St00pid Asus tech support

[bingo13]

In summary, I contacted Asus tech support because of a compatibility issue between the M2F and GTX460. Hilarity ensues on Asus' behalf.

If possible, please put the KFA2 card in another board and run the current version of GPU-Z. Please PM me the VBios version on that card. I know an early version of the VBios from NV caused several problems but all production level cards were suppose to be updated before shipment. However, I have come across several cards that had an early VBios on them, even retail units. Another real problem is when users decide to use unsupported tools to modify their VBios and end up creating all sorts of compatibility problems - http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...=256367&page=2 - and you would not believe the number of video cards that are returned with either a modded BIOS or another manufacturers' BIOS on our card, yet for some reason it is an ASUS (or insert other manufacturer name here) problem.

I have run 11 different GTX460 cards in the Maximus Formula II board with BIOS 2302 without a problem tonight. The only cards I do not have are the Galaxy (KFA2 is a rebrand) and Sparkle cards. At this time, as hard as I have tried I cannot get the GTX460 to fail on this board with a variety of CPU, Power Supply, Memory, and audio options. That said we are still trying to replicate your problem and I am trying to get the Galaxy card here shortly.

[Mic]

Actually that is one of the better answers from asus tech support. You should see some of my old mails from them, makes you think they just took some guys without any computer knowledge from the street and put in customer support. They got some of the worst support from my experience, they could learn a lot from companies like EVGA, BFG ect. But then again you can find people here, who got bad experiences with just about any hardware company.

[Ket]

If possible, please put the KFA2 card in another board and run the current version of GPU-Z. Please PM me the VBios version on that card. I know an early version of the VBios from NV caused several problems but all production level cards were suppose to be updated before shipment. However, I have come across several cards that had an early VBios on them, even retail units. Another real problem is when users decide to use unsupported tools to modify their VBios and end up creating all sorts of compatibility problems - http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...=256367&page=2 - and you would not believe the number of video cards that are returned with either a modded BIOS or another manufacturers' BIOS on our card, yet for some reason it is an ASUS (or insert other manufacturer name here) problem.

I have run 11 different GTX460 cards in the Maximus Formula II board with BIOS 2302 without a problem tonight. The only cards I do not have are the Galaxy (KFA2 is a rebrand) and Sparkle cards. At this time, as hard as I have tried I cannot get the GTX460 to fail on this board with a variety of CPU, Power Supply, Memory, and audio options. That said we are still trying to replicate your problem and I am trying to get the Galaxy card here shortly.

Looks like you missed this from the first post

I sent you a reply about 7 days ago (not including weekend!) and still haven't heard a peep from anybody about this issue! Even a reply saying the issue is being worked on would be nice! Lets have a recap of the problem and whats been tried so far to remedy it shall we for those of us with (apparently) very short memory and attention spans.

System Spec:

Maximus II Formula w\ BIOS 2302
Q8400 CPU
2x2GB OCZ PC9200 LV Platinum
Xonar DX 7.1 PCI-E
KFA2 GTX460 1GB
XFX 750w modular PSU (62A 12v rail)

The PROBLEM:

Most of the time on powering up the PC and on restarts the system fails to get a monitor signal. This does NOT happen when using a HD5830 1GB or a HD4830 512MB.

Whats been tried:

- Replacing the PSU with a 800w modular unit (80A 12v rail)
Outcome: Problem remains

- Verified the system is working properly with alternative graphics cards (HD5830 1GB, HD4830 512MB)
Outcome: No problems

- Verified the KFA2 GTX460 1GB is working properly in another system.
Outcome: GTX460 1GB is working perfectly. Tested in a M3N78 running BIOS 0715.

- Reset Maximus II Formula BIOS
Outcome: No change. GTX460 still loses monitor display on most attempts at turning the system on, and on most system restarts.

- Verified all connections are secure
Outcome: They are

vBIOS version on the KFA2 is 70.04.13.00.01. I already contacted KFA as I thought it more to be a vBIOS rather than mobo issue, but according to the guy I spoke to 70.04.13.00.01 is the latest vBIOS they have. I can easily upload a video of the system failing to POST on a simple restart if you so wish.

