DON'T BUY MSI PRO2A

[oaydin]

Listen me folks. I'm one of those that like to spend my money for computer. I have lot's of friends so that I can buy something I want to try and can sell then. For 6 years I tried lots of mobos. I must mention that MSI PRO is the biggest dissapointment for me. If I hadn't live with KT7 for 2 weeks, I wouldn't know that MSI is that bad. Do u thing it's more stable than abit????
Nope. It's far away from stability if u concern to abit. Multiplier??????
It worked for a week now it doesnt. No pencil problem bc my duron multipliers work great with KT7, just tried 3 hours ago. I feel very angry at the moment, from now on I won't believe to any review site. just for a opinion if that I know something about overclocking n tweaking . check this out it's a bit old, just for a opinion to u. I'm not using immersion at the moment. I will, when I feel that everything is ok. I'm using alpha pep66 now. Even tried a water jacket with a chilled water to see if there is something with heat. With abit my duron was stable @ 1140, 114x10. With msi? lolol only 1070 107*10. Also it wasn't stable. With gts @ 235/420 and with fastest ram tweaks abit gives 8200 3dmark result, msi locks at 7458. Now I'm thinking to give MSI as a gift to someone. I can't want money for it. lolol
Believe me folks, I don't have anything to flatter abit. This is just real world results. If u have KT7 don't sell it. U have the best mobo for now.

 

[pugh]

Oh plz,just your bad mishap,one opinion...my MSI works subperb....you cant judge all MSI for one board..

 

[PCComp]

I don't understand your intent of post. Are you trying to express you opinion about the MSI K7T Pro2A motherboard, or are you simply looking for enemies and a flame war? Many users in the forum are former KT7 users. They have migrated to the K7T Pro2A looking for something the KT7 couldn't offer, stability! Beyond stability, MSI also offers customer service, quality control and lower prices. Each of these strengths are Abit's weakness. True, Abit make a slightly faster motherboard, but undoubtedly MSI makes a better motherboard.

 

[jsbush]

PCComp: The Abit KT7 is VERY very very stable.

 

[Subversal]

Heh... glad to hear it Jason I like my KT7 but it isn't for everybody. I know if I used Jason's KT7 instead of buying a K7T pro2-A for a friend I'd be getting a lot more help calls.

 

[oaydin]

I'm not looking for enemies or a war. I just express my feelings. I do bc there are lots of and will be folks that may buy MSI bc of posts made here. I don't think no one thinks about extra 30$, everyone here would accept that if one motherboard is better it's logical to give +30. I may accept that msi has better quality check, but what then?????
Didn't abit change your problematic products?. And u still talking about stability. Even my grandmom can be stable as much as MSI if she would cycle that slow. I'm not saying msi is a board that unpossible to live with. But it's not that good, I'm sure that if anand wouldn't tell it's the most stable board even u wouldn't be using msi.....

 

[thai]

i would have to agree with you there.

i have 3 socket a board, 2 asus and one msi. the pro2 is not that good like anandtech henry kuo have been raving about it.

 

[Wiplash]

Well I would not say all the boards are bad considering all the good reviews and the way many peole have been ranting about them on other fourms. Plus Alienware use the K7T PRO series and they have very high standards on parts that go into their system. Plus your always going to have a few bad boards and people unhappy with them.

 

[FoolGuy]

I believe the YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY phrase is appropriate here.
I've had the same problem with my Abit KT7-Raid as you are raving about your MSI Board.

 

[Mem]

First about Abit, (Yes I`ve owned one in the past)they have problably the Worst RMA of any well know board manufacturer,also MSI use higher quality parts then Abit in their boards,my old Abit board used to have the odd crash or BSOD (about 2 or 3 a month)so not too bad,but my new MSI K7T PRO is rock solid much better on Stability,just because you had a bad experience does not mean the boards are bad or should not be purchased.

I even had a AMD processor go faulty after 6 weeks you don`t see me blaming AMD.

Btw did you set the board up right also did you do a clean install? I bet there is a reason for why you are having problems with your MSI board,99% fo owners have there MSI boards working great, you are probably the odd 1% that don`t.

 

[gittyup]

Long live the MSI K7T Pro2A......................

 

[shiner]

I think more often than not the people that have problem with a new motherboard just didn't set it up correctly. Either that or they tried to wedge the board into an existing install of Windows without first cleaning out any motherboard related devices from their device manager.

