most stable current chipset for AMD?

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On Sun, 23 May 2004 05:30:50 GMT,
salfter@salfter.diespammersdie.dyndns.org (Scott Alfter) wrote:


>The SATA controller in VIA's Athlon 64 chipset has a problem that kept
>corrupting the hard drive in a system at work. I worked around that by
>switching to the Promise SATA controller that was also on the motherboard
>(knock on wood ever since), but the Athlon 64 boxen I've built around
>nVidia-chipset motherboards that were also equipped with SATA hard drives
>have not had any storage-related problems (don't remember offhand if the
>nForce3 supports SATA natively or if boards using it used an add-on
>controller).

I used to have an AMD761 chipset mb and the only probelm with the mb
was the VIA usb controller they put on it. I had to do like you and
put in a PCI USB card to fix it.
 
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On Sat, 22 May 2004 00:16:55 GMT, "Yousuf Khan"
<news.tally.bbbl67@spamgourmet.com> wrote:

>Kai Harrekilde-Petersen <khp@harrekilde.dk> wrote:
>> Any particular reasons for disliking VIA?
>
>Just a lot of driver issues. This may have also been because back then I was
>using Windows 98 and earlier on those systems, where drivers are just so
>finicky to install and uninstall. If you ever change your processor or
>motherboard to any other brand after you've had a VIA, you're going to have
>a wonderful time with getting your OS back in working order again.

Before Win98, Intel had driver issues with i430HX et.al. as well as some
versions of the North Bridge which were broken. Surely you remember the
Win95 Bus Mastering driver of the month saga, which initially had no
uninstall procedure and you had to go through all the rigmarole of removing
..inf files, drivers and devices from device manager as each succeeding
version came out. Of course if you upgraded to Win98 without uninstalling
the Intel drivers.....BOOM!

No, apart from their reluctance to issue Errata Sheets, VIA's main problem
was that hardware add-in vendors, sound and other cards, CD/R-RW drives did
not validate their hardware with the VIA chipset.

With Win9x I've gone through several generations of chipsets, including to
and from VIA without a reinstall, the last from a VIA VP2 to a i440BX. You
just have to know how to do it and how to cope with any glitches along the
way.

>But I have installed VIA based systems since those days for friends, but I
>usually tell them strongly to avoid them if at all possible. If it's a
>matter of cost, then I can't argue with them, VIA boards do often tend to be
>cheaper than Nvidia, and more available than SiS.

For an Athlon64 system there isn't much else around other than VIA...
unless you want to use the nForce3 150 HT hobbled chipset. In fact some
mfrs, like MSI, have just avoided making nForce 150 mbrds. I've just done
a VIA K8T800 system because I got tired of waiting for nForce3 250 *and* I
expect it to be positioned at the high $$ end anyway.

This was a MSI K8T Neo mbrd and WinXP install went very smoothly and no
problems observed so far. VIA should look into this 4-in-1 thing though
and clean up the IDE filter/miniport driver confusion. One minor annoyance
with the system which is not unique to VIA, AFAICT, is that the HDD LED
does not work with a SATA drive. I'm not sure how much this is a hardware
problem with the mbrd - it appears that with *some* mfrs' mbrds a BIOS
update can fix it, while others need a new rev of the mbrd.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??
 
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On Fri, 21 May 2004 08:23:54 +0200, Loke <[baijxz at mailme dot
dk]ignore@this.com> wrote:

>Was just wondering which would be the best chipset if one wanted to
>build a pc today with an athlon xp.

I concur with the votes for nForce2. If you want to run DDR400 memory
choose it carefully though and look at the mbrd site for "approved" modules
- maybe check out some of the overclocking forums for experiences. Also
consider seriously if you might want to add memory later and what size to
start with and whether to go single or double sided DIMM - download any
mbrd manual and check details of supported configs.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??
 
