Recent AMD64 Nvidia boards

Altcon

Regular
I've recently had the dipleasure of getting two mid-high end boards come with quirks and problems.
It sort of got me wondering what percentage of the lastest high end boards come with teething problems.
I got an AN8 Sli deluxe which had strange IO behaviour and bad sound (and am still waiting for it to be replaced), I also got an Abit FN8 (today) which just wouldn't post, you'd switch it on and it would turn off. I guess it was revolting against being used... :?
anyways, how many here have had problems with recent new AMD64 Nvidia based boards?
 
I've allways had problems with nvidia boards . But i've had more problems with via . I'm sure in the future i will have problems with ati boards .


My advice to you is wait till they put out some revisions of the board and chip. Don't jump into something new . Reviews never see the problems
 
I have nothing specific on Nvidia mainboards, never having used one, but I think it's safe to say there has been a general turn for the worse in the mainboard industry. Boards are getting shoddier and shoddier as manufacturers try to squeeze in more features while maintaining prices instead of focusing on quality. This is, of course, coupled with the increasing demands that performance is putting on the hardware. We are at an inflection point where technologies like DDR-2 are being introduced for exactly these reasons: the old tech is running out of steam and operating on very thin margins.

I think the best thing you can do about this is to find a store that handles RMAs elegantly and expect to get some duds.

I also think that it is important to disregard some of the 'trends' of problems you see reported in user discussions on the Net unless there is a very strong reason to suspect a certain flaw. As the boundary is pushed it becomes increasingly important that all components (especially the PSU!) are of good/high quality. I suspect that many problems people are having a legitimate, but they are caused by a poor mix of hardware. This is one factor that favors buying complete systems from companies like Dell; you can feel confident that the shipped configuration should work.

For the record, I am currently using an Asus A8V-D (Via K8T800Pro) and have had no problems whatsoever. I was eager to try an Nvidia mainboard and buy into the SLI option, but I already had an investment in their AGP card and there wasn't enough to suggest the NForce 4 was spectacularly better than the Via boards.
 
jvd said:
I've allways had problems with nvidia boards . But i've had more problems with via . I'm sure in the future i will have problems with ati boards .


My advice to you is wait till they put out some revisions of the board and chip. Don't jump into something new . Reviews never see the problems
The Abit was a early adoption option, but they did get great reviews for that 754 board. It seems that there is a trend towards less reliability on high end boards (highly packed feature boards).
All the budget systems I've built to date-P4 or Athlon XP have rarely shown any of these kind of faults. Even then it's easier to justify a 50$ board not posting over a 100$-200$ board giving me such greif.
RMA policy in my country (Israel) is utter crap practically everywhere-you overpay and wait for 2 weeks for any exchange (except Kingston memory). This is due to everyone shipping boards to the local importer for exchange and not taking any of the responsibility.
Oh well, it's not like I have a choice.
:devilish:
 
wireframe said:
As the boundary is pushed it becomes increasingly important that all components (especially the PSU!) are of good/high quality.
As you can njote in my sig I custom build my rigs and I do put an emphasis on a solid PSU as well as ALL the other compnents. Nothing makes a system last better than a solid base-I had to learn that when I bought my first PC, which was a useless piece of junk. Actually that's how I got into all this DIY stuff.
I'm having problems despite waiting for second and third evision boards and using quality stuff that should hold up.
Yes, I'm frustrated and venting-but the system specs you see below are over a month old and I have yet to recieve the new board after the first one had some problems....... :cry:
 
Altcon said:
wireframe said:
As the boundary is pushed it becomes increasingly important that all components (especially the PSU!) are of good/high quality.
As you can njote in my sig I custom build my rigs and I do put an emphasis on a solid PSU as well as ALL the other compnents. Nothing makes a system last better than a solid base-I had to learn that when I bought my first PC, which was a useless piece of junk. Actually that's how I got into all this DIY stuff.
I'm having problems despite waiting for second and third evision boards and using quality stuff that should hold up.
Yes, I'm frustrated and venting-but the system specs you see below are over a month old and I have yet to recieve the new board after the first one had some problems....... :cry:

