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ECS...Extra Cheap S**t!!

» Pros

Cheap Nforce2...
Reviews say not too bad benchmarks...

» Cons

Fairly unstable...
Virtually NO support...
Beware!!! ECS seems to offer NO support for any of their products. If you see anything wrong with it, don't take the chance, or think you'd trouble shoot it later!!! Go directly to your delaer!!!

» Review

I build systems mainly for my small business and do upgrades for freinds. I've gone through more than 30-40 diffrent mobos and have bought very few from ECS. I've bought the N2U400-A for a freinds upgrade...but ended up with 10 hours of trouble shooting and NO support from ECS...

I've had 2 or 3 ECS mobos prior to this one and encountered more than a few problems...although I'm not going in to details, they range from missing accesories to total rejects...

I swore never buy another from them. The only reason I bought this one was because a freind needed an upgrade, and specifically asked for the Nforce2 chipset under a $120 total budget...the only cheap one out there was the ECS N2U400-A as while other Nforce2 mobos are in the $80-100 range, this one was a little over $50.

The thing seemed to work fine..as it started up OK and all on board functions worked fine...no compatibility issues with a Radeon 9600, PC2700 memory, Duron 1.8Ghz and other components as it went through 12hours of memory check. WindowsXp Set up was smooth and was able to build the full system within 24 hours.

But after a day or two...my freind came back to me with a Power up problem...it simply doesn't turn on...The power supply was a new 430W...I tried a few diffrent power supoplies and switches but to no success...afterward I found out that it seems to turn on after I have the power switch pushed down for about 10-30 seconds...and after it boots up it was fine...but power up seems to be random and turns on instantly at times, other times my hand gets tired of keeping that stupid button pushed down...

I began to trouble shoot this by upgrading the bios...same problem...I pulled out everything except for the graphic board and memory...same...swapped GPU...same...swapped memory...same...

The thing that got me most was the lack of support from ECS...Be warned!!! they do NOT return E-mails!!! I asked for a trade in at the dealer, but my freind stupidly threw away the box and was unable get one...I E-mailed ECS 5times now...the first 4 E-mails got no responce...The 5th E-mail did but seems to be an automatic message...I called them and I got a machine...

I'm fed up with ECS...I've been through more than a few mobos but never had the return rate as theirs...If they at least had better support I wouldn't be fedup and writing this review...Never again an ECS for me!