Don't buy VIA !!!

S

Silence Seeker

Being fed up with the horrible customer/tech support VIA provides - in
the form of _private_ forums that do not get saved on Google (so that
prospective customers can research) and that are full of _unanswered_
problems - I am making sure now this farse gets on record.

Before deciding on a motherboard (mini-ITX or other), you are welcome
to read here:

http://forums.viaarena.com/messageview.cfm?catid=32&threadid=46622
http://forums.viaarena.com/messageview.cfm?catid=32&threadid=44623

I would have left it here, but since I strongly suspect VIA is going
to "get rid" of these threads (hide evidence...) I am going to quote
some favorite notes:
I too am disappointed with the Video and Audio drivers, and frustrated
with VIA's lack of support. But taking this frustration out on the
only person who tried to help is not the answer.

Is there a FAQ list on this site or anywhere else on the web?

Seems like the same questions are asked over and over again, and as
time goes by fewer and fewer are answered correctly, and the
frustration among users grows exponetially.
I second that. Its sad what happened. Via seems to have taken the
dictator rule n÷1: "when you don't like what you hear, just silence
it".

I agree some of us were a bit rough on fiona but what what was there
to expect?
people spend money on a product promising heaven on earth and in the
end we are stuck with a product that doesnt keep all the promises, is
very tricky to get to work, bad drivers and a totally irresponsive
support. Yes, completly irresponsive since if you read Fionas reply's
she doesn't say anything new or positive in the sense of fixing
problems. I don't know why she actually showed up in this forum...if
it was trying to cool things down, OOPPSS!

She complain that the thread wasn´t helping getting to any solution...
I think that this coming from a company that in the last few months
I've been in the forum hasn't showed up to answer specific problems
and all help is coming from private users is pretty....nasty! Old
portuguese saying: "he who has glass roof, shouldn't throw rocks".
Have decency people!


In a closing remark: I have in project 5 mini PC's I was ordered to
build has presents for this christmas all based in mini-itx boards.
It's still in auto cad and I'll only start building them in mid
november but I already changed specs so that I can use a standart
mini-atx boards instead of the via mini-itx. Quality is fundamental
for me. I want to build something that is rock hard and doesnt keep
anoying my customers with problems. The mini-itx boards dont give any
assurance. But I'm a beliver... I have plans for both mini-itx and
mini-atx...lets see what via does next. I still got till mid november
so...

VIA, what's its going to be? will you listen to your clients complains
and try to fix their problems or will you keep this "very dictatorial
like" attitude?
I learned that, after being absent from this forum for several weeks,
upon returning I see that the same issues are being complained about,
and the same lack of response from VIA is both being complained about
by the forum's users as well as observed by me.

But we've now got someone named Fiona, but who isn't actually
providing any useful help the forum's users.

And we also now have another person, yours truly, who absolutely WILL
NOT buy another VIA product again. Although my experience with the
M10000 has thus far not been as traumatic as others on this forum,
there are outstanding issues which are yet unresolved.

VIA, you've got a 1GHz processor which will run betwen 10 and 20-some
watts. That's great technology, shame you can't put it into production
in a solid offering. Not only can you run a processor on such small
wattage, but apparently you can also do it while providing such a
small level of continued support.

I'd rather pay a few more cents a month to power my PC and get
something I can get support for and not have to deal with VIA's
continued lack of attention to their existing customer base, whom you
treat (as others have rightfully pointed out) as your beta testers.
Shame on you. You've fooled me once, you won't do it again, you aren't
getting any more of my money, nor any more of my goodwill.

Like any online forum or community, you have people with hardware and
PC skills ranging from basic to advanced. One might imagine that
newbies might encounter more difficulty. One might also imagine that
such problems, because of lack of experience, may seem insurmountable
to them and daunting. Then there are those, like myself, who have been
doing this for years, and despite our experience plus the helpful
assistance of others who have a lot of experience there is simply no
way to get your motherboards working fully, as we should have the
right to expect them to. It seems no amount of experience on our part
will get thing to work -- it seems that both your BIOS and your
drivers are deficient, which you seem unwilling or unable to address.
Either way, that's a BAD sign.

For those whose systems are working, great. If you're lucky enough to
have some mystical combination of factors that makes your TV out work
properly, the ill-fuctioning video drivers function, your PCI slot
work with a second NIC, etc... then I am very happy for you. You don't
need VIA's help, which is good because you aren't going to get any.

