Z68 motherboards' low user ratings

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genegold99

Weaksauce
Joined
Jul 17, 2009
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Would you go with a board where only about 50% of customers at NewEgg rated it a 5 and one out four rated it a 1 or 2? I raise this because I'm in the market for a midrange Z68 board (~$125-$175), and after putting in some good hours looking around it seems that the the good majority of the motherboards recommended here and at other review sites from Asus, MSI, Gigabyte, ASRock and others are getting similar ratings or worse, plus lots of lousy customer service experiences. Granted NewEgg is not the be all and end all, but with major compute hardware its ratings and user comments are typically indicative. Here's a link for Z68 boards by rating at NewEgg: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...600093976 600158412&IsNodeId=1&name=Intel Z68.

I'm switching over to Intel (probably an i5) from a rock solid Gigabyte 790X-UD4P (AMD) motherboard that in the nearly three years since I bought it received 75% 5's and only 5% 1's from over 500 commenters at NewEgg, so I'm not sure what to make of this situation with the Intel boards (and maybe it's also the same now with AMD boards, I haven't checked). One never knows, of course, but I've had good experience over the years and like the idea of having reasonable confidence that the product I choose will work out and that there will be backup with minimal hassle if it doesn't through no fault of mine. It's clear that the problems being reported on NewEgg and elsewhere - like at this forum - are not just coming from a few cranks, as sometimes happens. So, where is the problem? Has something changed on the purchaser end - expectations too high? - or manufacturer end over the past few years? Any thoughts?
 
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Instead of looking at the numbers, read the reviews. If you like the specs of the board but are concerned there is a problem just skip right to the "cons" section and skim that. It's fairly easy to weed out the cranks since most of their complaints stink of entitlement.

2 minutes at Newegg show in order of frequency:

* Universally the Marvell chip used for 2 of the SATA ports is unusable.

* Unusual number of defective boards with bent CPU pins.

* Some experiencing issue where both integrated and discrete video stop working with the VGA error led on motherboard lit up. May be related to BIOS defect. No video means the motherboard may as well be bricked.
 
The point I'm making is from reading the numbers *and* the reviews. Typically, I start with what recent reviews say, then the low rating reviews to see the nature of the (real) problems that people are having, and then the 5's and 4's, because knowledgeable computer people will often mention real or potential problem areas and fixes along with their laudatory comments. An example of how bad the situation appears is shown reading the low rating comments just from the past month for the Asus P8Z68-V Pro/Gen3, which points to not just likely QA problems but also horrible customer service ones. And that despite being one of the relative ratings exceptions, having so far garnered 61% 5's.

The Marvell chip has been a significant consideration in my thinking, because two SATA 3 ports don't seem adequate in the long run (I've already got two SATA 3 drives, an SSD and a HDD, plus two SATA 2 HDDs). My reading of several comments about the Marvell chip is that it does work with an SSD if ACHI is enabled.
 
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* Unusual number of defective boards with bent CPU pins.
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Yeah this one pretty much sums up how I feel about the quality of your typical NE reviewers, and why you must take these anonymous reviews with a grain of salt. I highly doubt any pins were bent before unboxing\assembly.

Remember you don't even have to own the product to review it on NE.
 
What makes you think that the users of boards claiming, for example, bent pins, and hence helping give a lower overal rating distribution, are any different than the users of boards that give high or much higher ratings? One board I could see it, but when it's going on board after board, that's hard to pass off as random cranks and incompetents. Seen across a number of boards (or whatever product), the difference between 70-75+% '5' ratings (and 80-95% 4-5s) and 40-55% is a real story, whatever it happens to be. That's where the comments come in - and intelligent reading, of course.
 
It could be a NewEgg problem. I've used/tested about a dozen different z68 motherboards and not a single one had any issues whatsoever that merited a bad review or rma (ie. some didn't oc like I wanted them to, or needed a more mature bios). None of them were from NewEgg.
 
