Gone but not forgotten

[bigbeark]

As I booted up this Soltek KM800, I thought about the boardmakers that have ceased to exist:

ABIT - Last boards socket 939 and 775? I have a 939 board with ALI chipset.

DFI - last board series same as ABIT? I have a Lanparty 939 board.

EPOX - I have an NV61? AMD board. Suspect it's just a relabel.

JETWAY - Never had one, but I think 478 may have been the last ones.

QDI - Nothing after socket 478?

SOLTEK - was there anything after socket 462?

SOYO - I had a 754 board, when did they stop?

I suspect CORE 2 made laptops reliable, so people moved from the desktop. Also think
AMD in survival mode stopped selling to smaller boardmakers, could not afford any
bad publicity.

Yout thoughts?

[diif]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Dfi are still going.

[Dan81]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

As I booted up this Soltek KM800, I thought about the boardmakers that have ceased to exist:

ABIT - Last boards socket 939 and 775? I have a 939 board with ALI chipset.

DFI - last board series same as ABIT? I have a Lanparty 939 board.

EPOX - I have an NV61? AMD board. Suspect it's just a relabel.

JETWAY - Never had one, but I think 478 may have been the last ones.

QDI - Nothing after socket 478?

SOLTEK - was there anything after socket 462?

SOYO - I had a 754 board, when did they stop?

I suspect CORE 2 made laptops reliable, so people moved from the desktop. Also think
AMD in survival mode stopped selling to smaller boardmakers, could not afford any
bad publicity.

Yout thoughts?

ABIT - defunct,their last boards were the IP-35 (P35 chipset) and the IP-95 (P4M890)

DFI - still going in server industry,doesn't produce desktop boards anymore (last MB - DFI LANParty DK 790X-M2RS)

EPOX - still going,they rebranded as SUPoX

SOYO - I dunno,their last new board was the SY-AMN55-GR (nForce 570 SLi)

SOLTEK - again I dunno,this was their latest MB: Soltek SL-K8TPro-939

QDI - this was a Foxconn subsidiary I think,so after they went out of business Foxconn continued their boards. At least that's what I recall since the 865P/PE/G/GV days.

JETWAY - one of the companies that still makes motherboards nowadays. Their newest motherboard is TI61MC and it's using the Intel H61 chipset.

This is all I know.

[c_hegge]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Only the big 4 are left here now (ASUS, ASRock, MSI and Gigabyte). The gradual shift to laptops and tablets is slowly killing all of the smaller brands off.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Is Foxconn still making boards?

[Dan81]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Only the big 4 are left here now (ASUS, ASRock, MSI and Gigabyte). The gradual shift to laptops and tablets is slowly killing all of the smaller brands off.

Actually ECS is still into the industry AFAIK,and they started to get better than their older boards. Same goes for Jetway and Biostar.

[Th3_uN1Qu3]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Yes ECS is still going, and they make decent boards nowadays. They have even done a press release where they said they are determined to continue making boards, as there was a rumor of them closing. They have done some fairly impressive high-end mainboards lately, in an effort to steal some market share from Asus. Dunno if it worked tho.

I still don't trust them, but they get fairly high praise on tech sites nowadays. Biostar are still alive and well too. Don't know about Jetway.

[c_hegge]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

I know ECS and Biostar still exist, but note how I said "Only the big 4 are left here (ie. in this country) now". You can't buy ECS or Biostar or anything but the big 4 here in Australia anymore, and TBH, it's just as well. Biostar and ECS are junk IMO.

[Dan81]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

I know ECS and Biostar still exist, but note how I said "Only the big 4 are left here (ie. in this country) now". You can't buy ECS or Biostar or anything but the big 4 here in Australia anymore, and TBH, it's just as well. Biostar and ECS are junk IMO.

Biostar is good,ECS *was* junk.

[shovenose]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Have used several ECS and Biostar boards recently (LGA1155 and LGA1150 generations) and they work fine. The overall build quality does still feel flimsy though.

I prefer MSI boards. From the low end $50 boards to the high end $300 boards they have never let me down and seem to have the least "weird" issues (suddenly not booting, PCI-E slots dying, memory slots failing, intermittent no-POST) that I've seen/had/heard of on Gigabyte, ASRock, Asus, etc.

And while I love EVGA graphics cards I hate EVGA motherboards.

[Th3_uN1Qu3]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

MSI has really shoddy QC. I'm very partial to Gigabyte myself. Although they have their share of bugs, i haven't seen one come DOA or fail even with extreme overclocking. Unlike Asus which blow themselves up on auto OC...

A computer with a MSI mainboard new enough to not have any dust on it arrived last year in the shop i work in. Fault was no POST, it would start up after significant wiggling of cables. The regulator making 3.3v from 5Vsb was found to be the source of the issue. It was very poorly soldered. Equally bad soldering was found in other areas of the board as well.

