DFI Admits 5Volt Vdimm Problem

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but this needs communicating with our users

Read and weep :(

http://www.bleedinedge.com


:caution: UPDATE :caution:

I have just spoken to DFI RMA Department about my board........

Guess what was wrong....The chipset had blowen :woot:

Just as i was told by DFI USA.....Taiwan know that the 5 volt jumper is causing issues and could blow the chipsets on these boards....looks like mine was 1 of those.

ALSO.........BEWARE

When you RMA your board....DFI REPAIR the board NOT Replace it.

Guess i just wasted 300 bucks on a board thats now been hacked by some guy in a warehouse somewhere in a business park.

Good bye DFI.....I will never use you again....and now you have 1 customer who is on the war path to bring down you name and very bad products

Topboy

Told ya!

My contact told me this ages ago!

Since this was a major selling point about the board, you think that they would have tested it better before releasing it. :slapass: Now lets see if they do anything about it. I miss my 260, 2-2-2-6.

Hasnt affected my board and ive been running +5V from day one.

Yeah lets see! They could repreive themselves for me by admiting the mistake and releasing a new board without the prob!

I don't buy it just yet...
There's a LOAD of folks out there, including myself, that have NEVER had any problems with 5v jumper. I would say, there must be a very special circumstance (type and amount of memory used perhaps) that might be causing trouble. It just cannot be said that 5v has flaws if you see that many use it with no drama at all.

If I don't see it coming from Oscar Wu's mouth OFFICIALLY, on DFI-Street, with specific, technical explanation, then I do not buy it :D

I have run the 5v jumper ever since I got this board with no problems whatsoever, and I would also say that this is easily the best board I have ever run. 271 mhz 32mb Pi stable 2x512 BH-5 @ 1.5-2-2-3 1t.

It suck that people are having problems with this board but to me with an enthusiast board such as this it is just something that will happen. Its the same with high performance cars, they need extra care to stay in top form.

I wouldn't even care too much if I lost some Ram on this board considering how well it overclocks. The bottom line for me is I hope this does not change the products DFI delivers. I want them to stay with a serious overclocking mindset when the plan out and deliver a board. With this being a problem now I wonder how their philosophy might change.

Well this is what DFI Tech Support communicated directly to me on the phone.

So in my eyes this makes it official.

Topboy

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

So in my eyes this makes it official.

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Not really... It will be official If we hear a chief DFI engineer admitting that. Until now, it is NOT official.

I would agree with that. Just because it is a Tech Support guy that said this does not make it 'official'.

It has to come out of the mouths of the guys who engineered it.

Bah, I've been running off the 5v rail since I got the board (granted, it's only been a few weeks at most), and haven't had problems. My memory is running within the warranted voltage range, and my board hasn't been modded in any way to void the warranty... if there IS a problem that DFI has known about from the start, they can replace my system for me when it dies. Until then, great board.

I suppose we should stick with the 3.3v jumper trick and ramp up the 3.3v rail on our PSU then? man if this is true then this sucks! my PCP&C 510 SLI only goes up to 3.5v on the rail so it ain't going to work....anybody try the OCZ memory booster on these DFI NF4 board? :D :D

Do you really think Oskar Wu is going to come on here and bash his own board....I think not.

All i am stateing here is the coversation i have just had with DFI's Technical support.

I feel it is only resonable to inform people of the information that i was told.

Yes until DFI make a statement, you may say this is not official, however if this is going to save a few people the nightmare of RMAing their boards because of this problem until DFI realease a fix, then i hope i have helped.

Topboy

5v from day#1, 2 different boards... still alive and kickin'

C

I think the blame for most board failures from running the 5v rail can be placed on user error, lack of cooling, or lack of knowledge. The very the idea of running 4v on your memory should be enough of a risk to alarm someone to the idea that this might cause hardware failures and damage, and as such should be considered done at your own risk ! This is common sense stuff if you ask me.

I've had a DFI NF4 for several months now, it has been faultless in every way. I've used the 5v rail for Vdimm without issues.

my 2 cents

edit: I think that DFI had the best intentions by providing this option on the the NF4 for the enthusists market, what they didn't anticipate were peeps with limited or no experience OCing using the option.

I'm up to 4 cents so I'm going to step down now

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

Do you really think Oskar Wu is going to come on here and bash his own board....I think not.

All i am stateing here is the coversation i have just had with DFI's Technical support.

I feel it is only resonable to inform people of the information that i was told.

Yes until DFI make a statement, you may say this is not official, however if this is going to save a few people the nightmare of RMAing their boards because of this problem until DFI realease a fix, then i hope i have helped.

Topboy

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Post it at DFI-Street, then... We'll see what happens ;)

DFI will never say what went wrong. But SLI tells something when you think about 5v for vdimm and design of the board.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

Post it at DFI-Street, then... We'll see what happens ;)

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Posted.....and DFI have allready responded....Mr Frank Wong, DFI USA Technical Support quoting R&D in Taiwan..... ;)

Topboy

see page 9 in the DFI NF4 user manual !

Quote:

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DRAM 4V Select

Attention:
The DRAM voltage as originally supported by the spec is up to 2.85v only. Jumper JP17 allows you to select beyond the defined spec. Although this function is supported, selecting a higer voltage may cause unstable current supplied to the system board which may subsequenly cause damage to the CPU and DIMM's

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I think that pretty much says it all !