Fair consideration. I suspect NewEgg is the largest retailer of motherboards (and maybe computer parts) in the U.S., and my sense is that they take their reputation, as well as their bottom line, seriously enough to not allow themselves to be a dumping ground for inferior product. Some of the manufacturers seem to see it that way too, given their active monitoring of NewEgg reviews (ASRock, Gigabyte, MSI). But I can't prove it. Where do you get your boards?
 
I don't even look at those reviews. Most of the time they are written by angry people who bought something without knowing what it was they were getting, and not having the knowledge and experience needed to put things together right the first time. For every review with useful information in it you probably have to sift through 100 entries of crap.
 
Exactly. I've just recently (maybe the last year or two) started reviewing my purchases on Newegg. Countless others I never reviewed, because face it, most people will only review if they're unhappy with something.

Genegold, I've purchased mine at MicroCenter.
 
Dan_D said:
I don't even look at those reviews. Most of the time they are written by angry people who bought something without knowing what it was they were getting, and not having the knowledge and experience needed to put things together right the first time. For every review with useful information in it you probably have to sift through 100 entries of crap.
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You've expressed very nicely part of my point, i.e., the journalist's bias and real life limitations. Reviews typically take place in a bubble, based on a sample of one, with reviewers assuming that their expertise and thus conclusions, ones that they hope readers take as good coin, have little or no relationship to what follows, what the mass of purchasers are actually experiencing. When challenged on these grounds, reviewers typically defend themselves by disclaiming any responsibility - caveat emptor - or that the complaining purchasers are 99% a bunch of dummies. Which, in your case, given how much time and effort you put into arguing for user-sensible hardware and software design, doesn't seem to add up.
 
genegold99 said:
You've expressed very nicely part of my point, i.e., the journalist's bias and real life limitations. Reviews typically take place in a bubble, based on a sample of one, with reviewers assuming that their expertise and thus conclusions, ones that they hope readers take as good coin, have little or no relationship to what follows, what the mass of purchasers are actually experiencing. When challenged on these grounds, reviewers typically defend themselves by disclaiming any responsibility - caveat emptor - or that the complaining purchasers are 99% a bunch of dummies. Which, in your case, given how much time and effort you put into arguing for user-sensible hardware and software design, doesn't seem to add up.
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In addition, a lot of the positive reviews, especially of products that have received poor ratings by professional reviewers, are written by a bunch of dummies, as well: Either they have absolutely no reference at all whatsoever (to compare the product being reviewed to) or they are using them in systems that don't make anywhere near full use of their claimed capabilities.
 
Well, at least that is a consistent point of view. If the subject were cars, would you say the same thing? It's well established in business studies that blaming the customers is a sure path to financial loss, if not organizational demise. I see the matter same way with computers - and please understand I've never broken anything during a hardware install.

Buying most anything of significance requires a leap of faith. A disproportionate percentage of unhappy customers, and relatively fewer happy ones, makes that leap quite a bit longer. I prefer it when the percentage of happy ones is in the 80 to 90 percent range. When it's not I start looking at and asking why.
 
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genegold99 said:
Well, at least that is a consistent point of view. If drivers get in similar crashes with one brand of car and have other serious problems in some others, seen from the large perspective is it merely the drivers' fault or are there likely design or mechanical issues? How about the drivers of cars that don't have problems; how come they didn't mess up? Blaming the customers leads to organizational demise, just as the sign of a bad teacher is one that blames students for poor results. I see the matter same way with computers - and please understand I've never broken anything during a hardware install.

Buying most anything of significance requires a leap of faith. A disproportionate number of unhappy customers makes that leap quite a bit longer. I prefer it when the percentage of happy ones is in the 80 to 90 percent range, and when it's not I wonder start looking at and asking why.
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Except that there is one flaw: Some of the items that receive 80 to 90 percent positive (happy) reviews are of those products that have already been proven by the pros to be crappy or even shitty compared to most of the items that have had a very high percentage of negative (unhappy) customer reviews. And that is the very reason why most Newegg customer reviews are meaningless.

And those are the very reasons why I have not been writing reviews of products unless I have at least one other item of known quality of a similar type that I am comparing it to.
 
