starkers

Join Date 05/2004

+1153

My Big Beastie Died

mobo gave up the ghost

I'm not having much luck with computers just lately. My Big Beastie with the Ryzen Threadripper X2920 suddenly died and I had to take it into a techie to find out how and why.... being I have no diagnostic tools to speak of. It turns out that the mobo just up and died on me. Geez, it's not even 6 months old and it retired itself.

Anyhow, that wasn't the end of it and I got some good news. The techie sent it back to MSI and they promptly replaced it without question. Apparently there were a few others suffering the same fate.... a faulty BIOS or something. I should receive the replacement in the next couple of days, after which I shall take it into the techie to rebuild the machine for me. My hands aren't as good as they used to be, arthritis 'n all, and I don't enjoy building PCs like I used to.

The other issue was a brand new power supply that just stopped working. I installed it in my Ryzen 9 machine and I managed to set up the OS and programs without issue, but when I tried to reboot the following morning there was no power. I tried another lower powered PSU and the machine booted okay, so it wasn't the build itself, just the PSU. It is now on its way back to the seller to be replaced. Hopefully that doesn't take too long, being shipping and deliveries are often delayed in this age of Corona virus.

Oh well, all's well that ends well.

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Jafo

Join Date 03/2001

+1752

I had an Asus P4P800 snuff it on me once....got a replacement OK.... been the only bit I can recall that up-and-died before its time.....other than the old P100 that ate hard-drives....could kill one in a matter of days...

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SchismNavigator

Join Date 06/2012

+165

Good thing you got the replacement. These things always seem to happen when you least expect it.

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Quoting Jafo,

reply 1

I had an Asus P4P800 snuff it on me once....got a replacement OK.... been the only bit I can recall that up-and-died before its time.

I've had a few things up and die before their time... a couple of them being ASUS ROG Crosshair Extreme motherboards..... hence my reluctance to ever purchase another ASUS board.

This MSI one; however, was part of a batch that had a dodgy BIOS. Apparently it is a known issue so I had no worries regarding a replacement.

Quoting SchismNavigator,

reply 2

Good thing you got the replacement. These things always seem to happen when you least expect it.

Yeah, it was unexpected and quite a surprise when my PC wouldn't boot.... the mobo was almost brand new and had not had a lot of use.

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admiralWillyWilber

Join Date 05/2009

+99

I bought a msi motherboard once. It didnt last had to replace it.

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RedneckDude

Join Date 04/2009

+2197

I have several MSI boards going. Always been my favorite. Odd how some have luck with a thing while others do not.

Asus would be my 2nd pick, then Gigabyte.

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Asus and ASRock Motherboards for me. Never tried Gigabyte and MSI. Intel at one time long time ago.

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Jafo

Join Date 03/2001

+1752

All my machines are ASUS ...

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Quoting admiralWillyWilber,

reply 4

I bought a msi motherboard once. It didnt last had to replace it.

I have 2 other MSI motherboards that have worked perfectly for some time and I have no complaints regarding the brand. I'm not fussed on ASUS boards after having 2 ROG versions die on me after the original had to be replaced due to malfunctioning. I have since gone with MSI boards and had no issues until now. However, this particular fault does not put me off the brand. I have several MSI products that have served me well over the years... and given customer service promptly resolved this issue I see no reason to change brands.

Quoting RedneckDude,

reply 5

I have several MSI boards going. Always been my favorite. Odd how some have luck with a thing while others do not.

Asus would be my 2nd pick, then Gigabyte.

I started out with Gigabyte boards and was quite happy with them until they started cutting features; ie, reducing 5 or 6 PCIe slots down to just 3; cutting 6 or 8 SATA ports down to just 4. This was of no use to me being that I have various add-in cards and internal HDDs I need to connect. Other brands have cut features and options, too, which is why I changed to MSI when 3 of my ASUS boards went guts up one after the other.

Quoting basj,

reply 6

Asus and ASRock Motherboards for me. Never tried Gigabyte and MSI. Intel at one time long time ago.

I have a couple of ASRock motherboards that served me well during the AMD AM3 days. Due to various upgrades they've been out of use for some time now, but I still have them with the CPUs still attached... just in case I need to put a build together for somebody down the track

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The replacement board arrived yesterday and is now with the techie to rebuild the Beastie for me. A couple of years ago I would have rebuilt it myself, but hese days my hands don't like the fiddly bits of system building and it'll be quicker and easier for the techie to do it.

