The Return of DFI?

Nelly said:
I could be tempted into using DFI boards if the RMA service was in the UK, I dont like the idea of having to ship the motherboard off to europe & wait with no system for weeks & paying excessive freight charges, same went for Epox - whatever happend to them. . .

I know a lot of people will slate me because you all worship DFI i.e. DFI is the Ancient lost Holy Grail or something, but thats one of the main reasons I've gone back to Abit from Asus as I know very well if I have to RMA a motherboard I'll have a new one shipped to me within a few working days due to Abit having a UK RMA service. :)

I had a right nightmare with an Asus RMA due to a bad flash of the bios - the retards use soldered on bios chips IDIOTS!!! I didn't hear anything after months of chasing up, I ended up going back to Old Skool Abit after 4 or 5 years.
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to be fair they were very fast but it was about £20 a time to post a board back with any kind of insurance, thats crackers when its not your fault its bust in the first place.

And I think a lot of people "worship" DFI because they normally clock better, this is normally down to better power circuitry and possibly more important more voltage controls allowing you to seriously overvolt your cpu, thats why they were firm favourites with phase users.

But that encouraged you to run your cpu on the ragged edge and probably why I (and lots of other people) has issues with them just packing up. But like a highly tuned car, you wouldn't expect it to work every day because its on the limit.
 
The DFI LanParty UT 790FX could be a good board I think if the price is right especially with the Phenom cores.
 
matt100 said:
to be fair they were very fast but it was about £20 a time to post a board back with any kind of insurance, thats crackers when its not your fault its bust in the first place.
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Aye thats my point, do they actually just replace the motherboard or actually repair them?
 
Nelly said:
Aye thats my point, do they actually just replace the motherboard or actually repair them?
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my repeated returns appeared to be new all the way up until they told me they wouldn't replace it because it had dielectric grease in the socket which is used in phase.

Frankly I was a bit put out.. these things don't get used in packard bells you know? What were they expecting offering over 2v to the cpu?
 
I am severely tempted by this DFI LANParty LT X38-T2R board

Also a DFI Transpiper is also available for this motherboard (sold separately )

Transpiper” too; a heat pipe sub- assembly, an extended design from Southbridge, Northbridge and now to PWM. The design of it is unique to any others in market. The, Transpiper servers as an extension joint to carry the heat out from the chassis. The Transpiper can be extended to the outside of the PSU fan. So that can carry out the heat from the Transpiper. This is magnificent technical breakthrough that takes the heat out of the chassis to prevent system overheat. These certainly increase the stability. Last, but not the least the thermal paste that used in our board is an advance-level product for better heat –dissipation; DFI is generous and willing to spend the 4 times higher cost than others in market, to provide the best for our customer.

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Last DFI i had was with my AMD 64 (3200), was an Ultra-D. Fantastic overclocking board! All i can say really! DFI DFI DFI!!!!
 
still got my dfi nf4 lanparty ultra d, stilll a great board and for when i upgrade in the very near future, to beable to go back to dfi from ocuk would be great.

get em back in :)
 
The only problem I see is that DFI have 'missed the boat' on numerous occasions with intel chipsets. They seem to be very slow in releasing there own boards compared to the usual suspects which leads them to be left behind as by the time they do release a board, the new revision of the chipset is released. They just dont seem to be able to keep up. They are certainly great boards, there is no denying that but its of little use if they cannot keep up with the competition. Having said that it would be nice to get a board that dosn't need beta testing for months before getting a decent bios!
 
DFI were great around the Nforce 4 days, their board overclocked very well and were deemed top-end enthusiast. However since then they went into decline, with boards being released with hideous bugs and BIOS/stability issues, and overclockability that wasn't really any higher than other leading brands like ASUS and Gigabyte.

DFI survived on hype for a looong time, now with all manufacturers churning out top quality overclocking boards accross the range DFI have no real advantages to speak of. Not to mention their support has left something to be desired in the last couple of years.

DFI are a spent force imo, and I don't think i'll be swapping my Gigabytes any time soon, not without waiting to see user feedback for a few weeks anyway, i'm done with being a BETA tester nowadays with the money people are charging for motherboards.
 
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Richdog said:
overclockability that wasn't really any higher than other leading brands like ASUS and Gigabyte.
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....that's why all the overclocking records for s775 are currently held by DFI boards right?

nearly 700fsb has been reached on these boards...I have yet to see any Asus or Gigabyte come anywhere near that.
 
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Maybe the latest boards are better... but the previous ones weren't anything to scream about from a board average. Who gives a stuff about some record set by some overclocking "legend" on XS... it's the consumer results on a board average that I care about.

