p67a-gd65 Intel Issue

Corky McDuff

Corky McDuff

Corky McDuff

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Joined
14 Jan 2011
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28
Bit of a long story so bare with me.
All of a sudden my PC has started to not recognise the location of my hard drive and I would have to reset and get into BIOS settings to assign the boot order again. Then I realised my DVD burner has stopped working, so bought a new one.

Then I couldn't get my MB to recognise this at all. After a lot of digging around I found that MSI released a utility to check the SATA ports on the p67a-gd65, all this utility does is check to see if you are using any of the Black colored SATA ports, if you are it advises you not to use them!!!

More digging and I found out that there is an issue with this board, more specifically with the Intel chipset which makes the Black SATA ports unusable.

Thats 4 ports gone! I am using all the white SATA ports for hard drives and one of the reasons I bought it was because I wanted the quantity of SATA ports.

See under B3 Stepping Ready

http://uk.msi.com/product/mb/P67A-GD65--B3-.html

Are you aware of this issue and is there a process to replace these faulty boards or know fix?
 
The majority of owners of Sandy Bridge boards are aware of the issue and there were many threads in the forum earlier in the year.

There was a program (now closed) where you could swap the boards with the potential fault (the B2 chipset revision) for boards with a fixed chipset (the B3 revision).

This thread for example regarding the exchange of MSI boards:

MSI UK Details its Sandy Bridge Exchange Program

If your board has actually developed the fault so that the Intel SATA 2 ports have failed (the black ports) then the solution now is to RMA the board to the place you bought it from.
 
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Corky McDuff said:
Thank you for the reply. Just wish mine had developed the fault sooner!!

I ordered it from Overclockers - 18/01/2011
Click to expand...

You need to RMA the motherboard.

Remember that when you return it only send back the motherboard. You need to keep everything else as the replacement you get may not come with the accessories.

Also you need to put back the plastic protector for the CPU socket. If the board arrives with bent CPU pins it will get very complicated. It will also ensure that you remember to remove the processor!

You can fill out an RMA request using the WebNote system.
 
Think I may just bite the bullett and have to get a new board to replace it, as I have been waiting for MSI to reply for a few days now and its outside your RMA period.

Any suggestions please?
Need at least 5 SATA and have 2x HIS ATI Radeon HD 6950 2048MB
Intel Core i5-2500 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155
2x Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3

Also could do with a cpu fan that doesn't stick out too much, as the side of my case has a funnel that sticks out a long way for additional cpu cooling I guess. (Thermalite M9 case.) so a recommendation would be appreciated, realise this is the wrong section.
 
Corky McDuff said:
Think I may just bite the bullett and have to get a new board to replace it, as I have been waiting for MSI to reply for a few days now and its outside your RMA period.
Click to expand...

It may be outside of the exchange program period but it's not outside the time you can RMA it.

The motherboard has a 3 year warranty so you can get it replaced.

MSI increased the warranty period for motherboards and graphics cards to 3 years for those purchased in the UK after 1 January 2011.

You've only had your board 7 months.
 
I have had a reply from MSI and they will cover this under warranty, but no advance replacement is available. Which leave me with a problem as I cannot have the pc out of action for the period of time it will take to process and return.

So crazy as it seems I will have to buy a new board if you can recommend one please?
thanks for all the help so far.
 
Thanks again.
If I am going through the aggrevation I am tempted to upgrade. But would that require a new Win 7 install with a completely different board? Could probably stretch to £300 for a MB.
 
Corky McDuff said:
Thanks again.
If I am going through the aggrevation I am tempted to upgrade. But would that require a new Win 7 install with a completely different board? Could probably stretch to £300 for a MB.
Click to expand...

If you have OEM Windows then technically you need a new licence with a new motherboard.

If you have any problems reactivating your old licence just tell them that the motherboard failed and you should be OK.

The Z68 and P67 motherboards are quite similar so you may get away with using the current Windows installation. I would back up your data, fit the new motherboard and see how it goes.

If you have problems you can do a fresh installation.

I would suggest either of these motherboards:

msi z68a-gd65-g3 intel z68 (socket 1155) ddr3 motherboard

asrock z68 extreme4 gen3 intel z68 (socket 1155) ddr3 motherboard

the boards are pci-e 3 compatible for the next generation of graphic cards if you drop in an ivy bridge processor due out next year.

with sandy bridge processors the slots work as pci-e 2.

the asrock is a nice board and there's a review here.

The only downside is that OcUK have been slipping the price up due to the popularity and limited stock.
 
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The Z68 Extreme4 :-)
Can't arrive soon enough!

Disconnected one of the storage HDD from a SATA and used it for the DVD so I could burn a windows recovery disk. Now I can't get the SATA to recognise the HDD again in BIOS. Final nail in the coffin, the Mouse has also stopped working in the BIOS screen, only vertical axis. Grrrrr
 
Gone for the MSI one now.

I messed up the order, won't bore you with the details but ended up having to cancel to get it re-entered and lost the stock that I had allocated!
 
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