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On Sun, 23 May 2004 10:11:53 +0100, GSV Three Minds in a Can
<GSV@quik.clara.co.uk> wrote:

>Bitstring <f7j0b018v38f3ajl5kd1kqrd5asranqpo2@4ax.com>, from the
>wonderful person Ed <nospam@email.com> said
>>On Fri, 21 May 2004 08:23:54 +0200, Loke <[baijxz at mailme dot
>>dk]ignore@this.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Was just wondering which would be the best chipset if one wanted to
>>>build a pc today with an athlon xp.
>>
>>I'll vote Nforce 2. I've had an Asus A7N8X v2.00 (Nforce 2 Ultra-400
>>chipset) with Barton running WinXP Pro for just over a year now and it's
>>been flawless, running old bios and drivers too, no fuss, it just works!
>
>Yes, the nForce2 chipset is super. The current nForce3 chipset for AMD64
>doesn't seem quite as slick, but maybe the revised one will be.
>
>Having said that my nForce2 board (EPOX 8RDA+) went belly up yesterday
>while recording some audio from cassette .. however it appears to be
>'bad capacitors' rather than anything nVidia did.

I dunno whether I'm being reasonable or not but I'm crossing Epox off my
list, as I had a 5-year old Epox mbrd suddenly go bad - dunno what it is
but it'd gone flakey and when I tried to run memtest86 on it, it died
completely.

>(Anyone know when those dodgy-recipe electrolytic capacitors finally got
>flushed from the build chain? I thought they were gone by early 2002,
>but these boards were built in late 4q 2002, and seem to have them in
>droves).

The IEEE article doesn't mention dates specifically and is kinda vague in
general about aportioning blame for obvious reasons:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/feb03/ncap.html

According to Gary Headlee, http://www.motherboardrepair.com/ it *does*
appear that 2001 was the cut off.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??
 

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George Macdonald wrote:


>
> No, apart from their reluctance to issue Errata Sheets, VIA's main problem
> was that hardware add-in vendors, sound and other cards, CD/R-RW drives
> did not validate their hardware with the VIA chipset.

LOL!!




--

Stacey
 
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Scott Alfter wrote:
> The SATA controller in VIA's Athlon 64 chipset has a problem that kept
> corrupting the hard drive in a system at work. I worked around that by
> switching to the Promise SATA controller that was also on the motherboard
> (knock on wood ever since), but the Athlon 64 boxen I've built around
> nVidia-chipset motherboards that were also equipped with SATA hard drives
> have not had any storage-related problems (don't remember offhand if the
> nForce3 supports SATA natively or if boards using it used an add-on
> controller).


sorry to hear that :/ are u sure it wasn't a driver u installed or
didn't install...? i'm using onboard VIA SATA/RAID controller with a
raptor boot drive... no problems.
 
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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

In article <c8rk2b$v8i$1@lust.ihug.co.nz>, gimp <gimpboy@smegville.com> wrote:
>Scott Alfter wrote:
>> The SATA controller in VIA's Athlon 64 chipset has a problem that kept
>> corrupting the hard drive in a system at work.
>
>sorry to hear that :/ are u sure it wasn't a driver u installed or
>didn't install...?

I used the driver that shipped with the motherboard. It might work better
with an updated driver, but it's working just fine through the Promise
controller. If it ain't broke...

_/_
/ v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
(IIGS( http://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
\_^_/ rm -rf /bin/laden >What's the most annoying thing on Usenet?

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iD8DBQFAsY/+VgTKos01OwkRAsGdAJ9ldjOMb3EmsYTn1/5w5J/+n9WugwCg6nfr
w9573scJQZUfghN/i/66B3c=
=f4wY
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
 
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On Mon, 24 May 2004 06:02:36 GMT, salfter@salfter.diespammersdie.dyndns.org
(Scott Alfter) wrote:

>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>Hash: SHA1
>
>In article <c8rk2b$v8i$1@lust.ihug.co.nz>, gimp <gimpboy@smegville.com> wrote:
>>Scott Alfter wrote:
>>> The SATA controller in VIA's Athlon 64 chipset has a problem that kept
>>> corrupting the hard drive in a system at work.
>>
>>sorry to hear that :/ are u sure it wasn't a driver u installed or
>>didn't install...?
>
>I used the driver that shipped with the motherboard. It might work better
>with an updated driver, but it's working just fine through the Promise
>controller. If it ain't broke...

