ABIT: reliability issues and poor service?

***Zardon*** · Feb 23, 2004, 12:41 PM

Ive known and loved Abit for a long time now - and ive always defended them. My experiences with their products has always been fantastic, but im noticing a worrying trend of late. There are more and more problems being posted on forums the net over. in particular im relating to the Nf7 boards and its quite unpopular replacement, the AN7. Not only are there literally hundreds of threads regarding stability and boot issues, but im hearing many people complaining about appalling customer service.

One of our team Lee Dickey (zerodamage) has been telling me of his terrible time with Abits RMAing process.

"I had a bad KG7-Raid and it wouldnt even post. It would just spin fans. Everything was tested, PSU, CPU, RAM, cleared CMOS, disconnected power, the works. So an RMA was set up, I paid to have this sent, got back another board. All seemed well. I got my replacement board, and the same thing happened ! no post. As I got this DOA via RMA, I phoned, got an answering machine, asked to be called back. Nothing for a week, even with emails. When I finally got a hold of someone, she told me this board is of limited supply and due to my issues. she would get an upgraded board, so to expect an email with choices of boards. The email never arrived. So I called again, got someone who I had communication problems with (not a native english speaker), and I was told my RMA had passed the alloted time. I asked for a manager and he was out to lunch. I then asked to be called back. During this time I was emailed with a statement that my warranty is expired and I will now have to pay for the service. The manager later called back saying I could not get my upgraded replacement. Their tech support department took 2 weeks to get back to me via email. ill never buy ABIT again."

Is this just a one off or is ABIT's RMA process a disaster?, I'd like to hear from members about their experiences with this company. I recently had an AN7 and it died, no post, no beep nothing - dead. This is currently undergoing RMA, and my older NF7s also died with the same issues. This all can not be coincendence.

There are many threads on the internet regarding Abit - posting and reliablity problems, I've taken a few from various forums on the net, including Driverheaven for some reading. Abit were always one of my favourite companies and I swore by them, even in the old days of my KR7a raid, now I'm not so sure.

A small selection:

NF7-s posting issues

NF7s posting issues again

5 dead Nf7s boards

NF7s no post

Abit NF7 BSOD

AN7 Died

AN7 released with cut on board and other issues

Bios Reset NF7

AN7 half multiplier problems

AN7 more posting problems

~~HawK~~ · Feb 23, 2004, 12:49 PM

Few months back there was a thread about which Mobo, I got almost fried for saying no Abit in my rig, seems I was right all along...
IMM best current mobo makers are Tyan($$$!!!), Gigabyte (reasonble prices) & Chaintech (cheaper but good) but that is my opinion....

***Zardon*** · Feb 23, 2004, 12:55 PM

I want to be proved wrong Hawk, im not out to get ABIT. i used ABIT for a long time as you know from my posts saying how wonderful they are all over DH

im very concerned about these recent events, ive been reading them over the net for the last few months, and its concerning.

~~HawK~~ · Feb 23, 2004, 01:07 PM

Offcourse your not out to get Abit, but the thrut has to be said, i know it is hard when a fav. goes the wrong path, that is why i'm pied at Asus, which was my long time fav.mobo maker,
but all things change apparantly, best thing to do IMM; observbe the way the flow goes, we just have to ride the boat..

zerodamage · Feb 23, 2004, 01:10 PM

What I would like to see happen is some change in their Tech support and especially their RMA departments. There should be no need for ignored e-mails, non answered calls, no returned calls, expected e-mails that never show up, and the other things. I have no problems with their products, they are excellent IMO. The issue with me are these departments.