Just purchase from a retailer that has a good return policy like Amazon.
 
E4g1e said:
Except that there is one flaw: Some of the items that receive 80 to 90 percent positive (happy) reviews are of those products that have already been proven by the pros to be crappy or even shitty compared to most of the items that have had a very high percentage of negative (unhappy) customer reviews. And that is the very reason why most Newegg customer reviews are meaningless.

And those are the very reasons why I have not been writing reviews of products unless I have at least one other item of known quality of a similar type that I am comparing it to.
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Well sure, the experts are smart and to be listened to and the masses dumb, to be ignored. And then, of course, there's the pecking order among the experts. Makes for good discussions.

During the time I attended grad school at Michigan, they built a new engineering school on their north campus, a few miles, a bus trip away, from the main one. The separation was intentional and prototypical: they wanted to get engineering students, computer ones among them, away from the "radical" social scientists and the relatively egalitarian natural and physical scientists. Intellectual pollution.

In any case, I appreciate the thought and effort that goes into your reviews.
 
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Unless the products have major flaws (which you can determine by actually reading) the negative reviews for motherboards almost universally sound like they were written by 12 year old gamer retards who couldn't put together a 5 piece jigsaw puzzle.

It's a bunch of people whining about IDE ports, blue screens (probably due to bios settings), their video card not working, not knowing what RAM timings are, or how they accidentally stabbed the motherboard with a knife while fileting some trout they caught over it and now it doesn't work.
 
InternationalHat said:
Unless the products have major flaws (which you can determine by actually reading) the negative reviews for motherboards almost universally sound like they were written by 12 year old gamer retards who couldn't put together a 5 piece jigsaw puzzle.

It's a bunch of people whining about IDE ports, blue screens (probably due to bios settings), their video card not working, not knowing what RAM timings are, or how they accidentally stabbed the motherboard with a knife while fileting some trout they caught over it and now it doesn't work.
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QFT.
 
genegold99 said:
You've expressed very nicely part of my point, i.e., the journalist's bias and real life limitations. Reviews typically take place in a bubble, based on a sample of one, with reviewers assuming that their expertise and thus conclusions, ones that they hope readers take as good coin, have little or no relationship to what follows, what the mass of purchasers are actually experiencing. When challenged on these grounds, reviewers typically defend themselves by disclaiming any responsibility - caveat emptor - or that the complaining purchasers are 99% a bunch of dummies. Which, in your case, given how much time and effort you put into arguing for user-sensible hardware and software design, doesn't seem to add up.
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I don't see what arguing for sensible hardware and software has to do with anything. I would figure everyone would want that. I have no desire for things to be unnecessarily complicated so that only the elite understand the product. I want things to be usable and to make sense. Feeling like much of the population doesn't know what they are doing with computers or system building has nothing to do with that. If anything I champion making things easier on noobies. I don't know how that "doesn't add up."
 
Dan, I don't doubt your sincerity, good intentions and the thought and effort you and your colleagues put in, just part of the methodolgy and attitude (or social view). Would you be saying the same thing if the topic were cars and customer experience, including yours? Toyota tried that recently, didn't they, claiming dumb drivers. It seems they weren't, but even if they were, there's still a design issue because trying to account for what users do, including errors, is part of good product design. Same with computers.

By the way, if you read through the NewEgg (and sometimes Amazon) reviews, you'll often find long-experienced IT hands reporting many of the same problems that the "dummies" report. More than anyone else, that's the population I pay attention to - and, ratings distributions aside, what in good part led to my posting this topic (those reviewers are also good for install and operating tips).

In any case, I appreciate your reviews. Thanks,
 
I don't want to sound like a broken clock, but after looking through many of these NewEgg motherboard reviews I think it's a NewEgg problem. A majority of the bad reviews are bent pins. This really has nothing to do with the Manufacturer, I'm sure they're all standard to Intel's spec. Don't get me wrong, I buy plenty from NewEgg. However, I stopped buying motherboards from them years ago because a noticeable percentage arrived DOA and left me stranded for a week or so before I could get a replacement. Whether it was NewEgg's fault or UPS's fault who knows, maybe a bit of both.
 
