Any non-Gigabyte motherboard recommendations?

[someoneelse]

I've been using a Z68 Gigabyte motherboard for a few months that just took a dump. This thing had a few oddball issues right out of the box (using the reset button would make it power up/shut down three times before it booted, wouldn't recognize my USB -> ADB adapter until the OS loaded, no issues with that anywhere else), but now it won't get past the splash screen. It powers up for maybe 3 seconds, powers down, powers up for 15-20 seconds, might show the splash screen, powers down. I've done everything I can think of and nothing works. CMOS reset, pull the battery, strip it down to minimums, different PSU, swap the RAM around...no good. It's toast.

I have to be prepared for the worst, which means crappy service. Maybe it won't come to that, but it's the end of the quarter and I have work that needs to get done quickly. I can't afford downtime like this. I may have to outright buy another board and have it overnighted. I might as well put a fresh copy of Lion on it while I'm at it.

It seems that Gigabyte is a huge favorite around here, but I'm not too keen on getting another Gigabyte motherboard at this point. I'm eyeballing Asus and MSI, perhaps ASRock as it seems their non-cheapie boards aren't bad. I've heard that Asus SB boards had some issues with power management or something to that effect. I'll be doing some digging, but I don't have much time for that today, so I'm hoping I could get some advice from folks here. I don't need anything fancy, but not cheap, either. Full ATX, good OC'ing capabilities, Firewire. One with a Firewire chipset that doesn't take a dump after sleep would be great.

 

[realfolkblues]

I recommend The asus p8p67 line. The one is use is:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813131705

 

[someoneelse]

Saw those. Asus is good, but I was hoping to stick with a Z68 chipset. Quicksync support (does Apple have that available to applications yet?) is good, along with onboard video (just in case) and Smart Caching. I could go with P67 if need be, but if I can get some Z68, then that would be great.

Doesn't look like there are any DSDTs in the database for any Z68 other than Gigabyte. Wha?

 

[powerpcg5]

It powers up for maybe 3 seconds, powers down, powers up for 15-20 seconds, might show the splash screen, powers down.

This happened to me several times while building my Gigabyte machine...

Different conditions that caused the boot/reboot cycle in my case.
1. I forgot to attach the extra power cables to the motherboard. Fixed.
2. I forgot to attach the extra power cables to the video card. Fixed.
3. Turns out one of my SATA drive is bad/going bad. Removing the offending drive fixed the problem.

using the reset button would make it power up/shut down three times before it booted,

4. If you're overclocking or you made a setting the mobo didn't like, it will also do the same thing... it will 3x try to reboot, and if still unsuccessful, it will reset itself to default bios settings... then it will boot successfully.

Maybe you have a wrong bios setting.... and the mobo attempting to correct itself 3x and if still unsuccessful will revert back to default settings, then will boot successfully. ... just saying.

 

[Gordo74]

That gigabyte problem is a widespread one that was fixed with the latest round of BIOS updates.

 

[someoneelse]

Oh, believe me, I stripped this thing down to a minimal config (video, power, CPU, one stick of RAM) before I came here. I even tried another power supply, the CMOS reset jumper, and I pulled the battery, too. The only possible culprits at this point are the CPU and motherboard, and the board is a far more likely culprit. If it's a BIOS issue then it's one that's bad enough that I can't even get far enough to flash it with a new one.

 

[thelostswede]

So RMA the board then, it's still under warranty and they'll either fix it for you, or send you a new one.

You do know that the board has two BIOS chips, right? It should be possible to boot for the backup BIOS if the primary one has gotten corrupted somehow, so check the manual.

 

[someoneelse]

The board will be RMA'd, but I'm going to need a replacement sooner rather than later. I'm going to buy one outright and then resell the RMA'd board. I need to be back up and running ASAP.

The dual BIOS is automatic. It's supposed to take over when the first one gets screwed, but that doesn't happen here, apparently. I've found that I can use the keyboard when the BIOS splash screen comes up for a few seconds and bring up the verbose POST screen instead of the splash screen. It reads my i7 2600k properly, reads the memory at 1333mhz, and then shuts off. The BIOS reset to defaults by shorting the jumper/pulling the battery worked, but it still won't boot. I can't enter the BIOS or the Q-Flash utility before it shuts off.

 

[someoneelse]

IT LIVES! Criminy, I had to do some real voodoo to resurrect this f**king thing, but I was finally able to trigger the BIOS recovery by holding the power button down and flipping the power on/off from the PSU at the right point. Then I was able to update to the F6 BIOS and get everything back together. I can still say that this will DEFINITELY be the last Gigabyte board I'll ever buy, but I'm happy to be running again. Apparently this problem has been going on longer than SB has been out and those idiots still haven't been able to really fix the problem in all that time. I think Asus will be my next board, probably a Haswell platform.

 

[thelostswede]

Dude, do you have any idea how complex BIOS issues can be and how hard some of them are to re-produce?
Yes, it's frustrating to no end when **** goes wrong, but you're being a bit harsh. It's not as if these issues are Gigabyte exclusive and as someone that has owned motherboards from more brands than even exists today, I can say that Gigabyte is far from the only company with issues. Asus isn't going to be any different and considering everyone else have moved to UEFI and there being issues with Chameleon and UEFI for some things, you're going to have an entirely different world of issues moving to Asus.
Anyhow, good luck with the move, hope it works out for you... but just so you know, there are reasons as to why Gigabyte's motherboards are being recommended here as the better choice for hacks.