Falstaff · Feb 23, 2004, 01:22 PM

My concern is which batch of these boards and where they are manufactured. We all know that certain components on the board and the tracings are made in different places. It is entirely possible that some board models are getting through the Quality Assurance portion of testing without being stressed. The name suffers now, but a young man i know who purchased an ABIT board, tried to overclock and had stability issues as well, he literally blew it up, took it back to the local vender and traded it for another one, no problems now. But he wanted a board that could take some abuse and be a learning tool, personally I would have purchased an ASUS board and took the hit on the pocketbook. Abit boards enjoy a great reputation for reliability, but it is entirely possible there is a bad batch of components out there, the vendor is responsible for replacing the board at least. Even the mighty ASUS boards have had problems, but the company quietly deals with some problems. I believe the ABIT problem to be the same, our local vendor was aware of issues with some of the boards mentioned in the article, and he simply replaced the board with a new one. Since the vendor rarely sees problems with the ABIT boards he was more than happy to exchange it, I cannot vouch for others, since in the marketplace you can deal with hostile entities that just want to pump out boards to customers,buyer beware!!!, Know who you are buying the components from. I buy locally, so I know I pay more, but in the long run, I can take almost anything back without a damn restocking fee....ABIT, DFI, ASUS and ABIT all have to meet quality standards before it leaves the plant, I would take the vendor to task rather than the manufacturer, but that is the first step for me.

***Zardon*** · Feb 23, 2004, 01:25 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by fallang_jeff
buy locally, so I know I pay more, but in the long run, I can take almost anything back without a damn restocking fee....

I know alot of people who pay more for local support, I guess its safer and less hassle in many respects.

Rayder · Feb 23, 2004, 01:39 PM

We've used Abit motherboards almost exclusively. It seems we're going to have to look into another company's product simply because of the fact that the place we usuallly buy our components has completely stopped carrying Abit branded M/B's. ( www.adamant.com, local to me ) We never knew why they stopped, they just have. I guess this goes a long way to explaining why.

The first (and only) board we got from Abit that didn't work right was the KD7. As soon as we stuck a 128meg video card in it, it wouldn't post, or required alot of coaxing to get it to post. My bro looked at the M/B and determined it was they cheesed on the.....transisters?....rectifiers?.....whatever those thingies are that ran right along the AGP port with the big round things with wire wrapped around them (my bro is at work right now, he's into electronics and knows about such things, obviously, I don't

) and they weren't providing enough current to the port. Anyway, it was shortly after the purchase of that M/B that Adamant stopped carrying the Abit brand.

We're figuring that we're going to Asus next. But I'll take Hawk's recommendation of Tyan, Gigabyte and Chaintech under advisement. But for us, Abit seems to be out of the picture by default. Which is too bad really, other than that KD7, we've had nothing but good experiences with them. But of course, we never dealt with Abit's RMA process.

Falstaff · Feb 23, 2004, 01:54 PM

I called three places here in town to determine if they will continue to carry ABIT boards, all three have stopped recently due to some problems with the aforementioned products, I was shocked actually, but I am an ASUS man anyway. Many customers simply returned the ABIT boards and upgraded to newer products by other manufacturers, and they all were AMD users as well. Interestingly enough, they have no problems with boards they used for corporate builds, only the customers that were building their own. Odd, but plausible.

nheimler · Feb 23, 2004, 02:02 PM

the only complaint i have is i wish they would get a good bios version to help with other components being installed on the nf7-s v2 board. for example certain hard drives seem to make the post screen hang for a few seconds longer than others when hooked into the ide controller. the ide to sata converter seems to make a difference at bootup which is how i have my system set now. i've tried every version of the bios from 20 and up and still some post issues with ide drives. i have even tested some modded bioses and still issues. that's my only complaint about the nf7-s v2 board. otherwise i've had all but good luck with abit boards. my server has been running pretty good for almost 2 years now on a via kx7-333 board w/ a 1900+ athlon. i have usually gone with a via chipset for amd boards, but wanted to give the nf7-s v2 a try for my new home rig. i've only had it for a few weeks now after dinking around with it in getting it to run stable at stock speeds. just installed some modded nforce2 drivers and a modded bios. all seems well at the moment and HOPEFULLY it runs good from here on out...please please please....knocking on wood...