Pic:


PM incoming.

EDIT - I tried reflashing both BIOS chips with 2302, seemed to be ok, but a false positive. After about 5 restarts it crapped out again. Testing the GTX460 on the M3N78 there was absolutely no issues I restarted the system 12 times in a row using the GTX460 and every time it rebooted without incident. I'm going to try skipping back to 2202, and if that doesn't work 2104, and I'll keep skipping back until 1602. Just in case the "fix" that was implemented for the dual GPU 4870X2 borked something up.

EDIT2 - I've just flashed to 1602, so far so good. (6 restarts without the monitor signal crapping out).

EDIT3 - Spoke too soon. On the 8th restart attempt, the signal died. All settings were of course stock (manually set). Still better than 2302 though, I'm lucky if I get 2 restarts in a row without the signal crapping out. Again I'll stress the KFA GTX460 has been thoroughly tested on a M3N78 and this problem is not present at all. It shouldn't matter, as the monitor used connected to the M3N78 system is also a LG, but the monitor being used with the M2F/GTX460 is a LG W2242S. Neither the W2242S or the M2F exhibit these signal loss / restart / bootup problems with a HD4830 512MB or a HD5830 1GB.

EDIT4 - I took the KFA GTX460 back to the M3N78 system and decided to do 20 reboot loops to see if the monitor lost signal, unsurprisingly, it didn't. So without any shadow of a doubt there absolutely zero problems with the GTX460. The issue is deffinatly somewhere with the M2F. I'll take my Xonar PCI-E card out to see if that makes any difference, but I doubt it will.

[bingo13]

Looks like you missed this from the first post

Actually I did not miss anything.

So we cycled three boards 1500 times each today without a single problem on the Palit, Gigabyte, and MSI cards. This is after a 500 cycle process on our GTX460 card. I will have the Galaxy card here tomorrow so testing will continue.

[Ket]

Well, one difference that may be the cause of my problem is I have a A3 rev, you are using a A2 rev. board. Eitherway, this is deffinately a issue with at least my M2F and possibly the A3 rev of the board as a whole. Nobody can logically explain why my GTX460 works absolutely flawlessly in the M3N78, and not the M2F. Unless KFA/Galaxy have really borked something up in their vBIOS I fail to see how the problem would be card specific relating to the M2F, its a reference design like 99.99% of all the other GTX460s out there atm.

Looking at screenshots though, the only difference that immediately jumps out is the M2F you are testing on is a A2, while mine is a A3.

[BababooeyHTJ]

Asus Tech Support Evaluation by BenchZone, 01-31-2007

Some things never change.

I love that article.

[Ket]

Insightful it is. Perhaps its where I'm a member here why Asus are going the extra mile, but the point is by the sounds of things they are doing their damndest to find what the issue could be At this point I will point out possible variants that could be why they can't replicate the problem to hopefully aid in diagnosis.

- My M2F is A3, not A2 like their using.
- Theres no mention if they are using a 750w XFX PSU
- They haven't been able to test with a Galaxy / KFA card (yet)

Not that these should make a significant difference but also;

- Unknown if they have been able to get hold of a 4GB OCZ PC9200 LV Platinum kit
- Unknown if they have a Xonar PCI-E card installed in the system

Those latter two as I say shouldn't make any real difference, but if you are trying to replicate a problem you need to use hardware thats identical down to sillicone revision (in the case of the mainboard). The only thing I can take comfort in is that I'm not the only one with the issue of a GTX460 sometimes failing to initiate properly, theres 3-4 others in these forums as well with the same issue and it does seem like a mobo>GPU communication problem. Even though its deffinately been ruled out as the GTX460 runs perfectly in a M3N78, I may return the card for a replacement just to rule it out. I don't want to return the card for replacement though, this GTX460 OCs well and I don't want a replacement that doesn't OC as well

[little_scrapper]

Unfortunately when problems you are having are not able to be duplicated by the Mfg. thent he ball tends to be in your court. Of all I have read the only onther thing I can think of is to test the output of your psu. I know it sounds funky and its a long shot, but are you sure your psu is delivering enough juice?

