Quote Originally Posted by virtualrain View Post
Based on what criteria?

Furthermore, as someone else points out above, their boards are notoriously tempermental and fussy... is this an indicator of good engineering?

Also, engineering says nothing about build quality, reliability, and support where DFI struggles as well. In my opinion, I think all of this could lead one to conclude that DFI sucks.

Funny you would use such terms VR. I've read some of your work and took you for a person who was firmly in the know. "Tempermental", and "Fussy" you say? Yes, to the uninitiated DFI LP boards might appear as such. What you label as "fussy" is no more than the boards placing a much higher demand on peripherals. Memory and PSU being the chief suspects. When low/midgrade components can't handle the strain they will cause instability on a DFI board. Place the same components on a non preformance board and they will likely run like a charm. Oskar designs these things for a purpose. That purpose is OCing. As a result the boards are put to market with very tight default BIOS settings. Tighter default settings mean decreased peripheral compatibility. No big secret. I can also never stress enough the value of a solid PSU. DFI boards draw and use more power than most of their comtemporaries. Do not assume that that 400 PSU you've been using on your 680 Bananatron board will work the same on a DFI LP 680 board. The specs of the boards might appear the same, but the electrical values are very different.

What people casually label as "tempermental" has an underlying reason. When one spends some time digging around that reason invariably turns out to be a one or more questionable peripherals. I deal with it day in and day out. A person reports an instability problem of one form or another. I eventually check the board and can find no trace of it.