Oh please, the vast majority of critical Intel board reviews are not about bent pins. But let's say they are. If it's that common among customers, it suggests either bad market, i.e., to the wrong people, or a design or manufacturing issue. Look over at the AMD board reviews with a different CPU design and you'll find much less about pins. And bent pins or not, it still doesn't account for the relatively low percentage of 5's and 4's among the other reviewers, the ones who are able to assemble without significant problem, if any.
 
Not to be crass, but this is a silly conversation. You seem highly focused on reviews by the average Joe on a retail website as the deciding factor on what you're going to purchase. Don't you see the problem with this?

You're better off reading those reviews with a grain of salt and then checking out reputable hardware review sites online ( can't think of any at the moment ) and their user forums then use that additional information to determine what you should buy. The best research uses multiple sources of data.

Also keep this rule in mind, people are more likely to voice their negativity rather than their appeasement with a product. Also understand the Dunning–Kruger effect where the majority of the population rates themselves as being better than they really are at virtually anything.

I say this having read some reviews for RAM recently where one user gave a rating of 1 with a huge backlash about how horrible the product because the memory defaulted to 1333 instead of 1600. Or maybe it was the motherboard not detecting it properly. Either way the point is this reviewer rated his "tech knowledge" at maximum. The next reviewer kindly pointed out this guy was a fool and there was no possible way his knowledge was that high because anyone really knowledgeable would've A) Known the ram must be manually set to run at that speed or at least B) Where/How to find the solution to the problem instead of griping about it.

Also what's been said about faux reviews, paid shills, etc. Some people will have genuinely bad experiences because some products don't work, more often than not though it’s probably user error.

My process for buying a product (which I recently upgraded to an i5 system with a Z68 board (Asus P8Z68-V/Gen 3)) is to first go to NewEgg and look for the component I’m interested in. I’ll sort by price/ratings and try to find something within my budget and with higher ratings. I’ll take the top 3 or so and read the reviews and details of each one to try and figure if the review is legit or not. Then I’ll Google the models of the hardware to see what comes up first, read some reviews, check out some forums, visit the MFG website for their forums on the product and repeat over and over until I’m confident I’ve chosen a solid product. Not really rocket science but definitely due diligence.

Hope that helps.

PS the Asus P8z68-V/Gen3 is great, I’ve had zero problems with it so far.
 
I was only referring to the P8z68-v pro/gen3 that was given as an example. I've personally had very good experiences with this board and the non-pro version. In fact MicroCenter during their 2600k combo deal + $30 off coupon went through stacks of these boards (it was an insanely good deal since the board was on sale as well). From what I've been told none were ever returned.

Almost all of the 1 & 2 egg reviews are likely related to physical damage.

Never got to use the board...
When I unboxed it...there were parts on the board where they had come loose or totally broken off.
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Sounds like the shipment of boards to Newegg got detoured through a war zone or something.
 
nitefallz said:
Not to be crass, but this is a silly conversation. You seem highly focused on reviews by the average Joe on a retail website as the deciding factor on what you're going to purchase. Don't you see the problem with this?
...
My process for buying a product (which I recently upgraded to an i5 system with a Z68 board (Asus P8Z68-V/Gen 3)) is to first go to NewEgg and look for the component I’m interested in. I’ll sort by price/ratings and try to find something within my budget and with higher ratings. I’ll take the top 3 or so and read the reviews and details of each one to try and figure if the review is legit or not. Then I’ll Google the models of the hardware to see what comes up first, read some reviews, check out some forums, visit the MFG website for their forums on the product and repeat over and over until I’m confident I’ve chosen a solid product. Not really rocket science but definitely due diligence.

Hope that helps.