I had a problem (may not be relavent) very similar, turned out to be the monitor. For some reason that card didnt like that monitor. Worked everywhere else. Again, another long shot that MUST be evaluated.

Load resistors for testing output are acutally pretty cheap. Load resistors that can handle 500W cost a couple bucks at most. I'm an electronics guy so I guess its easy for me to say, but I must conceed not everyone is comfortable building a psu stess bench. or simply putting a load res. into the 12Vrail of a psu to make sure it is actually doing what it is supposed to be doing.

[Ket]

My XFX PSU has been (in a way) diagnosed healthy. I clocked the snot out of a HD5830 not long ago (950/5000 @ 1.15v) and left it stressing for hours hoping to squeeze more out of the GPU, never any odd behavior and always restarted / booted without issues. The M3N78 system also uses a LG monitor and theres no problem at all with that monitor, so that as good as rules the LG monitor out thats used with the M2F system too. It had crossed my mind though if for some reason the card just doesn't like the monitor cable and perhaps I should switch it with another one and see what happens. Anyway, we still need to wait to see what happens when a actual KFA card is tested, and preferably, the M2F being used for testing is switched to a A3 revision

Can't expect to duplicate a problem unless you are using hardware thats as identical to the problem system as possible

[STEvil]

Build a tinfoil cage and see if you are having RF interference... i'm serious

[Ket]

If this problem goes unsolved I'm just going to drop using Asus period Theres no way a M2F should have problems when a crappy M3N78 doesn't, different chipsets be damned.

[Bulldog14]

Just a tip. As an industry rep I can say you might find that you get a bit further along with Asus if you dropped the condescending tone your so fond of using.
Sure they aren't perfect, but with that tone your taking with them, it wouldn't surprise me that your issue has been put on a low burner.
Mfg support does not exist to be at the beck and call of every angry Ket with an attitude. You might find that you get a better reply using a bit of honey rather than vinegar.

[bingo13]

Insightful it is. Perhaps its where I'm a member here why Asus are going the extra mile, but the point is by the sounds of things they are doing their damndest to find what the issue could be At this point I will point out possible variants that could be why they can't replicate the problem to hopefully aid in diagnosis.

- My M2F is A3, not A2 like their using.
- Theres no mention if they are using a 750w XFX PSU
- They haven't been able to test with a Galaxy / KFA card (yet)

Not that these should make a significant difference but also;

- Unknown if they have been able to get hold of a 4GB OCZ PC9200 LV Platinum kit
- Unknown if they have a Xonar PCI-E card installed in the system

Those latter two as I say shouldn't make any real difference, but if you are trying to replicate a problem you need to use hardware thats identical down to sillicone revision (in the case of the mainboard). The only thing I can take comfort in is that I'm not the only one with the issue of a GTX460 sometimes failing to initiate properly, theres 3-4 others in these forums as well with the same issue and it does seem like a mobo>GPU communication problem. Even though its deffinately been ruled out as the GTX460 runs perfectly in a M3N78, I may return the card for a replacement just to rule it out. I don't want to return the card for replacement though, this GTX460 OCs well and I don't want a replacement that doesn't OC as well

1. We have three test boards, one A2 and two A3 chipset revisions.
2. We have one testbed with the XFX 750W power supply, one with the Corsair 1000HX, and one with the Thermaltake Toughpower 850 AP.
3. Our memory consists of 2GB of OCZ PC2-8000 Alpha VX, 4GB of OCZ PC2-9200 Reaper HPC, and 4GB of GSkill PC2-9600 Trident.
4. We have tested with and without the Xonar DX installed. We have used a combination of hard drives from Samsung, WD, and Seagate along with SSDs from Crucial, OCZ, and Intel.
5. We do not know your software load. In each testbed before each 1000 cycle we wipe the OS drive, do a clean install of Win7 Ultimate 64-bit, and then the latest WHQL driver sets for the video cards, latest Intel chipset and storage manager drivers, latest audio drivers, DX11 update, and then complete a critical MS OS update before starting the tests.

