Fried my DFI X58 UT T3eH8

[Origin_Unknown]

Thats a new one. PM me if you want and I'll give you my support address here at DFI. Through all the ups and downs I've been there only support tech here in Europe for the last 5 years.

I'm just curious dude since there is no avatar / sig info but no, it's fine, i don't really need the information. have you averaged 10 posts a year?


p.s. i do own a dfi board and while i wasnt happy when i tried to RMA my board it's proven to be a resiliant old bird, especially after a psu blew up and it wouldnt post for 3 days then sprang back to life.

[woffen]

Any chance you can give those "allowed" voltages for future reference Bulldog14?

[sjakie666]

@woffen. lol everything above stock voltages won't be covered in the warranty. Must be obvious by now :P

[Bulldog14]

Any chance you can give those "allowed" voltages for future reference Bulldog14?

Hmm you have asked twice so I will give you a straightforward answer. I doubt you will like it thou. The answer is whatever the "Optimized Defaults" set it to. In the strictest sense of policy, adjusting pretty well any setting outside of default (FSB 200 set to 201 for example) voids the factory warranty on the board. Obviously if we went around voiding everyones warranty for such petty reasons would be ridiculous. So inkeeping with being flexible, the unoffical motto around here is "just fix it if we can". "If we can" being the key part.

As I said earlier we look the other way more often than not. Even thou we often know very well what someone has done to a board we fix it anyway. The repair techs who repair these boards have 1000s of repair hours under their belts. There is very little that you can truly hide from them.

I know you were expecting an answer along the lines of a specific range of values, but no such specified range exists.

[Bulldog14]

I'm just curious dude since there is no avatar / sig info but no, it's fine, i don't really need the information. have you averaged 10 posts a year?


p.s. i do own a dfi board and while i wasnt happy when i tried to RMA my board it's proven to be a resiliant old bird, especially after a psu blew up and it wouldnt post for 3 days then sprang back to life.

I don't post much as like many other support techs in the business we find little value in forums as a means of resolving problems. Too much speculation and one-sided thinking to make them viable. Don't get me wrong thou, forums are great for exchanging ideas amongst peers, and gathering some level of general concensus on matters.

[SoulsCollective]

Gents:

The bottom line is burnt PCB = voided factory warranty. No other way to say it really. How it happened isn't relevant to most MB makers to be blunt. Don't kid yourself, most of my competitors have similiar policies. They may be more or less lenient about it than us, but at the end of the day no one can repair a burned PCB. The only solace that can be offered is a replacement.

The point isn't and shouldn't be whether you can repair it or not. The point is that you offer a warranty on your products, you warrant that they will be free of manufacturing defects for the period specified. You don't get to pick and choose what gets covered - if it breaks, and it's not the end-users fault, you're morally and ethically bound to honour your warranty policy. If it's a simple, repairable fault, great, quick and easy for everyone. But if the fault is such that due to faulty components from the factory, the entire board requires replacing, tough luck. It's going to cost you more to replace, but that's the gamble you take by offering a warranty - you can't simply say that any PCB damage must be caused by end-user actions, and therefore that you will never, under any circumstances, replace a board with PCB damage, nope, never, can't possibly be a faulty component, guaranteed, 100% user error, not going to happen. That's lazy, arrogant, immoral and quite possibly illegal.

I've returned boards to eVGA, Asus, MSI and Foxconn for PCB damage without issue. The usual questions were asked about settings run and cooling used, but when I got all that information from the client and fired off an e-mail, proving that the board wasn't run with sub-zero cooling, run massively out of spec, etc etc, they were happy to replace it because the problem lay with a manufacturing defect. I've never before had a DFI board with PCB damage, so I hadn't come across this "limitation", but I can assure you that neither I nor my business will be dealing with a company that takes such a ridiculous stance on warranty issues in the future.

[Bulldog14]

The point isn't and shouldn't be whether you can repair it or not. The point is that you offer a warranty on your products, you warrant that they will be free of manufacturing defects for the period specified. You don't get to pick and choose what gets covered - if it breaks, and it's not the end-users fault, you're morally and ethically bound to honour your warranty policy. If it's a simple, repairable fault, great, quick and easy for everyone. But if the fault is such that due to faulty components from the factory, the entire board requires replacing, tough luck. It's going to cost you more to replace, but that's the gamble you take by offering a warranty - you can't simply say that any PCB damage must be caused by end-user actions, and therefore that you will never, under any circumstances, replace a board with PCB damage, nope, never, can't possibly be a faulty component, guaranteed, 100% user error, not going to happen. That's lazy, arrogant, immoral and quite possibly illegal.

