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So frusturated I could cry.

J

jdraughn

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 9, 2007
Messages
324
:mad::( I just left a post detailing my experience with a motherboard I bought from MSI in the "I Hate MSI" thread in the video card section. It says this:

The thing that gets ME about MSI is the fact that they continue to sell/allow distributers to sell their MSI P35 Neo2-FR motherboard.

I bought one from mwave.com, had lots of problems with it not remembering my drive order so I kept getting missing bootmgr messages. So I flashed to the latest bios hoping to fix the problem and then I couldin't get a post half the time, and the other half the time I couldin't get into windows.

Since newegg has a much better way of providing feedback to other customers I went to their website to warn other customers about my experience but guess what? Everyone already new about the problem!
Quotes:
"Cons: board did not post after updating the bios as per MSI's instructions"
"Cons: If you buy it against my warnings, do not run the MSI Live Update utilities to install the updated BIOS!"
"Cons: DON'T UPDATE YOUR BOIS!!"
"Cons: do not update bios using the MSI utility. after hours of work putting a new system together, I didn't listen to other reviewers and updated anyways. System would not post at all after that (even with all the tricks)."

It's a known problem that flashing to the latest bios kills the motherboard and yet MSI continues to sell the board and allow you to flash the bios. I upgraded the bios via their windows live update (only way to do it), so it automatically chose the bios to upgrade with. It's within MSI's means to detect the specific motherboard and give a message saying you shouldin't flash it, but they just keep on allowing it to happen and keep on selling those motherboards.

I have been without a decent system for about 3 weeks now, all thanks to MSI. Luckily for me I still had a 30 day warranty from mwave and didn't have to deal with MSI directly. I should get my ASUS motherboard by early next week. I am a little peeved that newegg and mwave (and other retailers) are continuing to sell the board, they should take it upon themselves to do the right thing and quit selling these to the unknowing public.

To top it all off, I had just created a raid 5 array with 3 500GB drives and copied all my data from my two 320GB drives to it. Over 600GB of data on an array created with the raid chipset on the MSI board. What are the chances that my nvidia raid will see it? Yeah, im probably out of my 600+GB of data too (thanks to MSI).

So to top if off.. THANKS MSI!!!
Click to expand...


So, I get done posting this message and check my e-mail to see that mwave is not accepting my return because of physical damage to the CPU socket. I bent a couple of pins a little bit because I didn't realise they were actual pins sticking up and I went to wipe a little thermal grease off the hinged top with the square hole and my towel snagged the pins. Now I am out the 115.00 plus the 8.00 shipping I paid to send it back.
 
That is the way it goes brother.

Look at it this way, atleast you may at most only be out the cash.....

At least you didnt kill a server at work and now you fear for your job.....
 
Good News. I talked to mwave and they made an exception and are giving me a refund on the motherboard after all.

Their customer support is not very good at keeping in contact with you, and you seem to be put on hold a lot, but in the end they did do a good job. They will be keeping my business.

Still bummed about what I am going to do about my data on my raided harddrives.
 
You're lucky. Technically, it was your fault that the pins were bent, and they could deny your RMA not to mention tell you to send your board to MSI and have it out there for 2 months while they determine that the problem is the bent pins and not the bad bios flash and send it back to you without fixing the problem and telling you to buy a new board.
 
Yep, it was my fault I bent the pins. The thing that gets me though is I never would have had to remove my CPU to send my back the motherboard if MSI would stop selling boards that are known to have flashing problems.
 
jdraughn said:
Still bummed about what I am going to do about my data on my raided harddrives.
Click to expand...

Another good lesson learned - use a hardware RAID PCI / PCI-E card, and not your motherboard's built-in RAID solution. It will use much less resources, is likely more scalable, and your data will be much more secure in case things like this happen in the future. Oh yeah, and back up important data to DVD.
 
ty for future advice i am getting a new setup soon... and im thinking a deffinite no to msi.. i want something if i need to rma i ca...
 
jdraughn said:
Yep, it was my fault I bent the pins. The thing that gets me though is I never would have had to remove my CPU to send my back the motherboard if MSI would stop selling boards that are known to have flashing problems.
Click to expand...

Just wondering. Can you download the correct bios and then use the Windows program to flash from file rather than go grab the wrong bios from the internet?
 
Yeah, my plan was eventually to get a good 12 or 16 disk raid controller, but the ones I wanted started around 800.00 so I was planning on getting that in a couple of years. If I got an elcheapo 100.00 4 disk raid controller, it would be software based and not any better then the motherboard raid controller (not taking into account having the motherboard go out on you and getting a different type of motherboard to replace it).

SEALTeamSix said:
Another good lesson learned - use a hardware RAID PCI / PCI-E card, and not your motherboard's built-in RAID solution. It will use much less resources, is likely more scalable, and your data will be much more secure in case things like this happen in the future. Oh yeah, and back up important data to DVD.
Click to expand...
 
From what I could see when your on MSI's website you have TWO ways of updating the bios. One is a standalone windows program which automatically chooses, downloads and installs the bios. The other is a windows program ran from the webpage is basically just a carbon copy of the standalone windows program. I have a feeling MSI has linked the wrong bios for the motherboard I have. They a few different versions of the P35 Neo2.

kirbyrj said:
Just wondering. Can you download the correct bios and then use the Windows program to flash from file rather than go grab the wrong bios from the internet?
Click to expand...
 
I was just wondering because I know with Asus I always flashed in Windows, but I never let it pick the bios out for me. I always downloaded the file I wanted then flashed from the HDD rather than from the internet. I had an MSI board a while ago, and don't remember how I flashed it :eek:.
 
jdraughn said:
Yeah, my plan was eventually to get a good 12 or 16 disk raid controller, but the ones I wanted started around 800.00 so I was planning on getting that in a couple of years. If I got an elcheapo 100.00 4 disk raid controller, it would be software based and not any better then the motherboard raid controller (not taking into account having the motherboard go out on you and getting a different type of motherboard to replace it).
Click to expand...

You could look into getting a used / refurb one... that would probably be cheaper than new, but just as good. DVD / external hard drive backup of the essentials in the meantime would help. There are some good deals on external HDD's in the hot-deals section. Just throwing out suggestions... I am sorry your mobo tanked on you, that's a real bummer.
 
Does anybody use onboard raid ???

I either use softraid (md*) or start with a 4-8 port raid controller (lsi, 3ware, etc). Motherboard raid is just horrific in stability which really is the most important thing for raid.
 
Robstar said:
Does anybody use onboard raid ???

I either use softraid (md*) or start with a 4-8 port raid controller (lsi, 3ware, etc). Motherboard raid is just horrific in stability which really is the most important thing for raid.
Click to expand...

Eh, one of my machines has been using onboard RAID for 4yrs now, ICH7R, 2-drive RAID0 array. I agree though, if you're hardcore, get a dedicated raid card. But for a simple gaming/media box, I use onboard. I usually have another storage drive in the system, with a small OS partition in case the array goes bad or a drive fails.
 
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