Latest Results -
1. Galaxy 60XGH6HS3GMW 1GB Super OC card - 3000 cycles (1000 cycles on each testbed) without a single pause, hitch, lock, or black screen.
2. ASUS ENGTX460 Direct CU 1GB Card - 3000 cycles (1000 cycles on each testbed) without a single pause, hitch, lock, or black screen.
Firmware on both cards is 70.04.13.00.01.

At this point we either have a potential problem with one of your hardware items (age, mods, etc) or something else (power delivery, monitor, cabling) is creating your problem. We will complete the last round of testing and then notify you of our results and possible alternatives to fixing this issue.

[stangracin3]

Just a tip. As an industry rep I can say you might find that you get a bit further along with Asus if you dropped the condescending tone your so fond of using.
Sure they aren't perfect, but with that tone your taking with them, it wouldn't surprise me that your issue has been put on a low burner.
Mfg support does not exist to be at the beck and call of every angry Ket with an attitude. You might find that you get a better reply using a bit of honey rather than vinegar.

someone needs to read up on asus rma horror stories

[Ket]

Indeed. Plus I find myself fixing asus BIOS code up quite frequently to sort out compatibility issues with storage devices (specifically, storage controller O-ROMS) because asus themselves don't do it. However, as far as I'm concerned I have not been rude, just forthright with my own findings making things as clear as possible. I'm yet to try another monitor cable, and I will look into some kind of firmware update on the W2242S, but the other monitor the card has been tested with on the M3N78 system is a LG monitor thats 2yrs old, and again no issues. As I have said, I drop the GTX460 in the M3N78 system (that has a crap casecom PSU btw) and absolutely no problems. Likewise if I drop a HD5830 into the M2F system, absolutely no problems.

So in summary;

M2F+HD5830 = no problems
M3N78+GTX460 = no problems
M2F+GTX460 = hell

EDIT: For the record, I wasn't even going to post in this thread until the end of today people need a chance to get back up to speed after the weekend

[Hondacity]

how many times have you modified the bios of your motherboard?

[BeepBeep2]

Indeed. Plus I find myself fixing asus BIOS code up quite frequently to sort out compatibility issues with storage devices (specifically, storage controller O-ROMS) because asus themselves don't do it. However, as far as I'm concerned I have not been rude, just forthright with my own findings making things as clear as possible. I'm yet to try another monitor cable, and I will look into some kind of firmware update on the W2242S, but the other monitor the card has been tested with on the M3N78 system is a LG monitor thats 2yrs old, and again no issues. As I have said, I drop the GTX460 in the M3N78 system (that has a crap casecom PSU btw) and absolutely no problems. Likewise if I drop a HD5830 into the M2F system, absolutely no problems.

So in summary;

M2F+HD5830 = no problems
M3N78+GTX460 = no problems
M2F+GTX460 = hell

EDIT: For the record, I wasn't even going to post in this thread until the end of today people need a chance to get back up to speed after the weekend

Ket, if you are having so much trouble and ASUS is doing such comprehensive testing, (1000 boots on three boards with a Galaxy card exactly the same as yours?) why don't you just switch to the M3N78 + 5830/460 for a while and throw your actual physical board at them.

This could be a problem with your 460 as much as it could be the board.

[Ket]

Sorry beep, but thats a pretty sqewed statement. The fact I've tested the 460 in another system completely rules out any possibility its a problem with the card. Also just look around XS, theres a lot of people with 460s and pretty much the exact same issues, pretty sure all are running intel chipsets of various forms too, thats not a coincidence If asus want to throw me another M2F then I'm happy to throw them my M2F. FYI if asus do want to do that, due to size/weight and the fact it'll cost a bloody fortune to post quite literally JUST the M2F will be sent. The cooling on that thing doubles the weight of the board if not more.