Sorry one more point, I wonder how many boards have been damaged by using the 5v rail for Vdimm while peeps were using 20pin PSU's and not using the extra molex power plugs suppiled on the mb ?? clearly this would be the USER and not the design of the mb.

I was wondering the exact same thing major. How many of these guys had the problem when running a 20 pin, unapproved PSU on this board.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Major

see page 9 in the DFI NF4 user manual !



I think that pretty much says it all !

Sorry one more point, I wonder how many boards have been damaged by using the 5v rail for Vdimm while peeps were using 20pin PSU's and not using the extra molex power plugs suppiled on the mb ?? clearly this would be the USER and not the design of the mb.

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Well i have been using all the required power connectors ( molex and 3.5 floppy along with the 24 pin and 6 pin and my PSU is a enermax 600 watt that has the 24 pin ATX supply.

So as DFI said to me they advise to change this jumper back to 3.3 volt as this is a known problem that R&D have found in taiwan

Topboy

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

Well i have been using all the required power connectors ( molex and 3.5 floppy along with the 24 pin and 6 pin and my PSU is a enermax 600 watt that has the 24 pin ATX supply.

So as DFI said to me they advise to change this jumper back to 3.3 volt as this is a known problem that R&D have found in taiwan

Topboy

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And you lost some ram on this board? Maybe you could tell us exactly what happened in your case;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by G H Z

And you lost some ram on this board? Maybe you could tell us exactly what happened in your case;)

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I lost 1 stick of VX4000 with this board straight away when running at 3.4 volts when i forst got this board and ram.

I then had this RMAd by OCZ....great work OCZ....and have been running at 3.2 volts with the 5 volt jumper just fine for 2 months.

Then the board failed....died 3 days ago....no changes made at all to the config....it just died.

This is when i RMAd the board and talked to Frank Wong tonight about the problem.

As the news articles states at BE " Mr Wong also said "Our R&D has also found that the Vdimm jumper when set to 5 volts can cause some of the affected boards chipsets to blow"

I belive this is what happened to my board

So when i get my new board back...as recomneded by DFI Tech support, i will be running at 3.3 volts Vdimm jumper until they fix the problem.

Topboy

I have said that long time ago... I think, DFI NF4 is just not for everyone, period.

DFI says that in the Manual (like Major pointed out) and everybody knows that playing with high volts can cause trouble.
So, my advice... If unsure and not confident enough, switch to 3.3v, get some TCCD and problem solved, right? Since 5v is what everybody says causes trouble.

Well based on what topboy just said if true, that the 5v jumper problem is only affecting some boards chipsets then it does sound like something they need to work out.

Still the best board ever made imo.

Its possible that you are jumping to conclusions about what was said to you.

It might be 'in certain configuartions' I.e with crap PSU's or wrongly set up.

I too have used 5v option from day 1 and have had zero problems.

Why is it becoming the 'norm' to blame the MoBo for instability/failure/compat problems now.

Interesting, lets see what kind of response we get from DFI. I am reserving my judgement, but I sure as hell am not going to try 5V until further notice.

Just to respond to some of the earlier comments. I had 24-pin PSU (Enermax noisetaker 485W) and I did have all the connectors plugged in (ATX24, P4 Ready, HD Molex, FD Molex ALL of them were plugged in). I have lost 2 sets of 2x512 TwinMOS UTT.

You guys should at least try to listen to people who have had this problems, we talked about this at length in the other thread about this issue, and here you are again blindly defending DFI and accusing the users.

I agree, lets reserve our judgement and not jump to any conclsions, but I think it is you who are doing just that.

PS. I am attaching a pic of my board with the approved 24-pin PSU and with all the connectors plugged in.

Overclocking is risky business, anything could happen so I don't think using the 5v jumper is any more dangerous than doing vdimm mod on these mobo, if you're skeerd...then stick with the default 3.3v, if you ain't...then crank away, thanks for the heads up though.....hope we hear something from Oskar Wu or whomever else responsible to clear this up. :D :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jessfm

Its possible that you are jumping to conclusions about what was said to you.

It might be 'in certain configuartions' I.e with crap PSU's or wrongly set up.

I too have used 5v option from day 1 and have had zero problems.

Why is it becoming the 'norm' to blame the MoBo for instability/failure/compat problems now.

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Ok lets put this to bed

I am not blaming the motherboard or manufacturer....i rate DFI products very highly.....I am stating what DFI said to me....period.

So please take my post as information on what DFI said.....not as a flame post against DFI....because i think DFI RULE

Thank you and good night

Topboy

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hovo73

Interesting, lets see what kind of response we get from DFI. I am reserving my judgement, but I sure as hell am not going to try 5V until further notice.

Just to respond to some of the earlier comments. I had 24-pin PSU (Enermax noisetaker 485W) and I did have all the connectors plugged in (ATX24, P4 Ready, HD Molex, FD Molex ALL of them were plugged in).

You guys should at least try to listen to people who have had this problems, we talked about this at length in the other thread about this issue, and here you are again blindly defending DFI and accusing the users.

I agree, lets reserve our judgement and not jump to any conclsions, but I think it is you who are doing just that.

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Agreed - but do you see the trend - BTW I use 20pin PSU, but the point is I suspect its the vast differences of hardware configs possible.
I think there is an issue - but its been clouded by ppl who have trouble setting up such a complex board with lits of BETA Bios's.
But the issue is something to do with power requirements and some PSU's not delivering .

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jessfm

Its possible that you are jumping to conclusions about what was said to you.

