, the values can be read off complete cards. Caps on the other hand ... no written value there, different color coding among producers - your best bet usually is to desolder them and measure them out of circuit. Good luck with that.

So I had a look at my card and it's very, very similar to yours.

I took some photos, maybe it's of use to you, maybe not.

Wondering what the jumpers are for. Setting PAL / NTSC?

EDIT: Yes that's they are for!

hope the pics help https://imgur.com/a/BJqDz3z