[BeepBeep2]

Sorry beep, but thats a pretty sqewed statement. The fact I've tested the 460 in another system completely rules out any possibility its a problem with the card. Also just look around XS, theres a lot of people with 460s and pretty much the exact same issues, pretty sure all are running intel chipsets of various forms too, thats not a coincidence If asus want to throw me another M2F then I'm happy to throw them my M2F. FYI if asus do want to do that, due to size/weight and the fact it'll cost a bloody fortune to post quite literally JUST the M2F will be sent. The cooling on that thing doubles the weight of the board if not more.

No, it's not skewed or screwed or whatever you want to call it.

The fact that the M2F runs with the 5830 (and I bet if you bought another 460 it would work with it) "Completely rules out any possibility it's a problem with the board" (of course it doesnt, but just because you tested the card on one other system doesnt mean it doesnt have compatibility problems)

I know you are pissed at ASUS tech support but maybe it's not their board this time.

[Ch@pS]

I've had the same problem in the past, an 8800GT would give the exact same problems you're describing now in one board, but when I used it with other boards(3 different boards) it would work fine. Other cards would work find in board A(An EP45T-EXTREME i think it was) and B, i just had a problem with the specific 8800GT and board. After quite a bit of testing I found that one of the PCIe pins on the 8800GT wasn't making good connection in the EP45T, but did in the other boards I was testing. At the end of the day I blamed user error in my handling of the board.

Not saying you damaged the board or that your problem is the same as mine, just putting it out there.

(btw I'm a hardware reviewer and overclocker and test tons of equipment each month, I've got a world of experience when dealing with boards and graphics cards and even after all this I make the odd mistake, just goes to show.)

Either way, hope your problem is solved soon Ket.

[Ket]

No, it's not skewed or screwed or whatever you want to call it.

The fact that the M2F runs with the 5830 (and I bet if you bought another 460 it would work with it) "Completely rules out any possibility it's a problem with the board" (of course it doesnt, but just because you tested the card on one other system doesnt mean it doesnt have compatibility problems)

I know you are pissed at ASUS tech support but maybe it's not their board this time.

See below quote, pretty much says what I was going to about the problem.

I've had the same problem in the past, an 8800GT would give the exact same problems you're describing now in one board, but when I used it with other boards(3 different boards) it would work fine. Other cards would work find in board A(An EP45T-EXTREME i think it was) and B, i just had a problem with the specific 8800GT and board. After quite a bit of testing I found that one of the PCIe pins on the 8800GT wasn't making good connection in the EP45T, but did in the other boards I was testing. At the end of the day I blamed user error in my handling of the board.

Not saying you damaged the board or that your problem is the same as mine, just putting it out there.

M2F PCI-E pins should be fine, but I have the necessary tools to check them over along with the 460 to rule that out too, although the no monitor signal happened even in the 2nd PCI-E slot and that one has barely had many card pulls / installs and the PCI-E pins on the 460 are perfect I never touch the pins cos theres no need to

I think I'm done with Asus anyway, I had 3 P5Q Pros I've had to replace where they have randomly died for no reason, and now this issue with the M2F.

[Metroid]

Asus never again unless I have no options to go Asus again. Their customer service is too poor and understanding about the problem leaves to be desired.

[RejZoR]

What's worse is when you live in the central europe, but everyone treats you like you live in eastern europe and you always get some guy from India who barely knows english. Not that i have anything against ppl from India, but most companies have absolutelly rubbish tech support. Especially hardware vendors. Acer and ASUS, they both have bad tech support. At least for my region. I have good experience with Auzentech and you won't believe it, yes, Creative Labs. Samsung HDD support was ok as well. Same goes for most software companies.

[BeepBeep2]

You guys do realize we have three or four ASUS reps on our forum now including one or two from support you could just freaking Private Message about your problem?...

There are still tons of bugs with my Gigabyte 790X-UD4P board that is already several years matured. One of them is USB support randomly dropping out. You don't realize how annoying that gets after a while...

[Ket]

This is a troubleshooting thread of all flavors. People will no doubt find it useful and could well come across the solution to a similar problem their having.