It might be 'in certain configuartions' I.e with crap PSU's or wrongly set up.

I too have used 5v option from day 1 and have had zero problems.

Why is it becoming the 'norm' to blame the MoBo for instability/failure/compat problems now.

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So we all go back to blaming the ram as usual????

Remember...boards clock ram and the cpu's....it may just be the board in this instance, it does happen.

I posted this yesterday...http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...6&postcount=25
Its a little weird many are seeing ram issues and the symptoms are all the same wouldn't you say?

I have been working with DFI on cold boot and dead dimm issues for a while and will continue to till the issue is sorted...remember I helped DFI with some of the aspects of this board so i am in no way bashing it...its just there does seem to be something not quite right...ask the users who are having issues; as there are quite a few of them.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bigtoe

So we all go back to blaming the ram as usual????

Remember...boards clock ram and the cpu's....it may just be the board in this instance, it does happen.

I posted this yesterday...http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...6&postcount=25
Its a little weird many are seeing ram issues and the symptoms are all the same wouldn't you say?

I have been working with DFI on cold boot and dead dimm issues for a while and will continue to till the issue is sorted...remember I helped DFI with some of the aspects of this board so i am in no way bashing it...its just there does seem to be something not quite right...ask the users who are having issues; as there are quite a few of them.

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No no no.

The big issue here is picking through the information recieved to work out the true problem. Lets face it, If the Ram had the failure rates that are sugested(as you seem t othink I implied) then OCZ would be shipping totaly cr@p products and would be out of business - we know thats not the case.

If the boards had such a failure rate as sugested(rem DFI is not that big in Mobo terms) then they would have no QC - we know this is not the case.

As OCZ have rightly pointed out many times , settings can be different. OCZ have also pointed outthe short comings with PSU's in the past, hence wh you started to make them.

See where I am heading ?

I've used the 5v jumper without issue with my sticks, but just because I and many other haven't had a problem yet doesn't mean there isn't an issue.
IF it's true that it's blowing some chipsets, then there IS an issue, because that setting(all vdimm actually) is supposed to be for feeding the dimm sockets, not the chipset.
I haven't had an issue with my board when it's running, when it is it can't be beat by any board I know of, just a stupid cold boot no matter what sticks/voltage I use.

I'll be watching for more info regarding this though.

Thanks for the info topboy

m

Well I'm not sure who to blame, if indeed anyone at all. But it must be said that I chose my DFI NF4 Ultra for its known overclockability, and high volt options (I have TCCD now, and it looked as though UTT/VX/Redline type memory was the future) were a major selling point, for me at least. It comes as a disapointment to hear that I cannot safely use this feature without the risk of killing very expensive RAM which I would not be able to afford to replace. If people would like to correct me on this and that there turns out to be a KNOWN SAFE/ WARRANTIED method for using the 4 volt Vdimm jumper then I stand corrected (as always) and would love to hear it. Bein fairly noobish compared to the majority of guys (and girls) here, I guess like many users I'd like a clearly defined limit as to what I can and cant do with this board, and where user risk takes over from warranty.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jessfm

No no no.

The big issue here is picking through the information recieved to work out the true problem. Lets face it, If the Ram had the failure rates that are sugested(as you seem t othink I implied) then OCZ would be shipping totaly cr@p products and would be out of business - we know thats not the case.

If the boards had such a failure rate as sugested(rem DFI is not that big in Mobo terms) then they would have no QC - we know this is not the case.

As OCZ have rightly pointed out many times , settings can be different. OCZ have also pointed outthe short comings with PSU's in the past, hence wh you started to make them.

See where I am heading ?

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I see your point m8 but Powerstreams and PCP&C psu's are used in most of the cases, it seems you guys are getting real specific about what what you power your rigs with these days ;)

Im helping DFI here and will continue to, im talking with Oskar nighly at the moment trying to brainstorm some fixes for the cold boot issues many are having.The news came as a shock to me as it may have with many of you guys that DFI actually are saying not to use the 5v line but I have to admit i find the board better using a tweaked 3.3v line.

Also another point to remember is many guys only use their boards for benching and tweaking for a few hrs each day, they don't see any issues, the guys who have 1 board that they use all the time are the ones who are having the issues.

Quite truthfully, while fair warning was given in the form of a vague instruction manual, DFI made this +3.2v option a bullet point in selling the board. Personally I don't/won't run this rig @+3.2v out of principle, just mines not anybody else's. The board was hyped for this kind, and other kinds of action and thats why peeps have it, you, me, the martians and everybody else. Moreover, certain products are being advertised that use this option
almost exclusively with this board. To not be drawn out of context, I truly love this MOBO. It does everything I need and then some(sometimes) but a spade is a spade.
Just because it hasn't happened to you(meaning anybody without issue...yet)doesn't mean it should be discounted as valid and very real. And the sad thing is I think it can be avoided or contained to a certain degree depending on experience of the user, and listenin to nubs talk about their 3Dmark scores or pi/P95 benches, etc. how they run 1-1-1-0(heheheh)and a few days later their :banana::banana::banana::banana: died on them...I wonder why?
All the same I see both sides.

will dfi street closed the trend.....

i know how DFI could make everybody happy just give us LIFE TIME WARRANTY.
my f'n ram costs $100 more then the motherboard. so you tell me which would i chose to die i'd say the board and not my ram.

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

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Yep......
It sat at 1 view and no answers for a long while then BAM an answer and 69 views.
Then a few more answers, but the views stayed the same.