I have actually read many reports of problems with the Asus A8N SLI Deluxe. It's not easy to tell if there is a common flaw in these boards or if it is just that many people buy it for SLI and then don't have the proper equipment for that and end up damaging the board. In your case, for example, a 350W PSU is not enough to fully exploit that mainboard. Now, I am not saying that is what you intended to do, but I suspect that some people have exactly such PSUs or even higher rated ones that are not up to the quality required and then end up frying their equipment.

Speaking of board revisions, I think it is prudent not to expect too much from these. Usually, if they are gonna get it right they do so almost immediately. Some of these revisions are just moving the problems around, trying to salvage the model name for sales (it's very bad publicity to pull a model, but if you can sneak in new revisions you may be able to come through looking OK).

For what it's worth, and without having tried one myself, I read good things about the DFI NF4 SLI boards. There seems to be one catch and that was that the packaging caused components on the mainboard being damaged in shipping. I am not sure if this has been fixed, but I suppose you could ask to have a look at the board before buying and manually inspecting it. Other than that, it seems this board performs really well.
 
I'm not planning on SLI (for now) and if I do plan to try it (highly doubtfull) I'll be in for a PSU overhaul (at least 500w quality). The board was stable a a rock, two problems I had:
1)strange IO behaviour-read times varied too much on the first SATA controller. Sometimes immediate response and sometimes read lagged for a whole 2 seconds. Disks have been through testing at my lab , so it was only the board.
2)sound. When using earphones (which is how I play most games), you could hear every tiny little action preformed (sort of like a cheap car radio when you hit the gas).
The first problem was the one I actually made me send the board back after all bios and drivers failed to adress the issue. Sound was solved with Nvidia sound drivers but of course left me unable to play CS Source which still lags with some Nvidia chipset+driver combo (yes Valve you again).
I bought a cheap Soundblaster Live 24 bit to cover my sound.
I also trust Asus a whole lot more than DFI to resolve any problems and maintain support for high end boards over a longer period of time. I intend to stick with this board for at least my first Dual Core CPU-which makes Asus a winner.
Performance differences are miniscule between the Nforce 4 boards ('cept Gigabyte in some cases), stability is what I'm aiming for.
On the up side the board ran prime 95 flawlessly for over 10 hours, so stability is there.
Anyways I figured all the reviewers can't be wrong, and it's the testing platform of choice to date for many reviews (even here at Beyond3d).
Oh well, I guess I'm looking for someone else to rant with :oops:
 
1)strange IO behaviour-read times varied too much on the first SATA controller. Sometimes immediate response and sometimes read lagged for a whole 2 seconds. Disks have been through testing at my lab , so it was only the board.

A little off topic but i'm having similar problems with my current Asus P4 board. The bios is extremely slow, the hard drive is operated at below what it should (about 35 MB/s) and whenever I install any drivers the system just sits there for 30 minutes like it's waiting for something.

Still have to RMA it. I just squint at the thought of it being a month before I see the replacement.
 
ANova said:
1)strange IO behaviour-read times varied too much on the first SATA controller. Sometimes immediate response and sometimes read lagged for a whole 2 seconds. Disks have been through testing at my lab , so it was only the board.

A little off topic but i'm having similar problems with my current Asus P4 board. The bios is extremely slow, the hard drive is operated at below what it should (about 35 MB/s) and whenever I install any drivers the system just sits there for 30 minutes like it's waiting for something.

Still have to RMA it. I just squint at the thought of it being a month before I see the replacement.
I hope service is faster where you are....
You definately have to RMA it! (thats if you checked the disk , and tried another battery for the bios).
 