Which driver for which OS? With my MSI K8T Neo mbrd, for WinXP there's a
driver on a floppy to get the install going and there was a driver install
procedure on the mbrd CD, which I installed once XP was up and running.
It's early days but I haven't seen any problems yet. Blaming VIA's SATA
controller as the cause of your problem, without elaborating, seems like a
bit of a leap here... "Oh it must be VIA again".

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??
 

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On Sun, 23 May 2004 05:30:50 GMT,
salfter@salfter.diespammersdie.dyndns.org (Scott Alfter) wrote:

....snip...
>
>The SATA controller in VIA's Athlon 64 chipset has a problem that kept
>corrupting the hard drive in a system at work. I worked around that by
>switching to the Promise SATA controller that was also on the motherboard
>(knock on wood ever since), but the Athlon 64 boxen I've built around
>nVidia-chipset motherboards that were also equipped with SATA hard drives
>have not had any storage-related problems (don't remember offhand if the
>nForce3 supports SATA natively or if boards using it used an add-on
>controller).
Just recently set up MSI K8T Master2-far with 2xOpteron242 and SATA
drive (Hitachi Deskstar 160 MB) as a boot drive working off built-in
SATA controller. The only problem was that during WinXP setup I had
to feed the driver from a floppy (arrgh - who would think this
dinosaur-old technology may be still needed for anything!), but so far
no other problem noticed (though the system is only a few days old, so
I knock on wood). Sandra shows the performance in line with other
Opty systems, no matter AMD or VIA chipset, though such synthetic
benchmarks should be taken with quite a grain of salt.
 
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On Mon, 24 May 2004 03:25:04 -0400, George Macdonald
<fammacd=!SPAM^nothanks@tellurian.com> wrote:
>On Sat, 22 May 2004 00:16:55 GMT, "Yousuf Khan"
><news.tally.bbbl67@spamgourmet.com> wrote:
>
>>Kai Harrekilde-Petersen <khp@harrekilde.dk> wrote:
>>> Any particular reasons for disliking VIA?
>>
>>Just a lot of driver issues. This may have also been because back then I was
>>using Windows 98 and earlier on those systems, where drivers are just so
>>finicky to install and uninstall. If you ever change your processor or
>>motherboard to any other brand after you've had a VIA, you're going to have
>>a wonderful time with getting your OS back in working order again.
>
>Before Win98, Intel had driver issues with i430HX et.al. as well as some
>versions of the North Bridge which were broken. Surely you remember the
>Win95 Bus Mastering driver of the month saga, which initially had no
>uninstall procedure and you had to go through all the rigmarole of removing
>.inf files, drivers and devices from device manager as each succeeding
>version came out. Of course if you upgraded to Win98 without uninstalling
>the Intel drivers.....BOOM!

Ugg, now THAT was a nightmare! I was working at a computer store for
some of this time frame and we had to be SUPER careful with the order
we installed drivers or else the whole system was just screwed. Even
while being careful we sometimes wouldn't know what patches a customer
had installed previously and things just ended up being a huge mess.

However Intel DID eventually manage to get stable drivers out.
Sometimes it would take Intel 6-8 months, but they would eventually
get things working. That, in my experience, is VIA's main problem,
they just never seem to quite fix the problems, only reduce the
symptoms.

>No, apart from their reluctance to issue Errata Sheets, VIA's main problem
>was that hardware add-in vendors, sound and other cards, CD/R-RW drives did
>not validate their hardware with the VIA chipset.

That used to be the problem, and that's a large part of the reason why
things aren't as bad now as they used to be way back in they day.
However since about mid-'98 it just hasn't been an option not to
validate your hardware with VIA chipsets, there are just WAY too many
people using their chipsets to ignore them (unless you're Creative
Labs apparently). No, VIA's problems run deeper than that.

>With Win9x I've gone through several generations of chipsets, including to
>and from VIA without a reinstall, the last from a VIA VP2 to a i440BX. You
>just have to know how to do it and how to cope with any glitches along the
>way.