PS the Asus P8z68-V/Gen3 is great, I’ve had zero problems with it so far.
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Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I think you've misunderstood. My process is similar to yours. The point I raised with my initial post was to note and ask why what NewEgg reviewers as a whole are indicating is so different (worse) than what the indie reviewers are for Intel Z68 boards. I could have posted this at another reviewer's site, but appreciate the work of the reviewers here (tho I suspect they wish I didn't). The reason subsequent discussion has focused so much on NewEgg is that all those who have replied deny the validity of the reviews there, considering the writers incompetents and worse. Obviously, I don't, at least not so categorically.
 
genegold99 said:
I think you've misunderstood. My process is similar to yours. The point I raised with my initial post was to note and ask why what NewEgg reviewers as a whole are indicating is so different (worse) than what the indie reviewers are for Intel Z68 boards. The reason subsequent discussion has focused so much on NewEgg is that all those who have replied deny the validity of those reviews, considering their writers incompetents and worse. Obviously, I don't, at least not so categorically.
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I'd chalk it up to two things. First it's a popular, well heard soap-box which leads to point two that a lot of vendors respond directly to negative feedback in attempt to reconcile the problem. I think many of those people are simply begging for attention from the vendor instead of simply contacting them directly for support.
 
Heres a chart of 2 Asus motherboards, both of which are pretty decent, the chart is a compilation of all 1 egg to 3 egg reviews, as 4 and 5 egg reviews are considered positive and mostly problem free.:

Manufacturer:
Asus
Model:
P8Z68-V/Gen 3
Problem Ratio (Problem/No Problem)
Can't OC_______________2/110
Bad Support____________ 3/110
DOA___________________7/110
Not up to expectations____ 2/110
Breaks soon after bought_ 2/110
Defects (ie. Bootloops)____9/110

Manufacturer:
Asus
Model:
P8Z68-V Pro/Gen 3
Problem Ratio (Problem/No Problem)
Bent Pins_______________8/197
DOA___________________12/197
Bad Support_____________1/197
BIOS Breaks after Update__1/197
SATA Fail_______________2/197
Breaks soon after bought_7/197
Marvell Fail_____________3/197
Defects (ie. Bootloops)____11/197
 
I built a number of system with "6" series boards in them this year including boards from Asus, ASRock and Intel® and a number of systems dating back since we released the LGA sockets and I have not had one board that had bent pins from the factory.
 
Another statistical hound.. 61% 5's, 10-15% 1's and 23-25% 1-3's for the two Asus models, which I call upper mediocre ratings, but are easily the highest of the Z68 boards at that level. Compare those figures with the ASRock P67 Ext4 Gen3 - 70% 5's and 16% 1-3s on 327 reviews - and my AMD Gigabyte 790X UD4P with 75% 5's and 5% 1's on 517 reviews. The point of my original post was to wonder why the scale had seemingly changed downward.

To show that I actually do read critical reviews critically, take the Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3, which got an Editor's Choice Enthusiast Silver Award from this site's reviewers. At Micro Center, it's going in a bundle with the i7-2600K for $110 less $15 rebate + $175, respectively, i.e., $270 + tax. Very attractive deal, except that the 47% 1's and 19% 5's (33% 1-3) for the board over at NewEgg makes me pause. Looking at the comments, however, roughly half of the 1 ratings were for start up/boot loop problems that have been supposedly corrected with the latest BIOS update. Given the combo and price, it seems worth the leap (and worth asking my brother to drive 75 miles to pick it up - MC only sells cpu's in-store).
 
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genegold99 said:
Another statistical hound.. 61% 5's, 10-15% 1's and 23-25% 1-3's for the two Asus models, which I call upper mediocre ratings, but are easily the highest of the Z68 boards at that level. Compare those figures with the ASRock P67 Ext4 Gen3 - 70% 5's and 16% 1-3s on 327 reviews - and my AMD Gigabyte 790X UD4P with 75% 5's and 5% 1's on 517 reviews. The point of my original post was to wonder why the scale had seemingly changed downward.