Stability also counts for a lot, and Gigabyte/ASUS have that in spades AS WELL as being very, very overclockable. Head over to the DFI boards and look at the numerous bugs these boards are experiencing, a good stable BIOS is something DFI have always struggled with.
 
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DFI are a 2nd Tier motherboard manufacturer, Gigabyte and Asus are always first to release boards because they get the chips first, so early in fact their boards are in retail outlets before the bloody chipset has been officially launched. You can't expect them to Launch at the same time.

Only two of their Intel boards have been disappointing, RD600 is a terrible chipset and should never have seen the light of day hence the ICFX3200 really was a terrible board, if another motherboard manufacturer had released an RD600 based board it would have been the same story.

680i board from DFI was also a bit disappointing, surprising really as Oskar Wu and nVidia chipsets are usually a match made in heaven. Not really sure what happened there.

The Infinity 975 board was one of the best you could get, if not the best and the 965 Dark along with the Abit QuadGT were the only boards to stay on 1066 strap when going over 500FSB.

The LP P35 board is without doubt one of the best P35 boards on the market. Gigabyte boards? Yeah they clock well, but it's no surprise when they set performance level 10 at high front side buses :rolleyes: and they go through 3 different PCB revisions for each chipset.

Not enough info out on X38 LP board yet to comment.

As for stable bios', funny that because I don't remember any other board that had a bios' out for every single type of memory IC that allowed you to clock further. The P35 board bios' is stable as hell and recovers fine from a bad overclock.
 
The reason they released so many different BIOS for different types of memory was because each initial BIOS didn't work well with all the different types of memory, an update was often needed to get them to run properly, never mind overclock further.

Their P35 mobo is £165 at a UK e-tailer, an absolute rip-off by any standards, so hell it had better be good for that money when you can get proven Gigabyte boards for about £70 less.
 
Id consider it too provided they get it right, and it isn't hideously over-priced. That's always been another of my problems with DFI, they are always about the latest to market with their board,s, and charge a fortune for the privilege. By that time other boards have been out months, have mature BIOS, and are cheaper.
 
Richdog said:
The reason they released so many different BIOS for different types of memory was because each initial BIOS didn't work well with all the different types of memory, an update was often needed to get them to run properly, never mind overclock further.

Their P35 mobo is £165 at a UK e-tailer, an absolute rip-off by any standards, so hell it had better be good for that money when you can get proven Gigabyte boards for about £70 less.
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It wasn't because of that at all, the bios' were released by BigToe/Tony from OCZ as a way of furthering clocks. I'm not sure what board you was playing with, but I had TCCD (Rev2 Plats) sticks running at 300 HTT no problem on original bios' at very good timings.

Again, as stated you can run as high clocks as the Gigabyte and tighten chipset performance levels, Phase adjusts etc. I overclock/watercool as a hobby and for extra 24/7 stable performance, processor speed isn't even half the story. That might not be your cup of tea, but there is a market for DFI boards.

Granted the difference between DFI and the other manufacturers isn't as apparent as Nforce 2/3/4 days but Intel chipsets are pretty robust anyway in comparison which is why most boards based on Intel chipsets are good clockers. Even MSI have made a couple of good motherboards :eek:
 
Mekrel said:
It wasn't because of that at all, the bios' were released by BigToe/Tony from OCZ as a way of furthering clocks. I'm not sure what board you was playing with, but I had TCCD (Rev2 Plats) sticks running at 300 HTT no problem on original bios' at very good timings.
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The original SLI-DR BIOS wouldn't boot with my BH-5's at any setting... it took a BETA BIOS (I forget which exactly) to get them up and running, and even then only in the orange slots. I call that serious amount of hassle for an expensive motherboard.

Again, as stated you can run as high clocks as the Gigabyte and tighten chipset performance levels, Phase adjusts etc. I overclock/watercool as a hobby and for extra 24/7 stable performance, processor speed isn't even half the story. That might not be your cup of tea, but there is a market for DFI boards.
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Maybe so... I have to admit that while I used to be heavily into watercooling and hardcore tweaking, it just doesn't hold the same joy it used to 3 years ago. Nowadays i'd much rather have the performance out of the bag without worrying about tweaking like a loon for an extra 1-2%.

Granted the difference between DFI and the other manufacturers isn't as apparent as Nforce 2/3/4 days but Intel chipsets are pretty robust anyway in comparison which is why most boards based on Intel chipsets are good clockers.
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Agree 100%, which is why for me it comes down to pricing. I just don't think DFI just can't command the premium any more imo, especially not 70% higher, when so many other mobos are in the same performance league.

Even MSI have made a couple of good motherboards :eek:
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Heresy!:eek:
 
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