I used to be one of those nothing but Abit people but after 3 bad experiences with them I decided to try the MSI K7T Pro2A based on several positive posts I read here and a BUNCH or research I did. I have to say that even though I was a bit tenative about VIA chipsets, along with being an Abit guy I was also a rah rah Intel all the way guy, but after building my system with the MSI board I have nothing but praise for it. VIA, or any non Intel chipset for that matter, will never be 100% compatible with most things since this is an Intel dominated world(for now anyway) but VIA has improved vastly since my last experince with them. I have yet to have a system lockup or crash with this board and my T-Bird.

I guess what I'm trying to say is...

When you see 99.9% of the posts on a forum, such as this, that reflect in a positive light on a particular product you can bet that it is a damn good product. Most of us here have been dealing with hardware for quite some time and know what we are doing. We are also much harder on systems than your average user so when a majority of us come out and praise something you would probably be well advised to listen and learn.

 

[AMD4ME2]

well said shiner! I'm still in the R&B(research and buy, not Rhythm and Blues) mode on my motherboard decision... its Abit vs MSI... and a pretty close race.. but I need realy good stability... so if this latest rash of bugs is solved by the time the Turbo is out.. it will be my pick!

 

[whalen]

I've used both motherboards w/ overclocked duron's, and they seemed about the same to me. I like the fact that MSI plans on useing Promise RAID chips in the Turbo instead of that High-Point crap Abit uses.

 

[AMD4ME2]

exactly my thought.. heard so much crap about the highpoint controller.. so im leaning towards MSI even though my current MSI socket 7 board is crap ala ali chipset.

 

[ZoSo]

MSI K7T Pro2-A beats the Abit KT7 hands down, especially when it comes to stability. I had and still have my Abit board, but won't use it. It gave me too much trouble in the last 2 weeks I used it. If you read this bbs and other bbs, ALOT of other people are having terrible troubles with there Abit board. The few problems that people are having with there MSI boards are VERY minimal, and basically have to do with setting them up, or they didn't do a clean install, etc. etc.

My MSI runs GREAT and overclocks alot better then my Abit did and runs stable as a rock.

Just my 2 cents

 

[Xylor]

Complaining because one board you own doesn't overclock as well as another?! All these overclocking problems people have just astound me. The ONLY way you can get a good board for overclocking is to go buy 5-10 of whatever motherboard you want to use, and test each one for overclockability. I have news for ya, even the same model from the same manufacturer will have different overclocking capabilities. You are running the hardware out of spec, what do you expect? Some boards are going to overclock more than others, there are more variables involved that simply brand name or model. I used to be a hardcore overclocker, every piece of hardware I bought got overclocked from day one. The last couple years I don't push my luck. Mainstream operating systems are unstable enough as it is, some worse than others of course. The last thing I need is having no way to know what is causing instability, hardware or software.

 

[oaydin]

As I guess the stability thing u are talking about is abit's bios and it's ram tweaks that u couldn't rightly. Of course u don't have any problems with msi. Even any oem ram can run at msi's max settings. I did everything with abit and didn't have those problems. I tried msi bc I thought maybe I could oc fsb up to 120...
I won't spend my money and time again with testing msi again

 

[Jamey]

So many complaints, and no solutions. Here's one from me, all the people having problems with the MSI boards send them to the people having trouble with the ABIT boards and vice versa. Then, and only then, will the world live in perfect harmony. I haven't had a perfect motherboard yet, and I have owned Asus, Abit and MSI boards. When the perfect board comes out, you guys better believe it will be hailed here as the one above all others NEVER to be outdone (the MSI was coming close ). As we wait until that never to come day, be sure to keep posting your rants about how your one experience should preclude everyone else from buying the same product you did. I bought three of the MSI boards, and I am happy with them so far. I was happy with the ABIT and ASUS boards I purchased. I also join the crowd here saying the pro 2-a was a little bit over rated. I do believe it is the best choice for a MB right now unless you're looking into an Intel solution. As with any product, if you aren't happy with it, send it back. If you can't, choose a better source to buy from next time.

 

[SilverBack]

Well here is my take on it.

I have been a system builder for 14 years now. I run the business from my home. I have had excellent opportunities to test many of the most popular motherboards made today.

