AOpen AK86-L UPDATE: Uncommonly Good
by Wesley Fink on March 30, 2004 1:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
AOpen AK86-L: Tech Support and RMA
For your reference, we will repost our latest 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 allow the manufacturer up to 72 (business) hours to respond, and then we will report whether or not they responded within the time allotted, and if they were successful in fixing our problems. In case we don't receive a response before the review is published, any future responses will be added to the review, including 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 upon which to base your motherboard purchasing decisions. As motherboards become more similar everyday, 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.
AOpen's technical support process is very straight forward and clear. It is, in fact, one of the best that we've encountered. If you have questions about features and specifications, the best place to find an answer is on-line at Tech Inside. Once inside the Tech Inside page, you can select features and a question, and then be presented with detailed information about your question. Many questions can be answered here.
If you have a problem related to your installation and need more help, then AOpen's Problem Report is available. First, select "Service", then "Problem Reports" on the AOpen web page. Once you've opened the Problem Reports page, click on the hyperlink that refers to the country and/or language that applies to you. AOpen includes the following countries and languages:
English (Canada, USA, and Latin America)
English (Europe)
English (Asia & other regions)
Chinese
China
Japanese
German
Dutch
After clicking the hyperlink, we were taken to the "AOpen American Technical Support Center" page. Here, we were asked to fill out a detailed form where we were asked for our personal information (including name, address, phone number, etc.), the product in question, the model/serial/part number, system specifications (CPU, Operating System, BIOS version, etc.), and of course, an area for describing the problem in detail. AOpen even lists examples in green under each category, in case a user is unsure about what to type in.
In case you do not like the support form format, you can also select the Dr. Open Center, which is a web interactive Technical Support Help Center.
Our last experience with AOpen technical support was impressive. This time, we received a response from their tech support staff exactly 7 hours after we sent our email, which is an incredible response time. The answer we got was helpful and had correctly diagnosed our problem. We decided to try a tougher question with Dr. Open. This question took several days to get a complete reply, but we did receive updates at Dr. Open on the web, telling us that they were working on the problem and asking us for more information. Dr. Open did a great job of keeping us informed and making us feel that our problem was important - something very few other motherboard manufacturers have yet learned about Technical Support.
If you still have a problem and need to RMA your board, AOpen has on-line RMA Procedures, including tracking of RMA requests. You can select "Services, RMA Services" and be taken to an "OpenCare" page to fill out an RMA form or track an existing RMA Request. This is an outstanding RMA procedure and most users will find the whole AOpen Tech Support and RMA process to be easy to use and responsive.
AOpen's RMA policies and procedures are outstanding and are very rarely seen in the computer industry. Any manufacturers trying to set up a good interactive website and an RMA process should take a look at the AOpen USA site at http://usa.aopen.com.
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howminn - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
I've got that board and am having hell with it. No matter what agp card, no matter what memory and in which memory slot, the board won't switch the monitor back on after restart. Which means it is not possible to install an OS onto it.I've returned the original board and bought another one, both boards have displayed the same trouble, and have both displayed cmos checksum error, default values loaded. Batteries have been changed, still no solution.
The vendor to whom I RMA'd the board have not given me any feedback as to what is wrong.
Has anybody else seen this before? Please!
cowdog - Sunday, April 4, 2004 - link
Good to see the update with information that AOpen "opened" up the bios options! Good job AOpen!Ditto what #14 said about the AK89 Max. Come on AOpen, don't overlook your nForce3 150 board!! DDR to 3.0v, cpu to 1.8v, fsb to 300Mhz. That would make my day, esp if AOpen also put that hyper-active watchdog on a shorter leash.
Ronnie - Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - link
Hey TrogdorJW, I also have the MSI K8T Neo and found that OCZ pc3200 works great for my setup, I tried some kingston hyperx pc-4000 with no luck.elixia - Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - link
Hey AMD4ME2, I had that problem on an old FIC motherboard. I simply pinned the power cable to the power supply and plugged it in. It will not hang in front of the CPU and block airflow this wayResh - Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - link
There was mention of a new board revision (as opposed to BIOS version). Could AT post the number codes for the new and old rev. to help us in purchasing?Thanks!
AMD4ME2 - Tuesday, March 30, 2004 - link
I'm a bit confused by the wording of the location of the ATX power connectors. they look to me like they are behind the processor blocking air flow, at least in my case they would be.Chuckles - Tuesday, March 30, 2004 - link
There is an error on page one (Index)."Adjustments for memory voltage have now been extended from 2.5V to 3.0v in 0.5v increments. This is an extremely wide and useful range for users trying to get the most from their memory."
Should be 0.05V instead of 0.5.
Pumpkinierre - Tuesday, March 30, 2004 - link
I posted my question on Feb.16(#12) and got my answer on March 30th (#13). Its never too late. Thanks for the follow-up.Venomous - Tuesday, March 30, 2004 - link
Westley, re: the AK89MAX.. Have them do the same kind of BIOS mods they did on the AK86. If they can bring those voltages up to AK86 specs, im sure hitting 280 fsb wont be hard. The watchdog thing IS annoying.Wesley Fink - Tuesday, March 30, 2004 - link
Pumkinierre -1.06Q was never a BIOS published by AOpen, so 1.08c is the first published BIOS that has multipliers. Ratios are the same as 1.06q, which is whole numbers - no option of 0.5 multipliers.
As I discussed in the PCI lock article and comments, the AK86-L seems to float the PCI/AGP up to 233, then at 234 it drops back to 33.3. This is a ratio arrangement very similar to what we saw in the Abit K8T800 motherboard we reviewed, and is much less flexible than a true adjustable PCI/AGP lock. If you look at the new screen captures you will see PCI/AGP now reports the rising frequency in the BIOS.
As mentioned in the update, the nForce3-150 based Gigabyte K8NNXP and the Shuttle AN50R, both nF3-150 based, are the only 2 Athlon 64 boards that I am aware of that are reported by respected writers to have AGP/PCI lock. I have not tested either with the PCI Geiger, so I can not personally confirm this. If you want fine adjustments for OC, then either of these would appear to be a better choice, at a higher price.
The AOpen AK89 Max, which is a very late nF3-150 board, also appears to have a working PCI/AGP lock, but there are some issues with high settings prematurely invoking the watchdog feature and resetting the frequency - requiring a CMOS clear. We have asked AOpen for help in resolving this issue with the AK89 Max, and if it is fixed we will post a review on Anandtech.