You mean glitches like having to use Win9x? That's a pretty big
"glitch" IMO :>

>>But I have installed VIA based systems since those days for friends, but I
>>usually tell them strongly to avoid them if at all possible. If it's a
>>matter of cost, then I can't argue with them, VIA boards do often tend to be
>>cheaper than Nvidia, and more available than SiS.
>
>For an Athlon64 system there isn't much else around other than VIA...
>unless you want to use the nForce3 150 HT hobbled chipset. In fact some
>mfrs, like MSI, have just avoided making nForce 150 mbrds. I've just done
>a VIA K8T800 system because I got tired of waiting for nForce3 250 *and* I
>expect it to be positioned at the high $$ end anyway.

The nForce3 250 is *FINALLY* showing up on store shelves, albeit
slowly. You're pretty much hitting on the main reason I've been
reluctant to recommend any Athlon64 systems to people, bad
motherboards. VIA does seem to have improved a bit, though I'm still
not sure I trust them; I just ran into too many odd little glitches
that never seemed to get fixed. Usually nothing that could easily be
pinned as for sure being a chipset issue, but they just didn't happen
on non-VIA boards. Things like problems with my audio depending on
what was being displayed by the video card, or issues with the network
card and a different video card. These things just worked so much
more smoothly in an nVidia or Intel based board.

-------------
Tony Hill
hilla <underscore> 20 <at> yahoo <dot> ca
 

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Tony Hill wrote:

> VIA does seem to have improved a bit, though I'm still
> not sure I trust them; I just ran into too many odd little glitches
> that never seemed to get fixed. Usually nothing that could easily be
> pinned as for sure being a chipset issue, but they just didn't happen
> on non-VIA boards. Things like problems with my audio depending on
> what was being displayed by the video card, or issues with the network
> card and a different video card. These things just worked so much
> more smoothly in an nVidia or Intel based board.
>


Like you said the "problems" could be sorted out. Like swapping out
different video card/sound card combos that would coexist with the via
drivers etc. The deal is with the other chipsets this didn't need to be
done. I look at it as "I save $10 buying a via board and end up spending 2
hours extra fighting with it." My time is worth a little more than $5 an
hour.
--

Stacey
 
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On Tue, 25 May 2004 05:10:12 -0400, Tony Hill <hilla_nospam_20@yahoo.ca>
wrote:

>On Mon, 24 May 2004 03:25:04 -0400, George Macdonald
><fammacd=!SPAM^nothanks@tellurian.com> wrote:
>>On Sat, 22 May 2004 00:16:55 GMT, "Yousuf Khan"
>><news.tally.bbbl67@spamgourmet.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Kai Harrekilde-Petersen <khp@harrekilde.dk> wrote:
>>>> Any particular reasons for disliking VIA?
>>>
>>>Just a lot of driver issues. This may have also been because back then I was
>>>using Windows 98 and earlier on those systems, where drivers are just so
>>>finicky to install and uninstall. If you ever change your processor or
>>>motherboard to any other brand after you've had a VIA, you're going to have
>>>a wonderful time with getting your OS back in working order again.
>>
>>Before Win98, Intel had driver issues with i430HX et.al. as well as some
>>versions of the North Bridge which were broken. Surely you remember the
>>Win95 Bus Mastering driver of the month saga, which initially had no
>>uninstall procedure and you had to go through all the rigmarole of removing
>>.inf files, drivers and devices from device manager as each succeeding
>>version came out. Of course if you upgraded to Win98 without uninstalling
>>the Intel drivers.....BOOM!
>
>Ugg, now THAT was a nightmare! I was working at a computer store for
>some of this time frame and we had to be SUPER careful with the order
>we installed drivers or else the whole system was just screwed. Even
>while being careful we sometimes wouldn't know what patches a customer
>had installed previously and things just ended up being a huge mess.
>
>However Intel DID eventually manage to get stable drivers out.
>Sometimes it would take Intel 6-8 months, but they would eventually
>get things working. That, in my experience, is VIA's main problem,
>they just never seem to quite fix the problems, only reduce the
>symptoms.

Well Intel *did* manage to get M$ to do it "their way" for things like IDE
BM drivers. That made a big difference for end-users who saw that there
were no add-on drivers to get the OS working on an Intel chipset. It took
a bit longer for M$ to waken up on this and the pidgin English instructions
on the VIATech Web site didn't help back then and that hasn't changed much.