"there is already a thread about this!!
Use the search function.....

Show me the other thread.

DFI employee damage control at it's worst.
Bah

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

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Yeah it does make you wonder what they are trying to hide here.......if they are trying to hide anything

personally i havnt had any problems so far and ive been running mine off the 5v since i got it when it came out. everybody should just relax and lets see what they can do about it, they arent going to just not do anything.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by pablo

personally i havnt had any problems so far and ive been running mine off the 5v since i got it when it came out. everybody should just relax and lets see what they can do about it, they arent going to just not do anything.

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Well lets hope they CAN do somthing about this.

I doubt this can be fixed with a bios update, but i could be very wrong.

Whatever the problem is with the 5 volt jumper, it is causing alot of people issues, and killing alot of very expensive ram.

I will speak again to DFI tomorrow abou this and try and get an email out of them, but i dont hold much hope to getting any written statments from them becuase that basically puts the nail in the coffin for them.

If anyone can get hold of Oskar or anyone else from DFI to comment please do so

Topboy

yeah i dont feel that it can be fixed by bios either but im sure everything will work out

Why don't we start a poll and see how many people fried their ram or had the mobo blew up while they were using the 5V jumper? :fact:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rubescen

Why don't we start a poll and see how many people fried their ram or had the mobo blew up while they were using the 5V jumper? :fact:

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http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...886#post881886

please use this thread to help the world!

can someone tell me what that jumper is for?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by calcal

can someone tell me what that jumper is for?

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which jumper? JP17? it enables the memory power to used the 5v rail so in turn your can give your memory upto 4v in the bios :cool:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by stealth17

which jumper? JP17? it enables the memory power to used the 5v rail so in turn your can give your memory upto 4v in the bios :cool:

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Which according to DFI is causing ram and boards to die.....so use at your discretion !!!!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

Well lets hope they CAN do somthing about this.

I doubt this can be fixed with a bios update, but i could be very wrong.

Whatever the problem is with the 5 volt jumper, it is causing alot of people issues, and killing alot of very expensive ram.

I will speak again to DFI tomorrow abou this and try and get an email out of them, but i dont hold much hope to getting any written statments from them becuase that basically puts the nail in the coffin for them.

If anyone can get hold of Oskar or anyone else from DFI to comment please do so

Topboy

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after hte information he gave you, i dont think he will be around to answer ur questions again. but if it came from the DFI's own tech support, and we assume they know what they are doing then it should be taken into consideration the problems with this board. You guys hounded Topboy like he's the worse person on Earth. I just hope that if there is a problem, DFI would come clean instead of hiding behind lies and denials. Coming clean will actually help their credibility.

In the beginning, I was actually excited about this board until I started hearing about the sudden DFI death syndromes. Lets all hope DFI sorts this out.

I am having cold boot too. My point of view is that if using vdimm more that 3.2v(in Bios) will cause problems, why must DFI to design vdimm to 4v. It is a waste for not overclock this board and using 4vdimm as this is the selling point of this board. Some OCZ VX series RAM are especially manufature for this board and requires at least 3.2v and it will show its true color when raise the vdimm more than 3.2v. How ironic if we have the RAM (OCZ) but the board could not support it by raising the vdimm. Personally, I don't think updating of Bios will solve the issues. I think DFI needs to rework or redesign the board because 4vdimm is truly a big selling point for this board. I will still rate this board with my 2 thumbs up even though I have cold boot issue. This board is indeed a great board that money can buy (Period)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Topboy

and have been running at 3.2 volts with the 5 volt jumper just fine for 2 months.

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I sure I've read warnings about using the 5V line set to 3.2 volts as it can cause major overheating problems for the Vdimm MOSFET. A definate no-no. It's been said time and again that increased cooling on the MOSFET is needed if you are using the high voltage setting.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

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Talk about it all you want in this thread.... http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/show...2&page=1&pp=15

It's original thread he was pointing to.

that thread was not started to address this issue at all. and the powers that be over there are surprisingly quiet in that thread too.

btw, lurker making his first post but i am definitely a dfi fan. i love my sli-dr although i run tccd so i'm not directly effected by this issue. either way i think this is a valid issue which should be addressed and i trust it will be.

They're thread closing happy that's for sure.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by aka-doc-

Talk about it all you want in this thread.... http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/show...2&page=1&pp=15

It's original thread he was pointing to.

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That thread is not even close to what the other thread he closed was..
Another thread asking about the J17 jumper got closed immediately also, with a point to that same thread.
They are not the same, but I guess some folks only want 1 problem thread over there
:rolleyes:
As if this board only has 1 problem :rolleyes:
Boy damage control is in full force over there...