I've returned boards to eVGA, Asus, MSI and Foxconn for PCB damage without issue. The usual questions were asked about settings run and cooling used, but when I got all that information from the client and fired off an e-mail, proving that the board wasn't run with sub-zero cooling, run massively out of spec, etc etc, they were happy to replace it because the problem lay with a manufacturing defect. I've never before had a DFI board with PCB damage, so I hadn't come across this "limitation", but I can assure you that neither I nor my business will be dealing with a company that takes such a ridiculous stance on warranty issues in the future.

Interesting points, but they all hinge on there being a "manufacturing defect" present. Thru which means are you determining this is so? Do you have access to our schematics? our ECNs? Are you drinking buddies with the designers? Sorry but your just speculating and making guesses, so you can't really expect me to give you a serious answer now could you?

[SoulsCollective]

Interesting points, but they all hinge on there being a "manufacturing defect" present. Thru which means are you determining this is so? Do you have access to our schematics? our ECNs? Are you drinking buddies with the designers? Sorry but your just speculating and making guesses, so you can't really expect me to give you a serious answer now could you?

What actual factual evidence do we have that such damage is so "innocently caused". The users word on the matter? Who is to say that in an novice attempt to OC the board he didn't pump the voltage far too high in one go. Who is to say that he didn't use a dodgy PSU. Who is to say he didn't remove the stock cooler, and assemble whatever aftermarket cooler incorrectly. The list goes on. The point is that no one can ever know for sure what the exact conditions were that led to the failure. ...The interesting point here is that any number of factors can cause such damage. Not to be harsh but the weak point here is the "I" part. There are many factors that you are not aware of.

Interesting points, but they all hinge on there being a "user error" present. Thru which means are you determining this is so? Do you have access to their diary? Their webcam? Their friends and family? Are you standing behind them when they're using the product? Sorry but your just speculating and making guesses, so you can't really expect me to take you seriously now can you?

I don't mean to be harsh, but this attitude is just astounding. As I've learnt over five years of dealing with customers, you simply cannot place all the blame at the end users doorstep. There is always a chance that you stuffed up, and every other OEM I've dealt with has had no problems in recognising that faults happen, that they're not always caused by the end-user, and have investigated and dealt with each RMA application on its merits. Noone's demanding you accept back every single board, because yes, you're right, a burnt PCB almost never happens without user error. But you cannot simply wash your hands of every case - as I pointed out above, in this thread alone there are multiple independent cases of the same thing happening to different users with the same model motherboard. As the OEM, you just can't stick your fingers in your ears and claim that everyone blew up their boards by running faulty PSUs or ridiculous voltages.

[v0dka]

But burned PCB cant be repaired, and therefore is always the users problem as far as DFI's warranty goes. Even with stock volts. Correct?

And I dont think your [and therefore indirectly the sellers] policy regarding overclocking will hold if a court had to decide on that here in the EU. They are sold as overclocking boards and support this, so a user has to be able to use them for overclocking. Of course chances are zero that someone actually goes to court for a burned motherboard so I guess you are safe.

[woffen]

But burned PCB cant be repaired, and therefore is always the users problem as far as DFI's warranty goes. Even with stock volts. Correct?

And I dont think your [and therefore indirectly the sellers] policy regarding overclocking will hold if a court had to decide on that here in the EU. They are sold as overclocking boards and support this, so a user has to be able to use them for overclocking. Of course chances are zero that someone actually goes to court for a burned motherboard so I guess you are safe.

If I was filthy rich it would be fun to give it a shot

[Peen]

Well this board has massive issues anyways, 2 of mine have fried from the PWM area. I have no clue if the PCB was burnt because it was under the mosfter cooler. I'd try to email Susana at DFI, Susana@dfiweb.com

I would seriously avoid this board though if anyone else is looking at them. Unless you enjoy RMA'ing boards

[woffen]

Another thing I'm curious about is that buzzing/whizzing sound from around the pwm area when under load. That really freaked me out the first time, thought it was broken then already. But who knows, maybe it was..

Peen, at least you got a new board

[madmax999]

So, if i had DFI instead of my Foxconn Bloodrage and if sudenly DFI got burned even on stock settings because of faulty or lower quality components (everything is possible, don't you agree?) you would not RMA my board? Am i correct? Nice to hear that

[Peen]

Another thing I'm curious about is that buzzing/whizzing sound from around the pwm area when under load. That really freaked me out the first time, thought it was broken then already. But who knows, maybe it was..

Peen, at least you got a new board

Ya for about 3 days then had to RMA it again for same reason (PWM)

But you can get rid of the PWM noise by putting Vdroop to enabled (actually disables it) and plugging in the floppy power connecters. Mine is silent at 1.4v-1.5v and 4.4ghz HT - 4.5ghz HT under load

[rintamarotta]

"If so that is unacceptable". According to whom? "Unacceptable" is entirely relative.

Its unacceptable according finnish law.

Interesting points, but they all hinge on there being a "manufacturing defect" present. Thru which means are you determining this is so? Do you have access to our schematics? our ECNs? Are you drinking buddies with the designers? Sorry but your just speculating and making guesses, so you can't really expect me to give you a serious answer now could you?

