Here is Asus' idea of warranty

[uOpt]

Here is Asus idea of a proper RMA.

I got an A8N-SLI Premium which did hang on heavy disk I/O. Probably a broken southbridge or somesuch.

No big deal, get RMA online (#EK632688), get exchange.

However, the board that they now sent me looked like this:



As you can see there is some fluid residue on the PCB between and around the RAM slots and the first PCIe slot. Not surprisingly, this board didn't work right either. It doesn't run memory anywhere near specified speed.

So I try to get a second RMA.

No go, RMA refused because I already got one. Email from rma@asus.com says that I need to contact the RMA department. Duh. Rma@asus.com is not the RMA department? In any case, three emails asking for a phone number remain unanswered.

I found the number on the web and I spare you the details of that call, but they gave me everything. Support says I need to talk to RMA, RMA says I need to talk to support, first level support says I need to second level support. All the whole I am being treated unfriendly and get force-connected, which I think isn't much better than hanging up.

I finally get a second RMA.

However, they did not use the error description that I gave on the website. They insisted on writing something down on the phone. Big mistake, as I will see later.

A few weeks later I get the return from the second RMA.

Here's what it looks like:



Looks familiar?

Right, same board. They returned it after flashing the BIOS (never mind the fact it already had the newest BIOS, which I can prove from the original RMA statement which mentions the BIOS number.

Here's the piece of paper.

The error description I have was: "the board has some fluid or chemical residue on the back of the PCB between RAM and PCIe slot. It doesn't run RAM at specified speed".

Here's what the phone dude made out of it and then what the RMA people did about the problem.



So, let's leave aside that the fluid residue is not going to go away from a BIOS flash.

These people in second-level support of Asus' mainboard division do not know what a PCB is. They also seem to have difficulty telling PCIe from USB.

The guy who did the actual RMA seems to be very well trained and seem to have inspected the board very closely

[SHiZNiLTi]

WOW that sucks man!!! The 2nd level guy is a F#$Cktard!

Thank god for Instant Replacement plan's at local retail stores and friends that can hook you up with store cost for the item's that you want. That way you get the same pricing that the internet has and a local instant replacement that allows you to even upgrade a product for free, well if you know how to work it right. Here is a real example at compusa...

- 6800GT bought 1.5 years ago for $320 w/2y TAP($40)
- Swapped out 6800GT for 7800GT for free w/2yr TAP about 3 months ago
- Swapped out 7800GT for x1900xtx w/ 2yr TAP and payed $200 difference.

[Ominous Gamer]

pwnage

[^don.k's^]

Did you another RMA ? Thats stories that makes hard to sleep...

[uOpt]

Did you another RMA ? Thats stories that makes hard to sleep...

Well, I cannot do electronic RMA.

To get a RMA that is not your first (it's my third because I "broke" 3 boards now ) the RMA department demands that you first talk to second-level support. Second-level support you cannot reach directly, only through first-level support.

So I have to call:

• First-level support, convince them that I have to talk to second-level. They might waive me off saying I am just too stupid and it's my fault.
  
• Second-level support, convince them that the board is broken. They refused to look at the pictures on my website that I placed for them showing the residue and as you see, they don't know what a PCB board is in first place (the sentense on the above form is my second level guy from last time).
  
• Then call the RMAs, convince them to give me a RMA
  
• And even if I get through this there is no guarantee that I don't either get another BIOS flash to remove the chemicals or else that they send me another broken other customer return board

You see, talking to every single one of these departments (and last time I had to talk to 5 people since nobody could explain the above procedure to me) is a hassle. They are unfriendly, they force-connect you, they don't know anything about computers, they don't identify themself with names (as you can see, the RMA form also misses names, not even the approved signature is there).

Last but not least the online RMA status page at
http://rma.asus.com/enduser/endUser.aspx
demands that you enter your "Customer Code". They never have me such a thing. Then I asked them about it they said I can use my real name. The field in the HTMl form doesn't even take as many characters as my name name

I consider threatening legal action, but in most cases such problems go up to whoever opens letters to their address and they ignore them easily.

[Andrew LB]

Damn... that sucks man. Everytime i've RMA'ed an Asus product i got it back quick and with a perfect working product. Sorry to hear about the misfortune.


.... reminds me of the service department at my local Mitsubishi dealer.

[GusC]

Danm that sucks.

[uOpt]

So I have to call:

• First-level support, convince them that I have to talk to second-level. They might waive me off saying I am just too stupid and it's my fault.
  
• Second-level support, convince them that the board is broken. They refused to look at the pictures on my website that I placed for them showing the residue and as you see, they don't know what a PCB board is in first place (the sentense on the above form is my second level guy from last time).
  
• Then call the RMAs, convince them to give me a RMA
  
• And even if I get through this there is no guarantee that I don't either get another BIOS flash to remove the chemicals or else that they send me another broken other customer return board

You see, talking to every single one of these departments (and last time I had to talk to 5 people since nobody could explain the above procedure to me) is a hassle. They are unfriendly, they force-connect you, they don't know anything about computers, they don't identify themself with names (as you can see, the RMA form also misses names, not even the approved signature is there).

Well, I was wrong.

Instead of the steps above I now had to connect to a special guy for 3rd-time RMAers, people like me who can't get computers to run, right?