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Well I'm truly pissed.... like livid, angered to the utmost. The techie advised me earlier today that the damned replacement motherboard is fucked. It has several damages, is missing the OC Genie knob and just doesn't post. The bastards sent me a second-hand board that's worse than my original. So now I have to pack it up and send it back at my expense, and that just isn't right when the issue was of their doing not mine.

Worse still, that motherboard is as rare as rocking horse shit and stocks just about everywhere are so low and even non-existent because of the Corona virus and supplies just not coming from China, Taiwan or other places. And then there's the issue of China treating creating issues for Australia, cyber attacks and hacking into our government and businesses alike because our PM is pushing for China to come clean about the Corona virus outbreak.

Yup, the world is going to shit.

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admiralWillyWilber

Join Date 05/2009

+99

Sorry to hear that. I was hoping that everything was going good.

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Quoting admiralWillyWilber,

reply 11

Sorry to hear that. I was hoping that everything was going good.

Yeah, me too..... even moreso. Even though I have other working PCs at my disposal, the Big Beastie is my primary machine as it has all my programs and apps installed. I do have some of them and alternatives on my Intel i7 4770K PC and AMD Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 9 machines, but it's better when they're all in the same place.... my primary and most powerful machine.

Oh well, it is what it is and I need to keep pushing to get a proper replacement motherboard.

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Not Good News!!!!! I just received an email from the store I bought the original motherboard from and they confirmed my replacement board was secondhand.... and damaged. The original was sent to MSI for repair or replacement..... MSI today confirmed they mistakenly replaced my original board with another sent in for warranty repair or replacement.

Thing is, that is not the worst of it, however. It is a good thing in one respect, as MSI has shown its preparedness to help me by attempting to furnish me with a replacement, albeit a damaged one. The worst part of it is that the store I purchased the original from has no more TR4 socket motherboards in stock and does not intend to get any more in, meaning that all they can do is return it to MSI for a credit of the original price.

That means I will have to wait for that process to complete.... then find another TR4 socket motherboard, which will not be an easy feat. Apart from an ASUS TR4 ATX Prime X399-A DDR4 board, which I'd prefer to avoid after 3 ASUS boards failed on me, TR4 socket motherboards are as rare as rocking horse shit, so it may take some time before I get Big Beastie running again. I'd prefer not to go with the ASUS board, but I may be forced to if I'm going to get Beastie going again.... and not have a 1200.00 dollar CPU sitting idle with no home to go to.

Damn! I must have pissed somebody off severely to have had such bad luck in recent times with motherboards, being this is the fourth unit in a row to go guts up on me Fech, I don't even know who I need to apologise to to turn my run of bad luck around.

Meanwhile, I rebuilt Shaunna's machine today, putting it in a new Antec case and swapping some parts around to boost her performance. I also built me a Ryzen 9 3900X 12 Core AM4 3.8 CPU on a MSI AMD X570-A Pro ATX board. Now I have 3 machines to load Windows on.

No rest for the wicked, eh... but it'll keep me off the streets. After various upgrades over the years I have around 4 - 5 leftover CPUs, still on their motherboards that I'll rebuild into leftover cases, etc, and give them away to various needy people I know.

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Jafo

Join Date 03/2001

+1752

2 things...

1 just go with ASUS.... they are one of the best....

And

2 once you build up a machine.....don't fuck with it. Every time you poke and prod....relocate stuff...you are increasing likelihood of damaging.....something.

Meanwhile my machine has been opened twice....in its life... for dusting.

Do it once....do it right....

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ALMonty

Join Date 01/2002

+242

Newegg has TR4 boards It's a shame that it will cost you double the price to order one from the US.

https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?N=100007625%20601301149

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Quoting Jafo,

reply 14

1 just go with ASUS.... they are one of the best....

I was doing that .... until two motherboards died one after the other. I just wasn't ready to go down that road again.

Quoting Jafo,

reply 14

2 once you build up a machine.....don't fuck with it. Every time you poke and prod....relocate stuff...you are increasing likelihood of damaging.....something.

I didn't fuck with it. All I did was move the CPU's cooler radiator and fans to get better airflow. When that didn't turn out as hoped, I restored it to it's original position, booted up and installed some updates and software. Nothing essential to the machine's ability to run was touched or altered and it ran for 4 - 5 hours without issue... it was only after the reboot to complete those installations that things went awry.