>>No, apart from their reluctance to issue Errata Sheets, VIA's main problem
>>was that hardware add-in vendors, sound and other cards, CD/R-RW drives did
>>not validate their hardware with the VIA chipset.
>
>That used to be the problem, and that's a large part of the reason why
>things aren't as bad now as they used to be way back in they day.
>However since about mid-'98 it just hasn't been an option not to
>validate your hardware with VIA chipsets, there are just WAY too many
>people using their chipsets to ignore them (unless you're Creative
>Labs apparently). No, VIA's problems run deeper than that.

Even in mid-'98 timeframe there was still the residue of the writeable
ATAPI interface foul-up. Of course CD-R/RW drive makers just did it "their
way" in the absence of a standard method and continued to do so.

>>>But I have installed VIA based systems since those days for friends, but I
>>>usually tell them strongly to avoid them if at all possible. If it's a
>>>matter of cost, then I can't argue with them, VIA boards do often tend to be
>>>cheaper than Nvidia, and more available than SiS.
>>
>>For an Athlon64 system there isn't much else around other than VIA...
>>unless you want to use the nForce3 150 HT hobbled chipset. In fact some
>>mfrs, like MSI, have just avoided making nForce 150 mbrds. I've just done
>>a VIA K8T800 system because I got tired of waiting for nForce3 250 *and* I
>>expect it to be positioned at the high $$ end anyway.
>
>The nForce3 250 is *FINALLY* showing up on store shelves, albeit
>slowly. You're pretty much hitting on the main reason I've been
>reluctant to recommend any Athlon64 systems to people, bad
>motherboards. VIA does seem to have improved a bit, though I'm still
>not sure I trust them; I just ran into too many odd little glitches
>that never seemed to get fixed. Usually nothing that could easily be
>pinned as for sure being a chipset issue, but they just didn't happen
>on non-VIA boards. Things like problems with my audio depending on
>what was being displayed by the video card, or issues with the network
>card and a different video card. These things just worked so much
>more smoothly in an nVidia or Intel based board.

Yeah but from what I see, initial mbrd mfrs' efforts on nForce3 250 are on
the Gb version... to get the extra $$?? Fine for a home system, where you
want bells 'n' whistles but ah heck-all use for an office system.

No doubt there was a VIA problem as demonstrated by the "Promise Bus
Mastering" priority, abort, retry thing. OTOH, most of the VIA complaints
were noise from people who couldn't follow instructions even in perfect
English.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??
 
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Rob Stow <rob.stow@sasktel.net> wrote in message news:<10asg41rh4bepc7@corp.supernews.com>...
> Kai Harrekilde-Petersen wrote:
>
>
> I'm *not* in the business of supporting systems that I've built.
> There is only so much I'm willing to do in exchange for dinner
> and a few beers. I want to put the pieces together, install the
> OS and drivers, hand it over to the user, and be done with it.
> I can do that with an nForce2 motherboard. I can seldom do that
> with a VIA motherboard.

Frankly, agree fully. Built a Via system and have had so many
compatibility problems with standard components in the market. I will
never use a VIA motherboards again. On the other hand, a SIS system I
built never had the same problems. Lucky I had the SIS system to
accept the many parts the Via system would have nothing to do with.
 
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I sent Gary Headlee my video card, which he also claims to repair--

a MONTH ago.

His web site states turn around time of 1-2 days.

I finally had to call the POLICE to track the guy down, after sending
him
cash and my card-- received by him via delivery confirmation.

He called me back, and promised to look at my card within a few days.

NOTHING- weeks later.

He does not answer EMAIL, and he has an UNLISTED PHONE NUMBER.

He still has my video card worth a couple hundred bucks.
He asks that people send him CASH for repairs.

You figure it out.


http://www.motherboardrepair.com/index.php?sec=home


Neil Slade Books and Music
Denver, CO 80206
 
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I sent Gary Headlee my video card, which he also claims to repair--

a MONTH ago.

His web site states turn around time of 1-2 days.