EDIT: My guess is if ya start bringing up the DFI admitted stuff in that thread, it'll prolly get closed too.
Either that or you will be warned and your posts deleted.

obviously this wasnt a high level tech support person. that or it was taken out of context. i've heard it all, as i do tech support myself (application layer), and some support staff will say one thing, and at times it will be miscontrued from the 'actual' truth. whether that is from ignorance, or just a lack of knowledge, depends on the person and or the 'situation' the person is put in.

i bet that person is answering a lot of emails back and forth right now to his superiors. he'll think twice before answering a question such as that without some thought behind the ramifications of said answer(s). then again, if his "dont use the +5" was taken out of context, that would surely negate this whole discussion.

you bought this board with the intention of using the +5. use it. thats overclocking. does it make sense to now worry? was it a pain to get corrupted bioses on dfi nf2 if you blew on them? yea. did u use those boards anyways? yup.

we are all fully aware of the dangers of running +5, if not used properly (i.e. 24 pin, all connectors in, cool the board/area, etc., not to go nuts 24/7 (like 3.7)). responsible overclocking if you will. all this power is given to you at your disposal. this is no way implies that I think the lot that are having issues are negligent. i feel there is a serious issue if this is happening and i applaud those that are having the issues for coming forth, and working to find a fix, if you will. however, singling out one thing and placing blame on it, when countless others disprove it, should be painting another picture.

my 2 cents.

as in for my situation, i'd say the +5 is rock stable. much more stable then the +3 feed. been running it since day 3 (its been 3 1/2 months). and i have done everything while on it (switch ram/slots, clear cmos, flash bioses, etc.), and no issues have come out of it.

that being said, i hope this issue is resolved swiftly for you all who are experiencing its wrath.

Someone posted the initial thread at BE in that other thread...heheheh

the most important thing to mention, in my mind is that you were using 3.2v with the 5v jumper. its quite plausable that the issue is simply using the 5v jumper for too low voltage causing way to much heat which might end up causing voltage spiking or after it gets too hot the mosfet gets damaged and suddenly far more voltage is being supplied than you think. using anything below 3.4v is really a bad idea on the 5v line due to the heat. no offence but, knowing loads of tech support and being tech support its FAR easier to say something on the phone to put the customer off using an option than trying to explain he's done something that was a bad idea, telling someone they fecked up over the phone is fairly difficult and not something you want to do all day long.

i bet the method of going from the 3.3v rail to the 5v rail has alittle something to do with it too...

drunken, i totally agree....

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

I don't buy it just yet...
There's a LOAD of folks out there, including myself, that have NEVER had any problems with 5v jumper. I would say, there must be a very special circumstance (type and amount of memory used perhaps) that might be causing trouble. It just cannot be said that 5v has flaws if you see that many use it with no drama at all.

If I don't see it coming from Oscar Wu's mouth OFFICIALLY, on DFI-Street, with specific, technical explanation, then I do not buy it :D

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I actually buy the story. Frank Wong is live person I talked to who did my RMA when my first board was DoA. In fact, he seems to be doing most of RMAs in western coast of US. If not across all US. Very pleasant and knowledgable person from what our phone coversation involved. (and PROMPT!)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by muzz

Someone posted the initial thread at BE in that other thread...heheheh

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ya... saw mrlobber post on the other thread... :woot:

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/show...t=12342&page=4

wonder what will happen next..... :nono:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by tictac

ya... saw mrlobber post on the other thread... :woot:

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/show...t=12342&page=4

wonder what will happen next..... :nono:

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Yeah did that to get a comment from Angry_Games to see whether DFI admits any official position on this one. So far the dfi-street reps have been very quiet, I'd even say, too quiet. Maybe that's because they're working on the problem, maybe because they cannot instantly call it "a user error", but I'm not going into any further speculations here so that not to insult anyone.

But I have to admit, just as jinu117 said, as far as I remember, Frank Wong is one of the top tech support guys at DFI USA so I indeed don't think he said something about the existing flaws without anything behind that.

However, the official word from DFI would be very nice to hear to confirm/deny this, otherwise I see some nasty rumors and/or ranting eventually getting out of control somewhere in the future.

This makes me feel great, considering my DFI will be here monday :(

I've been running with the 5V jumper since 1 month with a 20 pins PSU + adaptor and 0 problems by now.

I never touched the fricken 5V jumper, I used TCCD modules @ 2.6 and 2.8V, I had a recomended 650W 24 fricken pin psu and had all the 4 fricken connectors connected to the mobo.

Installation went smooth, 2 x 512 sticks in both orange slots, jumpers set to sli mode with 2 x 6800GT's, 2 x 74gig raptors in raid0, flopy, dvdrw, booted, installed windows and necessary drivers, did some reasherch and got the 310 bios, flashed, shutdown, turned off the power and unpluged, cleared cmos and thats when all the fricken CRAP started,

Had to pull sticks and vid cards to get the pos to post and enter windows....which I couldn't because it would reboot at the windows loading screen, the fricken pos was now caught in a reboot cycle, error messages here and error messages there....windows was HOSED!

Repeat all over again, clear fricken cmos, pull this stick, jam that stick there, wack out a vid card, change ram timings (which btw when set to auto did jack for stability) try this and try that blah blah blah and after a dozen windows installs resulting in the same senario I'd had it. :slapass:

I was sick of being told about "user error" and did you flash the bios correctly,run memtest etc etc etc etc, I'd already memtested my ram to bloody death and it was error free with various timings and V FFS!!, and don't even talk to me about how to flash a bios :nono: :fact:

The board has some serious issues and I mean SERIOUS!! :banana:

I gave up on the POS, got more important things to do than fart arse around with that tempramental schitzophrenic that DFI call a mobo. :rolleyes:

this is a reason for concern

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

---

i PMd Angry_Games about this Bleeding Edge revalation and he ignored it.....i mentioned it in a couple of posts over at DFI-street because this is a concern.........if this is really the case WTF is up with DFI....bit dodgy if you ask me :nono:

guys if they recall 100,000+ cars because of a manufacturing problem...it does NOT mean every car will have that problem...the probability of developing is high therefore it is recalled yeah

I think we had to be patience since they are looking into it....majority of the problem is coming from high voltage ram...those utt or bh-5...

i spoil my 1st set of tmsp pc3500 bh-5 after 3 hours and only during burn-in only....below 3.2v to be precise but on yellow slot and 3.3v

well, i now burning 2nd set with 3.4v w 5v jumper...

i think i burn the bh-5 in the timing it don't like and though it can loop 90 loops but finally die after 90 loops....weird

i don't know what's the problem till now....i would like to try on yellow slot again but it won't clock and had to stick to orange slot...

not many board can support this kind of ram so we might see other boards having same problem if they could drive it....

n i also feel my ram dead is weird...run wrong timing also can die ???? if tonnes of errors then i won't loop it 90 loops...it start with zero errors....

its a great board that i own till now....apart from those p4 days..