Once that had occurred I did swap out the Threadripper setup and installed it in the Cosmos II case with better airflow and cooling, thus leaving the more recent CoolerMaster case free to house the Ryzen 9 setup now in it.

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Quoting ALMonty,

reply 15

Newegg has TR4 boards It's a shame that it will cost you double the price to order one from the US.

Actually, it wouldn't quite be twice the price to order one from the States, but that's not my concern right now. As the Corona virus has caused delays in shipping and I could be waiting months and months on end In fact, even large and small stores are having issues getting new stock. When looking at many Aussie based PC stores, their 'shelves' are near empty.

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Jafo

Join Date 03/2001

+1752

Quoting starkers,

reply 16

Once that had occurred I did swap out the Threadripper setup and installed it in the Cosmos II case

And that's not 'fucking with it'?

As I said....build it once and build it right. All this relocating into other cases means pulling apart things that don't need it. A computer is not a Meccano set, it's a system build - once built it is built-done-finito-finished.

I'd blame my P4P-800 failure to 'being messed with'. Its replacement is still working [it's ancient] dates to 2002.

The 'upgrade' was a whole new build, box-up and that P6T-SE Terry still uses everyday [working from home].

Its 'upgrade' is the X99 Deluxe I'm still running 24/7/365 [my beast].....dates to 2015....and that one had to survive the trip to Ballaarat.

They're all ASUS - even the Graphics are too, and the monitors...

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Quoting Jafo,

reply 18

And that's not 'fucking with it'?

No, the motherboard died before I swapped cases.... and relocating the water cooler radiator and fans earlier did not interfere with any essential/working parts of the system itself. As I stated earlier, it was a known issue with that particular model MSI board. Nothing I did caused that.

Besides, I have successfully upgraded several PCs of my own and several for others. I've been in and out of various computers over the years to upgrade and such, with very few, if any issues. I did have issues with an ASUS build, though, but again it was a known issue with the ROG motherboard I used. ASUS replaced the original board with another and it too failed after a week or so of use. Again, ASUS replaced the board, but this time with a more expensive ROG Crosshair Extreme instead. I rebuilt the machine with that and it has been running without issue ever since.... about 18 months or more.

That, however, does not sway my feelings regarding ASUS motherboards. Like you though, I have purchased several ASUS graphics cards and find them okay.

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admiralWillyWilber

Join Date 05/2009

+99

It look like your having trouble with msi too.

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Yeah, I am disappointed with MSI and its handling of my RTM. The store I purchased the board from is helping me to gain a satisfactory outcome to my case, and hopefully it is resolved quickly so I can get back to using my primary PC.

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I dunno, can't take a friggin' trick just lately.... my 3rd piece of hardware in a couple of months died a week ago

Quoting Jafo,

reply 18

And that's not 'fucking with it'?

As I said....build it once and build it right.

I had to fuck with my AMD FX machine last week .... the PSU gave up the ghost and died. It was less than a month old so I took it out and RTM-ed the sucker. Well I got its replacement earlier today [that was quick] ... a brand new one still in its original shrink-wrapped packing. Anyhow, it is now fully installed and running like a dream.

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Well some good news on the mobo front.... not only do I get a brand new board, I'm getting an upgrade to a better, more feature packed replacement: the MSI MEG X399 Creation. It comes with a PCIE M.2 expansion card that holds 4 M.2 SSDs that can all be linked via the in-built RAID arrays. Yup, installing Windows on a x4 SSD RAID array should give it a bit of zip. Also, Big Beastie gets a RAM upgrade, from 64GB to 128GB

Hopefully the mobo arrives early next week so's I can get it into the techie to rebuild Big Beastie. I have so missed it and was suffering separation anxiety..... as if I needed another pill to calm me down.

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Jafo

Join Date 03/2001

+1752

Big beastie seems to be getting bigger...

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Quoting Jafo,

reply 24

Big beastie seems to be getting bigger...

Yeah, sure is, but then I always planned to upgrade the RAM, and I might just as well get it installed while the techie is doing the rebuild. I'm so looking forward to it being in working order again.... putting it through its paces with the additional RAM and the OS running off the RAID array utilising four 240GB SSDs. Yup, Big Beastie will absolutely fly along.

It will definitely be my last build, though. There will always be bigger and better tech coming out, but I'm more than satisfied with what I've got. Besides, the 3rd gen Threadripper CPUs and motherboards are way more expensive than I can afford, and the 4th gens will likely be even less affordable.

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