ABIT IT7 MAX2 V.2 (845PE)

ABIT IT7 MAX2 Version 2: Tech Support and RMA

For your reference, we will repost our support evaluation procedure here:

The way our Tech Support evaluation works is first we anonymously email the manufacturer's tech support address(es), obviously not using our AnandTech mail server to avoid any sort of preferential treatment. Our emails (we can and will send more than one just to make sure we're not getting the staff on an "off" day) all contain fixable problems that we've had with our motherboard. We then give the manufacturer up to 72 hours to respond over business days and will report not only whether they even responded within the time allotted but also if they were successful in fixing our problems. If we do eventually receive a response after the review is published, we will go back and amend the review with the total time it took for the manufacturer to respond to our requests.

The idea here is to encourage manufacturers to improve their technical support as well as provide new criteria to base your motherboard purchasing decisions upon; with motherboards looking more and more alike every day, we have to help separate the boys from the men in as many ways as possible. As usual, we're interested in your feedback on this and other parts of our reviews so please do email us with your comments.

ABIT's RMA policy hasn't changed since the last time we took a look at it. Information regarding ABIT's U.S. RMA policy, dubbed eRMA (Express RMA), can be found here.

ABIT's eRMA guarantees two critical things that most other motherboard makers are too shy or unwilling to make:

1. ABIT clearly explains that they will accept and process direct RMAs.
2. ABIT guarantees a 10-day turnaround policy on all RMAed motherboards.

ABIT's RMA and warranty information are also easily accessible on their U.S. web site by simply clicking the eRMA hyperlink at the left-hand corner of the page and cycling through each category. All in all, ABIT continues to do a great job making their RMA and warranty information easily available and understandable on their web site, which is a huge advantage over other top tier motherboard manufacturers.

ABIT's tech support isn't as impressive as far as available information on their web site. However, there is an email address you can use if you need to write to tech support, which is technical@abit-use.com. You can also reach ABIT in the U.S. by phone at (510) 492-0968 as well. Their hours are pretty good too; 9:00am to 6:00pm (although ASUS's phone hours are a bit better in the U.S.).

As far as email tech support response time was concerned, ABIT did slightly worse this time around, though 37 hours certainly isn't too bad at all (this is 15 hours longer than last time). Yet again, tech support was friendly and very helpful in general, and they indeed answered our question correctly.

We'd like to reiterate that ABIT's RMA policy is unmatched in the U.S.; no other motherboard manufacturer comes close. In combination with their timely tech support reply, we feel ABIT is one of the best (if not the best) motherboard manufacturer to turn to for motherboard customer service and support in the U.S. Hopefully ASUS and others will follow suit.