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 02:02 PM

same here,i buy locally,athe only other place l get st uff from is overclockers or komplett as the have no proplem replacing them.l have my abit nf7-sv2 for 11 months,use a program called flashmenu which flashes bios in windows ,just shut down other thing like e-mails,browsers,it get bios update and flashes and reboots windows ,no floppy disks,have had no problems so far ,knock on wood.

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 02:10 PM

l have had no problems with my nf7-sv2 so far in 11 months,l update my bios regulary,l use a program on abit website called flashmenu,it flashes bios from windows,it goes online get bios,tests it ,installs new bios ,before it installs,it askes you to shutoff all programs ,then it install new bios and asks to reboot,reboots windows ,all is ok,knock on wood,no floppys,all done in windows,

~~HawK~~ · Feb 23, 2004, 02:11 PM

Nice thing about google is it geves the total result on ones search
So i did just now a search on "brand" Motherboard problems.
off course there are problems that are user related, or multiple results from the same site
but on average it does tell something....
and here are tonights results:
Asus Motherboard problems 95.000 results
Abit 65.000
Gigabyte 44.000
chaintech 12.000

zerodamage · Feb 23, 2004, 02:18 PM

Hawk, you have to keep in mind the number of motherboards being purchased and used compared to problems. Abit and Asus are on the top of the list.

nheimler · Feb 23, 2004, 02:19 PM

briano98 - what components do you have installed? hd, vid, mem, etc... it was mainly wd drives i've been having issues with. maxtor seems happy with these boards in both ide and ide to sata controllers. i got one for work too and tested both with same components as my home rig and both did the same thing. they both took a few extra seconds when a wd drive was hooked up via the ide. and as mentioned i've used the newest bioses as well as modded bioses.

tek · Feb 23, 2004, 03:12 PM

Big deal, I've had my NF7-S 2.0 for half a year now still running strong at 220fsb 1.6V on chipset no mods at all on the board.

what people dont realize is most of the people having these big problems are volt modding the board and changing the NB cooler and maybe adding on SB cooling and they fuck it up while doing that and dont even notice.

judge the company by your own experience, not someone else's.

just my 2 cents

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 03:13 PM

have 2 seagates h-drives,1 gi gof munhkin pc 3500 memory,have amd athlon xp 3000+ with 400 fsb,sapphire ati 9800xt with 356 ram.cd burner and dvd burner

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 03:15 PM

9 fans 8 are 80mmx80mm and one 120mmx120mm,moded the case, and have perspects panel .have a 550 power supply

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 03:19 PM

have not pushed the motherboard as l notice it kills the life span of it,little tweaks and not big ones

scobywhru · Feb 23, 2004, 03:27 PM

It seems Abit is falling, but for the enthusiast what does that mean, I've herd good things about DFI, like how the DFI Lanparty Nforce 2 rev b board gets some extremely High FSB I've herd of some 270mhz FSB on them.

~~tenndevil~~ · Feb 23, 2004, 03:37 PM

The one linked to the amdmb site is a represented thread, Abit checks in on it. Not that it does any good but....

kelticknight · Feb 23, 2004, 03:41 PM

l rebuild my system about every year and half,next time l rebuild l will probly get motherboard and cpu and graphic card,till then lm happy with what l have ,till l have to get 64 bit system,with this express pci,will wait and see how this pci express fairs out

***Zardon*** · Feb 23, 2004, 03:42 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by scobywhru
It seems Abit is falling, but for the enthusiast what does that mean, I've herd good things about DFI, like how the DFI Lanparty Nforce 2 rev b board gets some extremely High FSB I've herd of some 270mhz FSB on them.

and in their wisdom failed to let it support the original Thermalright SLK900 - which is why alot of people went with the Abit NF7s initially - it would support all the massive bolt ons. I dont know why more mobo makers dont CLEAR the area around the CPU socket. makes sense. Abit have done that right for a long time.