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bachus_anonym

hehe... Angry Games just closed that thread on DFI-Street :lol: Wierd stuff....

---

Hah?! Nothing wierd about that if you ask me :/
It's quite a well known fact that both AG and RGone won't even assume that there is a problem with DFI motherboard, blaming it all on the end-user...

This starts remiding me the bashing over LANPARTY NFII ULTRA at the PCPer at the time.

I guess the guys working on support at DFI street is very very tired of anwering same questions over and over again.
And to me they do not know much at all about computer, put a questions and its like they go read some manual or FAQ to find an answer.
They care more about rules about posting then to answer questions.

I would like to see them replaced, but who the heck want that job ?

subscribing to keep an eye on things - i must say the best move i made was to ditch the utt for tccd.......been stress free 100% uptime ever since..

mb dfi will spring for a ddr booster for everyone x.x

Could someone post a link to the DFI-Street thread on this issue that Angry_Games says they have.

Im looking but im not finding it.

Topboy

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

Could someone post a link to the DFI-Street thread on this issue that Angry_Games says they have.

Im looking but im not finding it.

Topboy

---

Did you really think you were going to?
;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by pershoot

obviously this wasnt a high level tech support person. that or it was taken out of context. i've heard it all, as i do tech support myself (application layer), and some support staff will say one thing, and at times it will be miscontrued from the 'actual' truth. whether that is from ignorance, or just a lack of knowledge, depends on the person and or the 'situation' the person is put in.

---

Frank Wong happens to be the Technical support Manager for DFI USA so i feel i have been informed at one of the highest levels from their tech support.

Topboy

Just read through all of this thread. I'm tired of the easy "user error " comments about this problem. I was using the 5v jumper since I first got the board in Feburary. 3 different set of utt ram. Finally found 2 sticks that would do 260 2-2-2 with 3.5v. I ran many times memtest overnight. Always had 2 80mm fans over ram and although I don't have a temp probe, they never were hot to the touch. Ran 24/7 for about 2 months, with good cooling and a 24 pin psu. Only would reboot about once a week. Then shut down for the night. Unplugged computer just to look inside and check things out for dust and such. That is when my trouble began. 2 days of switching ram, trying to get back going again, then to found out that one stick was no longer good. I dont think just turning off and unplugging the computer is user error. I have some OCZ plat rev 2 now, but I want my utt ram again. Just because not everyone is having a problem, doesn't mean there isn't one. I have a Dodge Dakota. They have problems with the ball joints, even have had a recall. This is my second one and I've never had any problems with ball joints. Maybe the problem is those people don't know how to drive. Ok off of the :soap: All I want is for dfi to admit there is a problem and do something about it.

im with 4x4n - the user error, lacking support hardware (psu) etc comments are getting old - anything but a motherboard issue in some eyes i suppose...

Common guys, you act like sticking 3.5v+ to your ram is no big deal ! lol

I EXPECT to have hardware die OCing, I've killed countless cpu's, gpu's, mb's, ram, PSU's by overvolting. To put the blame off on DFI just because they made it easy for you to do ??

When using the 5V rail, you need to cover all necessary precautions like cooling the system....and this pwm and chipset with anmbient temp. @35..

Major noone is saying that sticking 3.5v to the ram is nothing.
I am not seeing that.

Alot of folks I see are having problems/ have had issues at even lower voltages than that, meanwhile taking ALL the precautions we know are necessary when running high voltages.

Of course running the 4V Vdimm is risky for ram, but if it's REALLY killing chipsets then thats another matter altogether don't you guys think?

Some folks have had ram die for mysterious reasons with this board, even when not much Voltage has been applied.
I like and applaud the fact that DFI gave us the option to use the 5V rail for high vdimm, but lets not lose sight of the fact that having that option was a MAJOR selling point of this board, so IF there is a problem with the circuitry it's a shame, but not the end users fault.

I've used the 5V rail myself without issues ( I use BH-5 and TCCD), but that doesn't mean that everything is fine in OZ.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arctic-k20

im with 4x4n - the user error, lacking support hardware (psu) etc comments are getting old - anything but a motherboard issue in some eyes i suppose...

---

24/7 since before they were launched in the us, @3.5v no problems whatsoever.....the hardware in front of the keyboard must have a problem... :p:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Major

Common guys, you act like sticking 3.5v+ to your ram is no big deal ! lol

I EXPECT to have hardware die OCing, I've killed countless cpu's, gpu's, mb's, ram, PSU's by overvolting. To put the blame off on DFI just because they made it easy for you to do ??

---

I dont agree....

DFI advertise this board as being able to feed more than 3.2 volts SUPPORTED and its one of the major selling points with this board.