Also same thing as previous quote, product that "brakes up" under normal use intented for it for 10years of buying the product, manufactuers and sellers responsibility wont end when warranty ends, thats what our law says about manufacturing defects and according your and shops advertsing dfi boards are ment for overclockers witch means normal use is overclocking with dfi motherboards, how ever i dont know if Woffen have overclocked.

If I was filthy rich it would be fun to give it a shot

You dont need be, finnish coverment will pay that if your under the financial line or something.

Another thing I'm curious about is that buzzing/whizzing sound from around the pwm area when under load. That really freaked me out the first time, thought it was broken then already. But who knows, maybe it was..

Peen, at least you got a new board

Dont worry about that there is tons of small transformers in the board that do the noise, its completly normal as i have had that same noise in about 2 motherboards and 5 graphics card and yet they have still not fried.


One thing is shure, because of this kind of support by dfi, i will never buy another dfi board, what i have owned they all have got blown pwm (old althlon64 days) under normal use, even tho i just throw the motherboards to trashcan and buy new one since i can afford it.

[sjakie666]

i wonder if gigabyte,asus,msi and all the others would say the same?

[woffen]

Ya for about 3 days then had to RMA it again for same reason (PWM)

But you can get rid of the PWM noise by putting Vdroop to enabled (actually disables it) and plugging in the floppy power connecters. Mine is silent at 1.4v-1.5v and 4.4ghz HT - 4.5ghz HT under load

So no vdroop makes the board to buzz. That sounds good

[sjakie666]

my board is buzzing with vdroop. even under no load,lol. and if i press the delete key to enter the bios or use a key in the bios. the board buzzes also.

[donmarkoni]

Hmm you have asked twice so I will give you a straightforward answer. I doubt you will like it thou. The answer is whatever the "Optimized Defaults" set it to. In the strictest sense of policy, adjusting pretty well any setting outside of default (FSB 200 set to 201 for example) voids the factory warranty on the board. Obviously if we went around voiding everyones warranty for such petty reasons would be ridiculous. So inkeeping with being flexible, the unoffical motto around here is "just fix it if we can". "If we can" being the key part.

As I said earlier we look the other way more often than not. Even thou we often know very well what someone has done to a board we fix it anyway. The repair techs who repair these boards have 1000s of repair hours under their belts. There is very little that you can truly hide from them.

I know you were expecting an answer along the lines of a specific range of values, but no such specified range exists.

I hate being a black sheep, but anyone read this? They are fixing many user damaged boards, but there has to be a borderline. If there was not, would you people care if you are using too much voltage? Would I care? I would not! I would just push it until I need a fire extinguisher to "turn it off".
There is no way to be sure if user accidentally made a mistake in BIOS, so one must understand manufacturers policy. I made a mistake once, flashing BIOS, obviously forgot to load optimized defaults and finished with a dead board. But it cost me only fuel and a lot of time to find someone to flash it for a couple of bucks.

I know I could be crucified for this, but thats my point of view.
You get crucified for saying something, you end up with burnt motherboard, etc... Life's a b1tch!
I have couple of burnt components, including one VGA with burn PCB, that burned PCI-E slot and PCB on my DFI UT NF4 SLI DR-Expert which is still happily working.

I think that one cannot be overclocker (or Xtreme OCer) without accepting consequences.

[Praz]

i wonder if gigabyte,asus,msi and all the others would say the same?

A quick search will find which of those manufacturers this pic came from and is considered non-repairable under warranty.

[woffen]

Well this board has massive issues anyways, 2 of mine have fried from the PWM area. I have no clue if the PCB was burnt because it was under the mosfter cooler. I'd try to email Susana at DFI, Susana@dfiweb.com

I would seriously avoid this board though if anyone else is looking at them. Unless you enjoy RMA'ing boards

I guess this Susana is responsible for USA only. And if I send email to this address support@dfi-europe.nl I guess I will just have a bulldog telling me NO once more.

[sjakie666]

look at these praz(under pcb burned) http://download.cizgi.com.tr/akademi/991/CCER1.pdf,http://download.cizgi.com.tr/akademi/990/Pre-test.pdf

@woffen. I think bulldog says no indeed.....

[Peen]

Ahhh crap sorry forgot you're in Finland. Well if it makes you feel any better this board just finally took out the other GPU on my 4850X2. Put 105mhz PCIE frequency once and it took out a GPU. 3 months later try to go for higher BCLCK at 105 again, now GPU crashes in 3d in about 5min. Guess 105 kills cards these days

edit: sounds like I'm not alone with it killing the same card

[sjakie666]

nope my gpu died last week...... didn't do anything special.. no overclock or wierd voltages.

[Tommie_lj]

Bulldog, do you mean that even running an aftermarket cooler on your cpu woids warranty on the motherboard?