Unpleasant surprises

[musky]

About 2 months ago, I made a run to Chicago to hit the two Micro Centers there and pick up some I7 920's. My brother went with me, so I ended up with 4 for them. I current have three of them up and running. So I am checking Ebay for a motherboard for the fourth one and I find a "new" Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD3R for $155 But It Now. I grabbed it and another 6GB of ram to finish the last system.

Tonight, I started unpacking everything. When I looked at the motherboard box, I could tell that it had been opened. Figuring someone may have just opened the to check contents, I wasn't too worried yet. When I pulled the motherboard out of the box, I noticed that it had thermal compound residue on the retaining plate. This thing has definately been used, and do not know anything about its history since it was listed as a new board. We will see what the seller has to say about it.

It gets worse. Figuring I would still give it a shot, I grabbed the last I7 920 box, still sealed. When I opened it up and pulled out the processor, I thought that it looked smaller than an I7 920. Comparing it to the CPU socket on the board confirmed this. Looking at the processor, I now see that it is actually an I3 530 which was in my sealed I7 920 box. Better yet, I no longer have the receipts for these processors and I have no idea which of the Chicago stores it come from. Even better, I have no socket 1156 board to test the thing in to verify that it even works.

Moral to the story - make to to check your Micro Center purchases closely, or you may be surprised with what you get.

Needless to say, I am not a very happy camper at the moment...

Just needed to vent a bit.

 

[crawford60]

With Ebay, unfortunately that happens from time to time.

Now for the processor that is quite odd. Maybe give Intel customer service a call, to see what they have to say?

 

[sirmonkey1985]

ive never been to a microcenter store but do they do anything like fry's where your purchases are linked to a phone number? if so then you dont need a receipt because they would have a digital copy of it.. (number 1 reason i shop at Fry's)..

but either way this is their screw up even with out the receipt i doubt they would argue over this.. as for the motherboard.. its just another typical purchase on fleabay.. unless you see a picture of it completely sealed and not a picture that looks like it was pulled off the manufactures website then automatically assume that its been opened and used..

 

[gkanakis]

That is why the CPU top is viewable without opening the package.

 

[Choder]

Holy crap man, that is no good.

 

[lehmann]

they do have the digital recipe system

 

[Pocatello]

sorry to hear about this.

that sux.

 

[Zero82z]

Look up the purchase on your credit card statement. You'll be able to find out the date, and if you're lucky, which store you bought it at. That should be enough to have Microcenter pull up your purchase in their system.

 

[musky]

The I7's were cash purchases, so no credit card statements. The Micro Center stores are both 3+ hours away. The purchase also happened 2 months ago. If you worked at MC and I showed up with an open I7 920 box with an I3 530 in it claiming that this was what was sold to me 2 months ago, whould you really believe me? I wouldn't...

 

[sirmonkey1985]

well being that it was 2 months ago your screwed even if they did accept it.. this is a prime reason why you check everything after you buy it even if its not going to be used for a year down the road.. best hope is trying to sell it for full price on fleabay and hoping it starts a bidding war and you get your full amount you paid back..

 

[jhonnyD2]

many thanks mates;

 

[Zero82z]

The I7's were cash purchases, so no credit card statements. The Micro Center stores are both 3+ hours away. The purchase also happened 2 months ago. If you worked at MC and I showed up with an open I7 920 box with an I3 530 in it claiming that this was what was sold to me 2 months ago, whould you really believe me? I wouldn't...

Looks like you're screwed then .

 

[nitrobass24]

YGPM

 

[CraftyOtter]

The I7's were cash purchases, so no credit card statements. The Micro Center stores are both 3+ hours away. The purchase also happened 2 months ago. If you worked at MC and I showed up with an open I7 920 box with an I3 530 in it claiming that this was what was sold to me 2 months ago, whould you really believe me? I wouldn't...

I see your point. But it's worth a call to Intel. At the very least you have the serial number for the i3 530. They can track it from there. Who knows ... maybe Intel is hiding a dirty secret about a packing screw-up and will send you a new i7 920 because you are not the first this has happened to /fingers crossed/. Worth a shot.