If there is an issue with this design then they should fix it.

Yes not everyone is going to get this problem.....it depends on how long you use/have the computer switched on. Some people will only run their boards for 3 or 4 hours a day, some for 8 or 10 and some 24/7.

Look at it this way......

Mercedes Benz recently recalled 150,000 cars that had a problem with them. They sold 500,000 of these models that had to be recalled. So everyone was not affected.

Just because some people are not getting a problem does not mean there isnt a problem in the first place.

And Where is DFI.....come on we need to hear from them.

Topboy

@topboy, what kind of cooling you put on your system? Users of 5V rail should be really carefull with this.

Someone opened another thread about this at DFIS.
http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12609

First post points at user error...............
Things like this are not ALWAYS user error.

I really think this blows myself, as IF there is a problem, mobo manufacturers like DFI ( who as stated, I applaud for the effort) may forgoe anymore efforts to give an option like this again.
Catch 22 IMO.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by thelostrican

24/7 since before they were launched in the us, @3.5v no problems whatsoever.....the hardware in front of the keyboard must have a problem... :p:

---

my hardware - behind and infront of the keyboard is fine but i am using tccd - had nothing but problems with utt but thanks for sharing that YOUR board has been fine 24/7 :toast:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dumo

@topboy, what kind of cooling you put on your system? Users of 5V rail should be really carefull with this.

---

I have OCZ Ram with 2 80mm fans pointing directly over the ram and the PWIM Mosfet chip...the 1 right next to the dimm sockets.

So not a heat issue

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

I dont agree....
Look at it this way......

Mercedes Benz recently recalled 150,000 cars that had a problem with them. They sold 500,000 of these models that had to be recalled. So everyone was not affected.

---

A funny comparison IMHO. How can you compare a car with motherboard?
And a Mercedes Benz with DFI? Besides, way heavier manufacturers such as ASUS and others haven't recalled their motherboards in similar situations..
And there isn't much to be done if the issue appears to be a hardware related.
Lets hope it is not the case..

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Badong

A funny comparison IMHO. How can you compare a car with motherboard?
And a Mercedes Benz with DFI? Besides, way heavier manufacturers such as ASUS and others haven't recalled their motherboards in similar situations..
And there isn't much to be done if the issue appears to be a hardware related.
Lets hope it is not the case..

---

My point was that just because some poeple dont experiance an issue with their goods does not mean there isnt an issue in the first place.

And IF and i say IF this is a hardware design issue on the part of DFI then they are obliged to fix the problem even if that means swapping the boards for new revision boards...As did ASUS last year. Its what we call warranty.

Topboy

Well, abit and msi probly the ideal choices of mobo. Try 'em and probly you wont have anymore problems with your hardware.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dumo

Well, abit and msi probly the ideal choices of mobo. Try 'em and probly you wont have anymore problems with your hardware.

---

Let's not forget Sapphire's PURE series :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by topboy

Could someone post a link to the DFI-Street thread on this issue that Angry_Games says they have.

Im looking but im not finding it.

Topboy

---

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/show...2&page=1&pp=15

they say that the cold bug is a board problem due to bad voltaje :slobber: :slobber: maybe amd has nothing to do with it :slobber:

hope someone fix this, i was so close to buying one of this boards

At DFI street, this thread has just been closed:
http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12609

It seems no explanation from the mods is present there :rolleyes:

I really hope their silence is because they're working on the fix.

Big surprise...

I am certain restraint had to be prevalent for it to last THAT long.

I notice noone posted anything, it was just closed.
Walls must be closing in.

I have been seeing new/thread post after post about the cold boot issue lately too.

LMAO

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12641

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

I dont agree....

DFI advertise this board as being able to feed more than 3.2 volts SUPPORTED and its one of the major selling points with this board.

If there is an issue with this design then they should fix it.

Yes not everyone is going to get this problem.....it depends on how long you use/have the computer switched on. Some people will only run their boards for 3 or 4 hours a day, some for 8 or 10 and some 24/7.

---

In a nutshell, you're saying that DFI should guaruntee stability using the +5 volt jumper. However, this is impossible. Why do you ask? Because motherboard companies simply cannot/will not endorse overclocking. Despite the fact that DFI motherboards are designed for out-of-spec operations, we as enthusiasts must realize that there are still some risks we must bear.

I'm sure that didn't sit well with some people, so let's be fair here:

1. Do we know that DFI motherboards are engineered for overclocking? Yes.

2. Were there a fair amount of people who bought the NF4 motherboards for the voltage options? Of course.

3. Does this mean that we should be so quick to point the finger when things don't go necessarily as planned? No.

Aside from all of this, DFI even made it a point to issue a warning concerning the +5 volt jumper within the NF4 manual itself. So whether you believe or not, the company did an acceptable job of bringing this to your attention.

I'm sure that some people have simply recieved a bad board or two - it happens with every company. However, I also think that some (if not many) of these cases are due to user error. Now I'm sure that you might have sufficient cooling on your DIMMS and motherboard, but we cannot say this for sure about every single user with a complaint. Moreover, we all have learned by now that DFI's can be a real pain if you don't treat them the right way; in other words, being impatient with these boards (especially in the bios/flashing/jumper switching) is known to cause adverse affects. It's pretty easy to say "DFI motherboards are unstable!!!!!1111" when you don't even know the full story of most of the people with instability issues.

