xcel,
I bought a P4B533 from Googlegear.com about 3 weeks ago. I installed XP on it, and it was working fine for about 10 days. Then when I booted it up I got a missing system file. I didn't have much on it, so I just formatted the drive and tried to reinstall. Upon installation I received a STOP error about a PAGE_IN_NONPAGED_AREA or something like that. I tried it again and the same thing.
I thought the drive was bad, so I hit Maxtor's site and downloaded their drive utility. It passed all the tests fine, and I did a low level format for good measure. I then pulled out all cards, so the only things hooked up were GeForce4 MX440, 60gig Maxtor liquid bearing drive, single stick of ram, and cpu.
I tried reinstalling XP, and got the same error. I then figured I'd give Win2k a shot. Installed fine. Installed the nic drivers from CD. Downloaded video drivers, installed them, and then upgraded IE. After the IE upgrade it rebooted and when it came back the onboad NIC was dead. Said the cable was unplugged. I swapped cables, changed ports, etc, same thing. I hit the Asus site, and there are no driver updates, but there were some bios updates. I updated the bios, and noticed that v1006 fixed the problem with XP installing. (v1006 shipped with the board). I upgraded the bios to v1008. NIC still dead. I thought upgrading IE killed the nic so I removed it, no change. I reformatted and reinstalled 2k, and no change.
I emailed Asus tech support at this point (now 4 days later). Two days pass and no response. I then call Asus tech support at 4:30PST while I was at work. He said that they were busy and asked if he could call back in 30min. Worked out great for me, I could run home and be there to answer any questions or do anything. I run home and wait for his call, an hour and a half later, I hop on their site, and realize they close at 5pm PST. He blew me off, and I fell for it.
Next morning I wake up to a reply from Asus, telling me that either the hard drive, or the CD is bad. I was pissed. I wrote back asking if she even read what I wrote. The fact that I tested the drive because it's the first thing *I* thought of. I told her I had several XP cds (ton from work, they pay for the licenses, but then pay to have 2k loaded on the laptops instead). I pointed out the fact (again) that the NIC doesn't work anymore and asked for reasons why.
At this time I contacted Googlegear about returning the board, and they have a 15 day return policy. It broke in 10 days, I spend 4 days putzing around with it myself, then 3 days before I got a disappointing response from Asus tech support. That's 2 days out of warrenty.
I woke up early and called Asus tech support (Long distance, NO 800#!!) and was placed on hold for about 15min, then I explained my situation to the tech and he said the board was bad and to send it back. He connected me to the RMA department. The RMA department said they couldn't find any tickets logged under my name so they wouldn't issue me an RMA, so I was reconnected to tech support and told their database was down, and reconected to RMA and told them the database was down. The guy gave me an RMA number. I asked if it was possible to cross ship to cut down on downtime, and he said they only repair, or replace after checking it out. He stated turn around time was 7-10 days after receiving it. Needless to say, I was pissed again. I told him that was unacceptable and he told me to contact the vendor for replacement then.
I get home last night and then see another email from tech support stating that my video card is causing the problem. I basically replied saying that I've had better help ans service from untrained apes, and I can't believe the company is paying her for what she calls tech support.
I then hopped on the phone with Googlegear and they agreed to replace the board since I wanted to exchange it with the same thing. I asked about a cross ship and I was told to email their manager.
I sent the board off via Fex-Ex 3-day, and then emailed the manager. I stated that I would be happy to give them a credit card to hold money on for a cross ship, and I would like to shipped asap via 2nd day. I also included the tracking number of the package I sent.
He replies saying that they will look for the package and process it once it gets there. So, I'm stuck without the computer until sometime next week, possibly even the week after depending on when they get it, and how long they take to process it.
So, after this experience, I will NEVER buy another Asus board, or deal with Googlegear again! I've owned Tyan and MSI, and both gave me EXCELLENT tech support (highest praise to Tyan), and Tyan even shipped me a board overnight for no additional charge, and I shipped mine back AFTER I received theirs.