I finally had to call the POLICE to track the guy down, after sending
him
cash and my card-- received by him via delivery confirmation.

He called me back, and promised to look at my card within a few days.

NOTHING- weeks later.

He does not answer EMAIL, and he has an UNLISTED PHONE NUMBER.

He still has my video card worth a couple hundred bucks.
He asks that people send him CASH for repairs.

You figure it out.


http://www.motherboardrepair.com/index.php?sec=home


Neil Slade Books and Music
Denver, CO 80206
 
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I just looked at his site, you sent your card to a street address and he
states that a money order OR cash is required.

With a street address I hardly think he can be accused of being too shonky.


"neilslade" <neil@neilslade-dot-com.no-spam.invalid> wrote in message
news:4201350f$3_2@alt.athenanews.com...
>I sent Gary Headlee my video card, which he also claims to repair--
>
> a MONTH ago.
>
> His web site states turn around time of 1-2 days.
>
> I finally had to call the POLICE to track the guy down, after sending
> him
> cash and my card-- received by him via delivery confirmation.
>
> He called me back, and promised to look at my card within a few days.
>
> NOTHING- weeks later.
>
> He does not answer EMAIL, and he has an UNLISTED PHONE NUMBER.
>
> He still has my video card worth a couple hundred bucks.
> He asks that people send him CASH for repairs.
>
> You figure it out.
>
>
> http://www.motherboardrepair.com/index.php?sec=home
>
>
> Neil Slade Books and Music
> Denver, CO 80206
>
 
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Any place I see "Gary Headlee Motherboard Repair" I am posting my EXTREMELY
UNSTATISFACTORY EXPERIENCE with him

Report by Neil Slade
www.NeilSlade.com

CONCERNING THEFT OF SERVICES and THEFT OF $50 for alleged repair- not
produced- for video card by
Gary Headlee Motherboard Repair

Gary Headlee
692 Lennox St.
Midvale, Utah
84047
801-567-9150

Gary Headlee Motherboard Repair ripped me off $50 for a "claimed" repair
of my ATI 9700 PRO video card, and further made me wait over SIX WEEKS
before the card was returned to me, still non-functional. The card is
valued at around $200, with a new replacement ATI card costing nearly
$300. The card also was fitted with a Zalman silent heat sink valued at
$40.
He apparently lied, and made conflicting repair stories about the card on
two occasions-- first stating that "I've already spent a couple of hours
on your card and haven't figured out what is wrong". See the actual email
regarding this below.
Then several weeks later, apparently forgetting his first story, stating,
"Your card works fine, I couldn't find anything wrong, but will let it run
for a while to make sure its okay." 
When the card was finally returned to me after repeated phone calls over a
SIX WEEK period, it was still not operational, and Headlee kept the $50 I
had sent him in advance for the repair.
Use of another ATI card in my computer's AGP slot produces an expected
monitor result without any adjustment. Use of the "repaired" card produces
absolutely NOTHING on the monitor- the card is DEAD. All of my
motherboard's latest drivers and chipset drivers have been installed. It's
not my computer- its the card- it's DEAD and Headlee LIED about it working
on his inspection- for all I know, that never even occurred.
I discourage ANYONE from doing ANY business with Mr. Headlee and instead
encourage simple replacement of a broken motherboard, or use of warranty
if available.
Headlee asks for CASH PAYMENT or MONEY ORDER payment for "repairs", yet 
1) Does not give a phone number on his web site, 
2) Uses an un-listed untraceable fictitious web site registration for his
web page that does not have any contact information (i.e.
motherboardrepair.com contact information is untracable)
3) Apparently refuses to reply to any email communications except under
threat of law enforcement.
CASE HISTORY:
JANUARY 4, 2005
The first week of January 2005 I sent in my video card for repair after
viewing Headlee's web site at
http://www.motherboardrepair.com/
It looked like a respectable web site, and well documented. I sent Headlee
an email regarding my possible card repair, but did not receive a reply.
None the less (and a VERY STUPID MOVE, I must admit) I followed the
instructions on the web site for video card repair and sent. I sent it in
with delivery confirmation via priority mail on Jan 4, 2005, and the
requested $50 repair fee in cash- the excess which would be refunded if
the repair did not require a lot of work.
The web site stated 1-2 day turn-around for repairs.
Delivery confirmation showed that Headlee received the card two days later
on Jan 6.
JANUARY 17, 2005
After waiting TWO WEEKS and not receiving ANY replies to my emails, nor
receiving my card back, or ANY COMMUNICATION whatsoever, I set out to find
a phone number for Headlee.
Headlee's phone is untraceable, and unlisted, and can not be found
anywhere on the Internet.
My last resort was to call The Midvale Utah Police and report what had
happened. They instructed me to contact my local Denver Police and report
THEFT OF SERVICES. They then told me to have my local police contact them,
and they would contact Headlee if possible and look into the matter.
My local police then contacted the police in MIDVALE UTAH, who then
contacted Headlee immediately- and FINALLY apparently under threat of law
enforcement action he contacted me by phone. He then offered a number of
excuses why he had not looked at my card yet. He then said he would look
at it in 3-4 days and would email me with the results. This was around
January 17.
A week went by and Headlee made absolutely no contact again.
FEBRUARY 4, 2005
I began sending a series of emails to Headlee's email address (from his
web site) capman@att.net since he did not leave a phone number when he
called back.
After sending at least a dozen emails, Headlee finally replied with an
email, and left his phone number.
I then called him to see what was going on, and he claimed to have already
spent a couple hours working on my card, but to no avail, and that he
would try to complete work on it in the following week.
Here are his original emails sent to me on Feb. 4:

----- Original Message -----
From: capman@att.net
To: Neil Slade
Sent: Friday, February 04, 2005 5:47 PM
Subject: Re: WHERE IS MY VIDEO CARD PLEASE?



I do understand the way you feel (I have been in the electronics repair
buis for 35+ years), will do my best to stay in contact and repair your
card.
Working out of the home has some big drawbacks..... number one drawback is
that the family doesn't think I am at work, so they ask questions & favors
several times each work day, add a few freinds dropping by, an emergency
or two and the day is gone with no real work produced. Today alone I spent
3 hours at the vet as a favor to my son and his sick cat............... If
I add the vet bill alone with lost wages for the 3 hours...........the cat
had more money this week than I did.

Sorry for the poor comunications,


Gary--
Don't forget to put my website in
your favorites:
http://www.motherboardrepair.com

My home phone # is 801-567-9150 I
am usually available between
10:30am ~5:30pm MST
Message -----


From: capman@att.net
To: Neil Slade
Sent: Friday, February 04, 2005 2:58 PM
Subject: Re: WHERE IS MY VIDEO CARD PLEASE?



Hello,
I tried to call you 2 times today, however the line was busy.
I have spent a couple of hours on your video card, the problem seems to be
quite elusive.
I hope to make progress within a few more days.
Video cards take last priority over all my other work, that is the only
way I can maintain a 2~3 days turn-around for my motherboard customers.
 After I finish your card, I will no longer accept video cards for repair
and will remove the video card section from my web page. You are correct,
I am not able to provide a high quality of service for my video card
customers and no hobby is worth having the police come to my door. I know
of no-one else that even attempts to repair video cards...... now there
will be none.

I will be home late this afternoon if you wish to call me,


Gary Headlee
--
Don't forget to put my website in
your favorites:
http://www.motherboardrepair.com

My home phone # is 801-567-9150 I
am usually available between
10:30am ~5:30pm MST

FEBRUARY 16, 2005
Still no card, no news from Headlee. I send him the following email, to
which I receive no reply.
ATI 9700 Pro card with Zalman cooler


Dear Gary,

Its now been SIX WEEKS since my video card arrived at your home for
repair-

Please return it today, repaired or not, and send a delivery confirmation
tracking number.

If the card is not repaired, kindly return my $50 cash.

I will expect to see my card delivered here by Saturday latest.

