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Copyright |
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©2005 Jason Cross
All Rights Reserved
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 Tuesday, May 25, 2004 |
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I've been building systems for several years - for clients and family but lately for myself more than others - and I've found that for price vs quality vs features, Asus was a great product to work with. Until now.
I bought an Asus P4P800-E Deluxe motherboard last week, to put into a new system (intended to be a Home Theater PC). I was using DDR400 Corsair RAM, a 3.2E Prescott-based P4 chip, an MSI FX5900-XT video card, an Audigy 2 ZS game card, and putting it all in an Antec Overture case with a 380W Power Supply. As you can see, a high end system.
I assembled the unit and powered on. The fans whirred softly, the drives spun, but there was no signal to the video card (in fact, the fan for the video card didn't spin). There were also no POST codes signally what the problem might be. Over the next few hours, I removed the sound card, replaced the video card with an older AGP card and even a PCI one, replaced the RAM, even the processor. I thought maybe it was the PSU not having enough power (despite being a 380W) so I hooked the PSU from my main PC to this system and had the exact same response. I then hooked the new PSU up to my other system and it was able to boot it like normal - so I knew it wasn't the PSU. And never through the process were POST codes generated.
I turned to Google to do some research and found other instances of the same issue. It turns out that this revision of the board (1.2) has an issue telling that the extra 4-pin connector from the PSU is connected, so it thinks it's not and doesn't attempt booting. They also reference that rev 2.0 of the board has no such problems. The only hitch - rev 1.2 and rev 2.0 are sold interchangably as the revision number is not marked anywhere on the packaging and they have the same UPC - so getting a 2.0 board is a roll of the dice.
Knowing this, I decided to call Asus to get an RMA and have a 2.0 board sent out. First I called technical support, and after waiting on hold for 25 minutes, an agent got on the phone to take my name and number so I'd get a call back in 24 hours. I gave them the info and told them I still wanted a call back, but what I was really looking for was an RMA on my existing board as I knew what the problem was. The agent told me to go ahead and call the RMA department and gave me their number.
I called the RMA department and got a very unhappy sounding woman on the phone. I explained the issue and how I needed a rev 2.0 board sent out. She immediately stated, no, they considered that an upgrade and would only send back my exact same version of the board. Surprised, I asked why that was, considering the 2.0 board sold under the exact same product and that knowing the 1.2 board they sent out would have the same problem. Her response: "We don't give free upgrades." I asked how they considered it an upgrade when it was a release to fix known problems like these ones. "Company policy." She then went to get me an RMA number and hung up on me.
This time I called back and got a woman named Heidi. I immediately asked for a supervisor, to which she answered that all the supervisors were out to lunch. "All of them?" I asked. "Yes, but I can try and help you." So I went through the whole story again along with my research. I explained that I knew that company policy said they sent the same revision out, but that I knew that it wouldn't work and wanted to talk to a supervisor. "I can tell you they won't send it out, because that's a free upgrade." I again pointed out that one could go to a store and look at the packaging for 50 of these boards and never see a difference when buying as to what was rev 1.2 and what was rev 2.0, so it wasn't like I was asking for a different product - I was just asking for the one that works. Same response.
By this time I was getting pretty frustrated. "So what you're saying is that I basically have to eat it on this board, since this revision doesn't work with my power supply, and though you have one that does work, you won't send it to me." She then said I should talk to support on this issue because they could research it and go from there but that she knew they would not send me a board with a later revision either. I pointed out that I had called support, but that it was a 24 hour wait, so she was asking that I wait a day on the off-chance I actually got a call back (which seemed unlikely given the support so far in this situation) and even then it would just mean they'd start the research process but would not do what was proven to fix the problem I had.
"Sir, we provide support for free as a good will service."
What?! It's not just a free good will service! Asus made money off of my being a customer. "No, sir, we don't sell direct to the public, so we didn't make any money from you." This despite the fact that Asus makes money from the distributor who sold to the retailer who sold to me.
She then went on this kick about how Microsoft charges for support and they don't when they could, so I should be happy to get any support at all for free. I pointed out that Microsoft wasn't really a direct comparison, but that their competitors like Abit and Gigabyte also provided free support, and that it was just as much of a competitive factor for them than something we, their customers, should feel grateful to have.
By this point we had been on the phone arguing the point for about 15 minutes. She then turned it around saying, if this is a known problem, why didn't I know before buying the board in the first place - as if it should be expected that motherboards made by a leading manufacturer would not work with PSUs made by another leading manufacturer.
"Look," I said. "I can see we're getting nowhere. I would like to talk to a supervisor on this." "Sir, I don't see any around. But I can tell you that all the way up through upper management, nobody can give you what you want. I can take your number, but I really won't even say that someone is likely to call you back on this issue."
So that's where it is left - with Asus refusing to make right on a product defect, acting like customer support and warranty work is something we should be happy to get when we get it but shouldn't complain about when we don't "because it's free", and insisting that a working revision of a defective board is an upgrade despite the fact that this revision is sold in the exact same packaging under the same UPC with no marking on the label or elsewhere short of opening the package, unsealing the board, and looking on it directly.
I've always liked Asus products in the past, but if this is how they treat customers when they have a problem and a solution, then count me out from this point on. |
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