For everyone else who feels as I do, you need to clear out of here,
ditch your VIA hardware, and go get something from another company
that goes further in fulfilling the promise of giving you what you
paid for, hardware that works and which is supported.

VIA/forum admins, why don't you lock this thread, too, and stop others
from saying what you don't want to hear, but which is none the less
TRUE?
All this looks like a brasilian soap opera...it goes on, and on and
on..and it seems something is going to happen it just goes streching
even longer...

This to say via just put out new drivers that a friend imediatly tried
to see if problems would go away on his Nemiah1K... Screwed again!
luckly we new we were working with via drivers so we took a drive
image to cd before even considering changing drivers (Via drivers and
material should carry a health warning label:"DANGER! Using this
Software/hardware can be dangerous for your health"(both mental and
financial)...

With this "new episode" i just place an order for 5 mini-atx boards to
build the 5 mini-sistems I was ordered to build for christmas. I
wanted stable performing systems for my clients...VIA doesnt fit in
this group!
How does via plan to get to sell its products when it gets reputation
like this? You know the first thing I looked before buying the 5
mini-atx boards? I CHECKED TO SEE THAT NO VIA CHIPSET WAS INCLUDED!

And the Fiona thing...some people did lost their reason going after
her. But she came with no answers at all and during the time the
thread was active she never gave any "real" answer. And the toping of
the cake was when a user came on saying that he had 1000 kiosks to
build using their boards and he got full attention! Even got untested
bios updates to see it would solve his problem! He comented this on
the thread, trying to share experience with all of us but the next
message from fiona told him to contact her directly and not by the
forum...What?! Like we didnt know Via cares more about big orders than
the poor, litle and not at all important common users....

If you look up "computer junk" you will find VIA!

ME a negative person? no! I've been trying to help a friend to fix is
nehmia system for the past months and got nowhere! Computers should
help us in our lives not making a mess out of them!
The problem is, the computer doesn't even boot when the vid card is
installed... Cant even see anything
The problem is... you bought VIA. I bought VIA, too, and I keep
regreting it. Providing a forum to vent frustration instead of
providing technical support says it all... I have yet to find a
solution from VIA for the temperature monitoring problem. They ship
the EPIA M10K with a CD containing the flitedeck utility that does not
work! It has been like that for months, yet all I hear from VIA is
complete silence. Perhaps I deserve this, because I am a silence
seeker... But that's not the kind of silence I was seeking.
Yeah... I agree completly... via blows, i only needed a mini-itx for
the project i was working on... bad decision. DONT GET VIA, CRAP TECH
SUPPORT, AND THEY DO NOT TEST THEIR PRODUCTS WELL BEFORE THEY RELEASE
THEM!!
 
S

stacey

Silence said:
Being fed up with the horrible customer/tech support VIA provides - in
the form of _private_ forums that do not get saved on Google (so that
prospective customers can research) and that are full of _unanswered_
problems - I am making sure now this farse gets on record.



Someone else has seen the light... Via=Crap
 
@

@drian

Silence Seeker said:
Being fed up with the horrible customer/tech support VIA provides - in
the form of _private_ forums that do not get saved on Google (so that
prospective customers can research) and that are full of _unanswered_
problems - I am making sure now this farse gets on record.

In my opinion, that is sound advice.

@drian.
 
V

\(\) |V| 3 G /-\\

i`ve never had problems with via's
last chipset i had was the KT333 on the asus a7v333, and 2 prehistoric via
chipset's in the days of celerons - bloddy perfect except for the pci/agp
fsb moved inline with system fsb.

now running nforce2 just about purely because of pci/agp locking.

i`ve found the via chipsets rock solid. customer support i cant comment on
though -- never needed to use it.
i`m sure EVERYONE can find something wrong with a company, weather it be
intel for locking their cpu's for overclocking reasons, nvidia for
'tweaking' 3dmark scores, amd for their PR rating system (which i`m an amd
owner and dont agree with entirely), ati for the lame drivers (possibly of
changed that now?), or creative labs for their insanely huge bloat-ware
driver's

tim draper

ps - i`m a home user and have NO connection to any hardware or software
companies - just good expeiences
 

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