Thanks
Neil Slade
303-399-0418

I finally got Headlee to answer his phone, and he said my card would be
looked at right after he finished his current other repair job. There was
no mention of his claimed previous "couple of hours spent on the card
repair" from January.
I called two days later- and Headlee had STILL NOT TRIED TO REPAIR MY
CARD. His excuse this time was "I had to spent the weekend with my
girlfriend for Valentine's Day". He said he now would look at the card.
I called the following day, and Headlee claimed the card was working
perfectly, although he spotted a couple of loose solder connections, which
he claimed to repair. He said he would let the card run for a while to
make sure it was okay, and then send it back.
The card arrived via priority mail on February 19, 2005 forty five days
after it arrived at his home.
The card shows no evidence of repair of solder connections anywhere, and
the card still does not function.
Headlee sent no email explaining the so-called repair, sent no invoice,
and kept the entire $50 cash sent to him by me.
I have demanded the full return of my $50 payment, as there is no mention
of a $50 diagnosis fee for an un-repaired card by Headlee on his site.

If anyone has had similar experiences with Headlee, please contact:
neil@neilslade.com
Denver, CO 
-
Neil Slade
 
G

Guest

Guest
Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips (More info?)

In article <cc06b3c7dc2435ff498801d372a077ef@localhost.talkaboutelectronicequipment.com>,
neilslade2 <neil@neilslade.com> wrote:
>[spam snipped]

Spam report sent to abuse@supernews.com.

_/_
/ v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
(IIGS( http://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
\_^_/ rm -rf /bin/laden >What's the most annoying thing on Usenet?
 
G

Guest

Guest
Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips (More info?)

To interested parties in this case:

Carey Holzman of www.CareyHolzman.com a major computer internet hub
cared enough to get involved in this issue, my web page on the topic
was ranked #3 on Google within days of posting concerning the subject
as well. ...

My apologies to those one or two dormant brains who have nothing but
negative comments to add- amazing how much time these dead beat brains
have on their hands... sigh...

Here's the outcome:


In terms of resolving the issue
Gary made good on his promise and refunded my repair fee in its
entirety to me yesterday along with an apology for taking so long to
get around to resolving the issue.


I have heard from a couple of other people who have had satisfactory
and good repair work done by Headlee previously.

I wish him the best in his business from this point on.

I know as a self-employed business person it is easy to miss things
and get behind, but I know it is also crucially important to quickly
acknowledge errors made and to treat every customer fairly.

Best wishes to all positive computer enthusiasts in getting their
machines working.

Neil
www.neilslade.com
500,000 hits a month and growing

System: 350W SilenX PS (yes, it runs all of this), P4 3.2Ghz, 5
Maxtor 250GB Diamon Max int. HD, 2GB PNY PC3200 DDR400 (4X512MB), MSI
865 G NeoP dual memory, 3 Plextor DVD-RW 716A, Nvidia 6600GT by MSI,
Zalman silent CPU, and VGA FX700cooler
:D
 

Jack

Distinguished
Jun 26, 2003
1,276
0
19,280
Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips (More info?)

neilslade <neil@neilslade-dot-com.no-spam.invalid> wrote:
: To interested parties in this case:
:
No one here is interested, puke. Or didn't you get the message with your
last set of spam posts? Geez!

j.
 
G

Guest

Guest
Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips (More info?)

Sorry to educate you, but you don't know Jack, jack.

A lot of people did care, and got involved in this case, and as a
result- I got results.
Learn something from it.

**********


For those with a few neurons connected here's the outcome:


In terms of resolving the issue
Gary made good on his promise and refunded my repair fee in its
entirety to me yesterday along with an apology for taking so long to
get around to resolving the issue.

Many thanks to Carey Holzman www.CareyHolzman.com who went out of his
way to help encourage my refund with Gary. Gary runs a major internet
computer web site hub and thought enough of this case to get involved
over a period of over a week, and negotiated a fair resolution-
thanks Carey!


I have heard from a couple of other people who have had satisfactory
and good repair work done by Headlee previously.

I wish him the best in his businessness from this point on.

I know as a self-employed business person it is easy to miss things
and get behind, but I know it is also crucially important to quickly
acknowledge errors made and to treat every customer fairly.

Bet wishes to all positive computer enthusiasts in getting their
machines working.

Neil
www.neilslade.com