Jetway poverty-pack cheap crap mainboards

B

bruce56

I went to a clearance sale at a computer store.
There I bought a Jetway mainboard, new still in box for $5.
It is AM3 and I had a few CPUs I could put in it.
The specs on Jetway website stated it supported quad-core up to 95W.
HOWEVER, at the back of the manual is an addendum imploring user to
to run a CPU drawing more than 65W, as it has only 3-phase power
and MOSFETs may be cooked.
No wonder it had been sitting unsold for years.
Not a bargain after all!
 
P

Paul

I went to a clearance sale at a computer store.
There I bought a Jetway mainboard, new still in box for $5.
It is AM3 and I had a few CPUs I could put in it.
The specs on Jetway website stated it supported quad-core up to 95W.
HOWEVER, at the back of the manual is an addendum imploring user to
to run a CPU drawing more than 65W, as it has only 3-phase power
and MOSFETs may be cooked.
No wonder it had been sitting unsold for years.
Not a bargain after all!

I wonder if the board is from this generation ? Year 2008.

*******

"AMD 780G Goes Boom"

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2496/2

"we lost four of our seven boards during
final benchmark sessions this past week"

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3380

"The problems revolve around the capability of current
designs to properly handle the 125W TDP processors at
stock settings or when overclocked."

*******

On the one hand, the CPU Support table hints at
the power handling capabilities of the motherboards.
But the fact that the generation of motherboards
seemed to share that "cheapness", suggests AMD put
them up to it. Like "why don't you guys make
some $50 motherboards, so we can crush Intel".
It's possible, even running 65W processors, the
Vcore regulator would end up running hot.

I think in the next generation, some of the marketing
materials started mentioning "140W" capability, which
was the manufacturers trying to cover their asses
after the previous generation screwup.

(See? It's a feature now... "Board no go boom")
http://event.asus.com/mb/140w/

I have this problem right now on a new motherboard.
Cheesy little heatsink on VCore regulator. Run Prime95
on the processor (board rated to take that processor),
CPU at stock speed, and the heatsink is too hot to touch.
Meaning it is running 65C or a bit more. I had to fit a fan
to try to cool it off a bit.

One reason why VCore should not run that hot, is
because MOSFETs are subject to thermal runaway.
The channel resistance goes up with temperature,
and when the resistance goes up, the MOSFET gets
hotter still. As a consequence, I like my heatsinks
to not be very hot. It there was no chance of
thermal runaway, or there was a thermistor to
shut off the machine, I wouldn't mind this
kind of thing so much. I would not be happy if
it burned.

Paul
 
F

Flasherly

No wonder it had been sitting unsold for years.
Not a bargain after all!

I remember Jetway, they go back a long way. Never did have much
credence, tho, strictly bottom of the heap. Working condition for
effectively nothing does tend to redefine the perspective, and 65watts
is better than 95 or 125watts in my book. Especially when you know
better than to use anything "unofficially" more. My AMD2 Gigabyte is
a better MB, I bought new for real MB money, not off some slag heap,
and though I am now disappointed at a severity of limitations for the
MB, even if I could trade it for an AMD3 Jetway, I wouldn't.

It's support chips do run hot, not to rule out an Intel videochip on
that particular MB. Nor is a 65watt ADO4200IAA5DD helpful in that
regard -- a better processor possibly involving a higher wattage CPU,
600Mhz faster at 2.8Ghz, I can swing off Ebay for $10-15. Looking at
them the other day, as a matter of fact. Only, I don't see much past
middling benchmarked parity, really, in what upgrade prospects I do
have.

Now, take that LGA774 Gigabyte and a completely different story - much
more robust, value and performance options in the Intel field (pretty
much Conroe processors). Enough to give pause before AMD3/+ possibly
for considering the next generation of Land Grid Arrays.

I got a sneaking, lowdown, suspicious feeling about something I'd
never live to see -- that Intel, price/value wise would ever consider
selling a bulk of its processor offerings at direct cost-per-umph
value, where AMD has traditionally held its ground. Intel has always
spelled premium, and that's what you pay. Obviously, I'm very biased
against Intel. It's like eating my own straw hat to consider LGA1155.
Whenever. I'd have to dig in deeper for pricing options, only seeing
cream rise lately from nanoarchitecture, and another Intel score, on
Haswells;- rather nor really, quite the deal, as much as a game, when
the Haswell processor has already popped up a couple times on Newegg
"flash sales," coupled with a MB to effectively cost average either/or
to a $15 MB/CPU: One-hundred percent markup off wholesale at roughly
$70 is how to read that go-to-jail card.

Nor, equally obvious, would any MB involved in such a sale be one to
write home to mom about. (I neither especially like a lot of these
newer namebrands in MBs - MSI/Gigabyte, & I just can't afford no
stinkin' ASUS for $300.)
 
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