I build 1 to 2 pc's a week, I built over 80 last year. 50 of those systems were using AMD cpu's.
Most of them were during the last half of the year using Duron and TBird processors.

I have 4 AMD systems of my own. I have a KT7 Abit, A7V Asus and a K7T Pro2-a from MSI.
The Athlon 700 is using a KA7 form ABit.

My first choice after having the time to use these motherboards is the MSI board. It's a great board that is stable and overclocks very well.

So far this year I have had to RMA 2 of the Abit boards that wouldn't boot straight from the factory. The KT7 seems to have a higher than normal failure rate. I do like the board however when it works.
The A7V that I have is the 1st revision and I have had nothing but problems with it. I understand that later revisions are more stable. I however will not buy another.

I'm running my 1.3GHz on the MSI board with zero problems.

I have the following installed in this system:
1.1 GHZ TBird ( oc'd )
CL GTS Ultra
256mb Muskin rev 2 PC133 CAS2 ( 2 sticks )
IBM 75XP 30gig ATA100 HD
SB Live Full
Realtek NIC

CPU speed - 1313 MHz
DirectX - not initialized
AGP revision - 2.00
VGA IRQ - IRQ10, not shared
AGP aperture - 128MB
System board AGP transfer support - 1x, 2x, 4x
Graphics card AGP transfer support - 1x, 2x, 4x
AGP traffic currently enabled - 4x
System board SBA - supported
Graphics card SBA - n/a
AGP sideband currently enabled - no
Pipelined transactions - supported, queue depth of 32
Fast write protocol - supported, currently n/a

Devices:
VIA CPU bridge (03051106h)
VIA PCI bridge (83051106h)
VIA ISA bridge (06861106h)
VIA IDE controller (05711106h)
VIA USB (30381106h) - IRQ5
VIA CPU bridge (30571106h)
Realtek Ethernet controller (813910ECh) - IRQ11
Creative Labs audio device (00021102h) - IRQ5
Creative Labs input controller (70021102h)
nVidia VGA controller (015210DEh) - IRQ10

The above is from PCIList

The above configuration is the most stable system I have owned in quite a while.
I'm using a F0P38 form GlobalWin to cool the cpu.

 

[filmore crashcart]

Oh you got to be kidding me..... thanks for your opinion but save your breath, buying the Pro2A was the best hardware decision I've made in a long time. No more Abits for me.

 

[AtomClock]

The only thing I know that is wrong with the Pro is that it is not the Turbo... Tee Hee

 

[Vairman]

built my system today, many problems with the Rage Fury Pro and drivers with Win98. Downloaded new driver from ATI and all is well.

I must say that I am really happy with the system out of the box, tweaking begins later tonight

 

[Technonut]

There ARE issues with the Pro2A, just as there are with any other board. After an entire day of trying to get the Pro2A to multiplier overclock with 2 T-Bird 800's that are Loctite unlocked, and run just fine with multiplier settings on my KT7, flashing to every official MSI BIOS update, and many insert key resets, I sent the Pro2A back. The multiplier issue is cropping up a lot lately, with Overclockers.com, HardOCP Review, a couple of other forum members, and myself.

The Pro2A ran well at the default 800MHz, and would FSB overclock. Setting my KT7 at 800MHz to compare against the Pro2A, The KT7 performed better and is just as stable. The Pro2A lacks control over BIOS and memory settings that any serious overclocker/tweaker would desire.

From The Cranky K7TPro2A article posted today at Overclockers.com:



<< No product lives in a vacuum. If you're going to buy something, you need a reason to buy it. >>




<< The MSI K7TPro2A does not provide a compelling reason to consider it over other motherboards. It does not perform significantly better than even first-generation motherboards. It is not notably more stable than its competition in day-to-day operations. >>




<< On the other hand, the motherboard gave me at least some pretty good reasons not to consider it over other motherboards. It's cantankerous. Sure, I can deal with it, and live with it, but why should you when you can get something else? >>


This seems very familar, just as was said about the ASUS A7V, and the ABIT KT7, If you get a good Pro2A, it is a good board, but be prepared for the known issues that some of them have if you happen to get a lemon.

 

[slpaulson]

Should we agree with a junior member with a whole whoppin 8 posts at the time of this reply or a golden member and many, many other people? Anyways my k7t pro2a is running just fine and dandy.
Get a clue.