To show that I actually do read critical reviews critically, take the Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3, which got an Editor's Choice Enthusiast Silver Award from this site's reviewers. At Micro Center, it's going in a bundle with the i7-2600K for $110 less $15 rebate + $175, respectively, i.e., $270 + tax. Very attractive deal, except that the 47% 1's and 19% 5's (33% 1-3) for the board over at NewEgg makes me pause. Looking at the comments, however, roughly half of the 1 ratings were for start up/boot loop problems that have been supposedly corrected with the latest BIOS update. Given the combo and price, it seems worth the leap (and worth asking my brother to drive 75 miles to pick it up - MC only sells cpu's in-store).
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I built my buddy a system a couple months with the mATX Gigabyte board from Amazon (i.e. the cheap one) and it had the bootloop issue. His PSU was really crappy, and that board only has a 4 (!!!!) pin CPU connection.

He returned the board (and CPU) to Amazon, got the board you mentioned with a 2500k for the $50 combo, and bought a Corsair PSU for sale at BB. Its been running like a champ for about 2 months now.

In all my years building computers, MoBos always seem to have the worst user reviews. I have honestly never had a problem personally. My buddy with the bootloop issue was the first problem I have ever witnessed first hand, and it was easily correctable with a fast swap. I am still blaming his crappy PSU for causing the bootloop though.
 
If your read Gigabyte's mobo reviews you see they are famous for boot loops, which makes me wonder is Gigabyte having quality control issues? Personally I place my faith in EVGA.
 
Vithar said:
If your read Gigabyte's mobo reviews you see they are famous for boot loops, which makes me wonder is Gigabyte having quality control issues? Personally I place my faith in EVGA.
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But not if one considers NewEgg reviewers a bunch of dummies...

That Gigabyte bundle with $175 ($174.99) for a i7-2600K at Micro Center has the look of a $100 misprint, but someone checked for me and says it's correct. Reading their monthly sales flyer is tricky, because the same combo on the Intel processors page (27) would seem to be considerably more, even with $50 extra off. In any case, with the Ivy Bridge gear coming out at the end of the month, it looks like there are going to be good deals on the latest boards and CPUs.
 
nitefallz said:
I say this having read some reviews for RAM recently where one user gave a rating of 1 with a huge backlash about how horrible the product because the memory defaulted to 1333 instead of 1600. Or maybe it was the motherboard not detecting it properly. Either way the point is this reviewer rated his "tech knowledge" at maximum. The next reviewer kindly pointed out this guy was a fool and there was no possible way his knowledge was that high because anyone really knowledgeable would've A) Known the ram must be manually set to run at that speed or at least B) Where/How to find the solution to the problem instead of griping about it.
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I see that frequently on there also. If you buy 1600Mhz RAM and you are buying an Intel motherboard, then you should be buying XMP-rated RAM and just set the profile in the BIOS. But that is too difficult to research for people and they would rather dock the rating instead of admitting their out ineptitude.

Also, many Newegg reviewers will give a product 1 or 2 eggs because of a shipping problem on Newegg's part, which has NOTHING to do with the functionality or quality of the product. :rolleyes:
 
"I know (or read or heard of) someone that...therefore, everyone or everything is..." That common way of looking at things can be applied to just about any topic. In fact, most social prejudices are expressed or justified that way.

As the sample size grows, the sorts of responses you mention lose significance in the overall figures. Plus, of course, one does their own filtering by reading the comments.
 
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I dunno. I was prepared for a problem and got one. After a few days my speakers started making noises even though they were muted. Whenever there was any graphics activity they started squawking and it got louder and louder.

Could have been damage from poor shipping. In any case, I was prepared to return it and it was pretty much no hassle as I didn't have to deal with Asus. The new board was fine.

So I have had poor packing from both newegg and Amazon and I won't purchase anything delicate from newegg anymore, I try to go through Amazon for delicate items like disk drives and motherboards because of their great return policy and turnaround.
 
Vithar said:
If your read Gigabyte's mobo reviews you see they are famous for boot loops, which makes me wonder is Gigabyte having quality control issues? Personally I place my faith in EVGA.
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I've built 4 rigs with Gigabyte motherboards with nary an issue.
 
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