Altcon said:
I've recently had the dipleasure of getting two mid-high end boards come with quirks and problems.
It sort of got me wondering what percentage of the lastest high end boards come with teething problems.
I got an AN8 Sli deluxe which had strange IO behaviour and bad sound (and am still waiting for it to be replaced), I also got an Abit FN8 (today) which just wouldn't post, you'd switch it on and it would turn off. I guess it was revolting against being used... :?
anyways, how many here have had problems with recent new AMD64 Nvidia based boards?

Purchased an MSI NEO 4 Platinum 6 weeks ago (not SLI). Absolutely no problems with the MB. The integrated sound left a lot to be desired though.
 
Fred da Roza said:
Purchased an MSI NEO 4 Platinum 6 weeks ago (not SLI). Absolutely no problems with the MB. The integrated sound left a lot to be desired though.
I built a friend a system around the same model only F (budget-no firewire or dual lan), and it's stable and had no problems.
I thought the Ultra was supposed to come with an onboard Live! 24bit card? or is that only the SLI model?
Anyway I got me a 24bit Live! cheap so I can replace onboard sound.
 
Altcon, if you're looking for stability than Asus is a totally wrong choice of motherboard. I know a bunch of people with Asus mobos and problems over problems. Actually, it's been that way since PIII days, over and over again.

I've tried many end always ended up with Abit. I heard a lot of good stuff about MSI K8N Diamond-54G if you're looking for SLI.

If you have some money to burn, Tyan is always a safe bet for quality.

Edit:
Something like Tyan 2895A2NRF

The mother off all AMD motherboards :!:
 
_xxx_ said:
Altcon, if you're looking for stability than Asus is a totally wrong choice of motherboard. I know a bunch of people with Asus mobos and problems over problems. Actually, it's been that way since PIII days, over and over again.
Funny you should say that, Iv'e had two Asus boards to date with no issues whatsoever. I have also seen only one Asus board fried or with blown up capacitators to this date (and I work in a PC lab). I'm sorry but I can't say I've personally experienced your reasons for disliking Asus. On the other side I have an Abit board I recomended to a friend that's given him nothing but grief (of course with a grade a component system) and is getting RMA'd next week.

I've tried many different combos with my good old A7n8x deluxe board-none gave me any trouble (different GPU's, memory, CPu's) . I've overclocked the bejesus out of an unlocked 2500 on a standard A7N8X board, also no problem. I still have my hybrid Asus ddr/sdr P3 powering my future inlaws internet needs-flawlessly I might add.

I can say though that I used to trust Abit a lot more before my friends NF7-S board.
As for Tyan. It's only shipped here on special demand, so service would probably be worse than it already is (if at all possible) and prices, which are quite high, would soar even further (My A8N SLI Deluxe cost 240$?!?!).
 
I guess you were rather lucky with Asus. I have a NF7 since January and never had a single problem. The previous two machines were Asus, RMA'd and replaced with Abit. I still have to meet someone who had no problems with Asus boards. Maybe it's something in the air here in mid-Europe that makes Asus crap out, dunno... ;)
 
_xxx_ said:
I guess you were rather lucky with Asus. I have a NF7 since January and never had a single problem. The previous two machines were Asus, RMA'd and replaced with Abit. I still have to meet someone who had no problems with Asus boards. Maybe it's something in the air here in mid-Europe that makes Asus crap out, dunno... ;)
If it's any comfort, pretty much everything else craps out here in Israel.....
EDIT: aparently the NF8 bug was human error, my friend installed the CPU wrong......that's like the dumbest mistake I've ever heard anyone make.
 
Altcon said:
I thought the Ultra was supposed to come with an onboard Live! 24bit card? or is that only the SLI model?
Anyway I got me a 24bit Live! cheap so I can replace onboard sound.

Yeah that's the SLI version. The SB Live is definately better. I will probably do that myself some time in the future. Besides that (and the price) I am actually very happy with the board.

I wish the F was available when I bought this board. I think it was announced a week after I bought the Platinum. Probably would have had to wait a few extra weeks before they become available locally but would have saved myself $90 CDN.
 
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