Also, your Mercedes analogy was pretty weak. Think about it this way: Recent Abit motherboards (beginning with the AN7 I believe) have all been shipped with the uGuru tool which includes an overclocking utility. Would a user be justified in complaining if they were unable to find a stable overclock with uGuru? Of course not. This is because motherboards are warrantied for stock speeds only, so anything above that is done at the discretion of the user.

Hopefully this will give you some food for thought on the matter. In no way do I seek to protect and/or defend DFI, but the fact of the matter is that only one side of the story is being heard and even that is an incomplete one. Often times you'll find that those who are having issues with a particular part are more vocal than those who have no complaints whatsoever (myself included in the latter). In the meantime, some other scenarios to ponder:

1. Would you rant about a VGA Silencer not allowing you secure higher clocks on your video card?

2. How about PC 2700 Bh-5 that can handle high voltage but simply won't reach PC 3200 speeds?

3. What about a x800 Pro VIVO that won't complete the pipe mod?

deception``

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

1. Would you rant about a VGA Silencer not allowing you secure higher clocks on your video card?

2. How about PC 2700 Bh-5 that can handle high voltage but simply won't reach PC 3200 speeds?

3. What about a x800 Pro VIVO that won't complete the pipe mod?

deception``

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1) Yes, if its advertised to do so and costs over $100 bucks

2)yes, if its advertised that it would support high volts and reaching 3200 speeds and beyond.

3)It was never advertised to do that.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by situman

1) Yes, if its advertised to do so and costs over $100 bucks

2)yes, if its advertised that it would support high volts and reaching 3200 speeds and beyond.

3)It was never advertised to do that.

---

Very well, but the point here is that DFI never advertised that the +5 volt jumper would guaruntee stability with high voltages. On the contrary, all indications (especially those in the manual) point to the exact opposite. I could understand if a guaruntee were in place (like speed-binned ram that fails to run at its rated speeds), but this is not the case here.

deception``

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

In a nutshell, you're saying that DFI should guaruntee stability using the +5 volt jumper. However, this is impossible. Why do you ask? Because motherboard companies simply cannot/will not endorse overclocking.

---

Cannot/ will not? I can understand the average co. going in this direction, but THIS board is being pushed as THE OC AMD board, hence the available voltage options, and they have garnered a boatload of sales they otherwise may/would not have gotten. Is it worth it for them? Yes it was until folks started having problems.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

Despite the fact that DFI motherboards are designed for out-of-spec operations, we as enthusiasts must realize that there are still some risks we must bear.

---

I agree, as do most other folks who have a brain. There is NO disputing that IMO.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

1. Do we know that DFI motherboards are engineered for overclocking? Yes.

2. Were there a fair amount of people who bought the NF4 motherboards for the voltage options? Of course.

3. Does this mean that we should be so quick to point the finger when things don't go necessarily as planned? No.

---

Agreed

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by deception``

Aside from all of this, DFI even made it a point to issue a warning concerning the +5 volt jumper within the NF4 manual itself. So whether you believe or not, the company did an acceptable job of bringing this to your attention.

---

If ya wanna give them credit for that OK, but I don't think that referred to killing memory at lower voltages, or chipsets dying ( dead mobos are not VERY common, but they are around).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by deception``

I'm sure that some people have simply recieved a bad board or two - it happens with every company. However, I also think that some (if not many) of these cases are due to user error.

---

Most likely true that SOME are user error, but there are alot of problems, and alot of the folks with these issues know wtf they are doing.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

but the fact of the matter is that only one side of the story is being heard and even that is an incomplete one.

---

This I agree with wholeheartedly, but folks have lost alot of very expensive gear,some of these folks know what they are doing, taking all precautions necessary to no avail, meanwhile nothing has been stated AT ALL until now, and of course THAT is " UNOFFICIAL"
Who's fault is that?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by deception``

1. Would you rant about a VGA Silencer not allowing you secure higher clocks on your video card?

---

You'd have to be pretty stupid

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by deception``

2. How about PC 2700 Bh-5 that can handle high voltage but simply won't reach PC 3200 speeds?

---

Come on, just cuz it'll take volts, don't mean it'll clock, I'm not seeing the correlation...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

3. What about a x800 Pro VIVO that won't complete the pipe mod?

---

WTH are you talking about, whats that got to do with anything?
The mercedes analogy was better than that.

I am not trying to start anything here, but it sure seems alot of folks are jumping to DFI's defense, when fact of the matter is most of those folks haven't had gear trashed.
I sure hope DFI can come up with a plan to remedy this issue, I believe their board to be the fastest in the land, and I WANT to see them succeed.

I am not blind to user error or fanboyism, both are very prevalent.

Peace

m

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deception``

Very well, but the point here is that DFI never advertised that the +5 volt jumper would guaruntee stability with high voltages.

---

We're not talking about stability but killed hardware. That's a completely different buisness.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by higgins

We're not talking about stability but killed hardware. That's a completely different buisness.

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I think you missed the point Higgins. The fact of the matter is that DFI warned users early on the use of the jumper could lead to problems, and dead hardware is no exception.

deception``

Quote:

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Originally Posted by topboy

Frank Wong happens to be the Technical support Manager for DFI USA so i feel i have been informed at one of the highest levels from their tech support.

Topboy

---

then it was careless of him to make such a statement publicly in the context it was made it in (i.e a blanket statement), as stated from you, in my opinion. now we have a panic frenzy such as this, and my original paragraphs are justified. that IS IF it wasn't taken out of context.