[momaka]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

JETWAY - Never had one, but I think 478 may have been the last ones.

Jetway made boards as far as the socket 939 and LGA775 era. Possibly AM2, but I'm not quite sure. Overall, their quality is very good. But why they chose to keep on using those awful GSC/Evercon/Sacon caps is beyond me.

They still make boards these days, but most specialize in ITX (and at least on the ITX boards, they use solid polymers only).

Biostar and ECS are junk IMO.

Not all of them... and hardly any more than ASUS... at least when comparing some of their older generation boards.

If you ask me, Intel motherboards are the true junk - crappy locked down BIOS options and crappy CPU VRM.

I prefer MSI boards. From the low end $50 boards to the high end $300 boards they have never let me down and seem to have the least "weird" issues (suddenly not booting, PCI-E slots dying, memory slots failing, intermittent no-POST) that I've seen/had/heard of on Gigabyte, ASRock, Asus, etc.

Same here.
And I've never seen an MSI with a hot-running CPU VRM... much less overheated.

[c_hegge]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Not all of them... and hardly any more than ASUS... at least when comparing some of their older generation boards.

ASUS are complete junk too IMO, so that's not saying much. They don't often get hot VRMs or even bad caps. They just die for no apparent reason. I've actually had pretty good experiences with Intel boards, though. Some of the 945 boards did indeed have issues with hot running VRMs (which is nothing that a mod like this can't fix), but when they didn't blow the VRMs up (and you didn't feel the need to OC), they were actually pretty reliable.

Same here.
And I've never seen an MSI with a hot-running CPU VRM... much less overheated.

Yeah, I don't mind MSI. They are my second preference after Gigabyte.

[Wester547]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

If you ask me, Intel motherboards are the true junk - crappy locked down BIOS options and crappy CPU VRM.

Well, that CPU VRM may be crappy for a Prescott or Pentium D, but who honestly ever wanted those CPUs for anything other than to cook dinner, even ten years ago?

Intel (Foxconn or Flextronics, but later on actually Asus or possibly Pegatron to be studious, which contradicts the next statement...) boards aren't great but I would say they are better than Asus, ASRock, and ECS, at least in way of stability. Hot running VRMs and locked BIOSes weren't their only issue. With some of the 845 and 865/875 series boards, Intel, in their infinite wisdom, thought it prudent to sacrifice ESD tolerance in the ICH4 and ICH5 southbridge in order to upkeep the high speed signal integrity of USB 2.0 (and ship chipsets without overcurrent protection whilst at it). This meant that "hot plugging" USB devices, especially into the front ports which often weren't "grounded" to anything but "plastic", would kill the southbridge chipsets very quickly by way of ESD (Intel did respond by shipping chipsets with improved ESD tolerance), and to add insult to injury, many motherboard OEMs (*cough* ASUS *cough*) would omit the necessary protections for the front ports in order to pinch pennies. When the southbridges failed, they would get extremely hot, latch, and that would be the end of the board (at least in a way - BGA packages are a nightmare to work with).

Same here.
And I've never seen an MSI with a hot-running CPU VRM... much less overheated.

MSI boards with hot running regulators certainly exist, at least linear regulators:

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/showpo...07&postcount=1

[momaka]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Well, that CPU VRM may be crappy for a Prescott or Pentium D, but who honestly ever wanted those CPUs for anything other than to cook dinner, even ten years ago?

I have one board that struggles even with a low-end C2D.

Also, in my experience, Intel boards tend to be more picky about RAM - especially no name stuff. Although, that probably has to do with the fact that those cheap RAM sticks usually can't run at their advertised speeds too well.

[pfrcom]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Intel boards tend to be more picky about RAM - especially no name stuff

+1

I've had an Intel Slot1 board complain during POST about SPD on a NoName PC100 or PC133 DIMM

[Wester547]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

I have one board that struggles even with a low-end C2D.

They must have really underspec'd it in order for a low-end C2D to heat the VRM up. I'm thinking three FETs per phase, two phase, two chokes, very small copper pads, all free standing FETs...

Also, in my experience, Intel boards tend to be more picky about RAM - especially no name stuff. Although, that probably has to do with the fact that those cheap RAM sticks usually can't run at their advertised speeds too well.

In a way, I don't blame the board for only accepting "good" brands. Now if only it were the same way for crappy PSUs.

[shovenose]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

Now if only it were the same way for crappy PSUs.

Yes! A sort of verification chip that PSU manufacturers could only put in if they passed a safety inspection and 100% load test. No chip = no turn on.

[kc8adu]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

that would get faked quickly like everything else.

Yes! A sort of verification chip that PSU manufacturers could only put in if they passed a safety inspection and 100% load test. No chip = no turn on.

[ratdude747]

Re: Gone but not forgotten

that would get faked quickly like everything else.

Like the chips in lightning cables... or the infamous NES cartige lockout chips...