Anyway, I got another board now. I didn't try it yet. Clearly a used board, too, but who knows, maybe it actually works.

[Nocturnal]

Since when did they start giving back refurbished motherboards? I did have one incident in which they shipped me the motherboard just in a box and it was crushed beyond being usable. They resent me another one and that one came fine.

[Movieman]

The only satisfaction you can get from this is to keep pounding the bad boards back to them and get pics of all the boards as you receive them and keep a history of what went on..Then send one copy to Asus North America, one to Asus International and leave a comment somthing like if I can't get any satisfaction this time my next send of this is to every states attorney general. Failure to honor a warranty is a federal offense since the lemon laws of the 60's-70's??
Maybe send a invoice with it for your time for everything beyond the first attempt. IE: Be the squeaky wheel.
Good Luck!

[alpha0ne]

Thats a real horror story uOpt, I hope you can get it sorted

Too bad you cant get your hands down the phone to strangle a few of these tards

[Direwolf]

Dude, I know you love the board and all but you really need to stop drooling all over the back of it when your installing it in your case! lol jk, sorry about all the hell you have been threw and back.

[uOpt]

Since when did they start giving back refurbished motherboards? I did have one incident in which they shipped me the motherboard just in a box and it was crushed beyond being usable. They resent me another one and that one came fine.

To my knowledge all consumer level mainboard vendors send out used boards for RMA exchanges. The number of boards that come in that are actually broken is just too low. DFI claims 3% which is probably a lie but interesting nontheless. With that many working boards in house not sending them out would be a waste.

Now, the real question is why doesn't Asus actually test one customer's return before sending it to another. I wonder who'll get my bathed board now

If you don't like that you'd have to go Tyan or Supermicro. Or rely on your online shop to give you a RMA guarantee that says you get a new board off the shelf.

Packaging was OK on all my Asus returns. Still haven't powered up the "new" board I got.

[fhpchris]

I think mushkin does the same thing, as nearly none of my RMA returns have lived past two weeks...

[Yoad]

o.o I was just about to order my new asus x1900xt video card in a couple of days...... now im... not so ease with that idea.

[NickS]

Wow man, sorry to hear about that.

I've had good luck with all RMA's I've done, Crucial's RMA'ing being the fastest. (They ship u back new ram too, not refurb).

[cadaveca]

Never has luck with ASUS RMA's...only when chipset fan died on A8N SLi did I even get an RMA. the rest i got nothing from...they took two x800xt's from me tho, and have sent NOTHING back.

[Major_A]

I had a Soyo, back in the day, that took a month and a half to get back to me. It was the same board I sent and was still broke. Shortly there after they went under. I'm glad other people won't have to deal with their terrible support. On top of this I had to call a local California number (from TX) and talk to a boater that I couldn't understand.

The only company I've had good RMA experiences with is Corsair. Less than two weeks round trip RMA (TX to CA and back) and they send brand new replacements, not refurbished bull crap. The only reason I believe I had to RMA my RAM in the first place was because I bought my PC3200 back when PC2700 was just JEDEC certified. So after I got a new stick I haven't had a problem in over two years.

[uOpt]

eVGA's RMA service also rocks.

They charge you big bucks for the return shipping, $16 off a credit card for shipping a product back that they screwed up in first place. And you only payed $4 shipping when you bought it.

But still, it's worth it. New item (as far as I can see) and very fast turnaround and no questions asked as to the burnmarks (cough, cough).

Good experience with Mushkin and got new stuff. That was professional (ECC reg) RAM which might have different policies.

[likewhoa]

bad asus, bad!

[uOpt]

Just as an update, although the board I got in the end tested allright (memory and CPU would run at specified speed) I have only now tried to put this thing into a permanently running machine and failed.

There is some kind of noise coming from the battery area. It is there even when the board is powered off and just has the battery. Removing the battery silences it. It is kind of a "static chatter", like little discharges about 10 times a second. It's bad enough that I can't use it for the fileserver I planned it for, much louder than even the Zalman 7700Cu I put on there.

Any idea what this could be?

[Movieman]

Just as an update, although the board I got in the end tested allright (memory and CPU would run at specified speed) I have only now tried to put this thing into a permanently running machine and failed.

There is some kind of noise coming from the battery area. It is there even when the board is powered off and just has the battery. Removing the battery silences it. It is kind of a "static chatter", like little discharges about 10 times a second. It's bad enough that I can't use it for the fileserver I planned it for, much louder than even the Zalman 7700Cu I put on there.

Any idea what this could be?

Maybe the battery is loose in that socket, a wedge of something to make it "tighter"
If your just going to use it for a fileserver I have a SM X5DAE w/2-2400/512/533's and 2-1 gig PC2100 ECC REG that should take care of your needs..
It's yours if you want it..

[alpha0ne]

Sounds like another RMA to me


Can you possibly confine the noise to a single component and post back here please with a picture ???

[Serpentarius]

looks like u get the sh|t in and got the dirt back .. that sux

[Talonman]

Makes my stomach turn....

Asus is doing you a major dirty!!

You may need to kick into Balisticks mode, ask for a Service manager?

Your initial post was on 6/14 too. OMFG no way!!!

That is a half a year ago.