Destroyed motherboard while installing. Really?

T

TheForumTroll

Weaksauce
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Oct 11, 2009
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Update: Long story short: The problem was bad Ram. Nothing wrong with the motherboard.


So apparently after having installed PC components since my early teens around 30 years ago I absolutely ruined the last motherboard i installed (pictures here, here, here and here). I returned it to the seller because the PC was crashing. Only in one game but after testing it had an error once in Prime95. The PSU was too weak so i upgraded it which of course didn't help and then PC BSOD'ed and corrupted Windows. Then I returned RAM, motherboard and CPU for testing.

I'm shocked that there's so many tiny scratches as I see myself as both careful and used to installing components. The tech is seriously behind schedule and my first though was that it simply must be them having f'cked the motherboard while testing in a hurry but 1) I didn't take pictures before sending it in since I trusted the shop and 2) I would not really have any recourse anyway. So now I'm doubting if I am actually not carful enough or the boards are extremely easy to scratch. I've look at other boards and I see nothing like this even on my old P67 Sabertooth board that have been in and out of PCs lots of times.

So.... anyone know if boards have become easier to damage? Or have I just been lucky so far? What do you think of the damages?


Board: ASUS PRIME X670-P
 
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None of those look bad enough to be an issue. Maybe depending what they are, some sensitive signal lines could have issues with the little nicks but think they avoid putting those on the top layer.

You would know if you made those scratches. I did this "once" when a screw driver slipped off one of the pcie16 retainers. Board still works fine, scratch was actually smaller than what you're seeing in photos, and damn right I know I did it.
 
TheForumTroll said:
So apparently after having installed PC components since my early teens around 30 years ago I absolutely ruined the last motherboard i installed (pictures here, here, here and here). I returned it to the seller because the PC was crashing. Only in one game but after testing it had an error once in Prime95. The PSU was too weak so i upgraded it which of course didn't help and then PC BSOD'ed and corrupted Windows. Then I returned RAM, motherboard and CPU for testing.

I'm shocked that there's so many tiny scratches as I see myself as both careful and used to installing components. The tech is seriously behind schedule and my first though was that it simply must be them having f'cked the motherboard while testing in a hurry but 1) I didn't take pictures before sending it in since I trusted the shop and 2) I would not really have any recourse anyway. So now I'm doubting if I am actually not carful enough or the boards are extremely easy to scratch. I've look at other boards and I see nothing like this even on my old P67 Sabertooth board that have been in and out of PCs lots of times.

So.... anyone know if boards have become easier to damage? Or have I just been lucky so far? What do you think of the damages?


Board: ASUS PRIME X670-P
Click to expand...
Again, those cuts don't seem too severe, but I reckon there are more. First thing you should've done is remove the on-board battery and repair the PCB

The damage is done, but, still try using something like these to repair the cuts. take your time to look for all the cuts
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32923369880.html
 
I'll look at it under microscope but I don't think there's any PCB damage outside what is shown in the pictures (not worth much as documentation otherwise) but for various health reasons I don't really have the energy to do this myself any more. As far as I know there's no way to test which component is the problem if it isn't the motherboard since I have no access to any other DDR5 RAM or AM5 CPU so right now I'm thinking I'll hand the complete PC over to a local tech and have him install a new motherboard if needed and any of the other two parts if they need replacing.

Guess I'm done doing this myself, at least when it requires extra hardware as everything I have is pre-AM5. Thank you for the link though, I'll have a look. When I got a working PC I might try fixing this board myself and sell it if successful.
 
None of those scratches look to have damaged any traces except maybe one of them. You're not alone though lots of people scratch boards up, seen it a ton in the last several years of repairing them. Typically I just put some clear liquid nail polish on them to protect the board.
 
Not to disparage 'Local Techs' but save your money and take care of it yourself. Watch any number of videos with 'Techs' repairing computers then tell me if you'd trust your PC to one of those guys ;)
 
I'll add in that those traces don't look damaged to me either, just exposed. They all look easy to fix if damaged, but someone so inclined. They're all fairly think and not in an area with lots of traces. These aren't likely to be very highly sensitive traces either; they don't have the wiggly look of traces that have been very carefully length matched.
 
I fixed alot of damaged traces using rear window defogger repair liquid. Those traces look like someone didn't watch where the mobo's stand-off are. Also looks like they rubbed the mobo up against something in the case while removing or installing the mobo.
 
I don't have the money to buy RAM and CPU to test with (or anyone i can borrow it from), especially not when I'm likely looking at buying a new motherboard. I do have some equipment for working with components safely and a microscope to look for damage but nothing to fix it with (or the skills) that isn't a hack job.

I still don't believe I made those scratches and sitting here I have a few old boards that I have gone over and they are all like new. That's why I asked if something has changed that made it easier to damage the PCB. Makes no sense. I might give it a try and see if I can fix it but I'm inclined to point to the RAM being the problem since the problem was there before I handed it over so unless I made the damage myself the problem isn't that and I found errors with Prime95 and i had BSODs after all.

The RAM isn't on the QVL (Kingston FURY Beast DDR5-5600 C36 DC - 32GB (AMD EXPO)) though I have never had any problems with this before.
 
hititnquitit said:
What did they say when you told them the mb was physically fine when it was turned over to them?
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They just refused it so it's my word against theirs. I've contacted a third party for a price to test the parts instead.

learners permit said:
Whats your zip code? Check shipping to 97216. I'd be willing to test and repair it if possible/necessary. I have a 7700X and two sets of DDR5 to test it with after checking/repairing those traces.
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That's really kind of you but I'm all the way over in Scandinavia. I will try s local shop sbd hope for the best. At least i learned something..
 
Did you use a credit card for the purchase? If so, check with them to see if you're covered.
 
only one looks like its more than superficial and as mentioned, you can easily fix it with a window defroster repair pen*. just a tiny light dab to fill the gap.
*which reminds me of the duron days...
edited speeling
 
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pendragon1 said:
only one looks like its more than superficial and as mentioned, you can easily fix it with a windows defroster repair pen*. just a tiny light dab to fill the gap.
*which reminds me of the duron days...
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You think this might be the cause of the instability? Because as stated my money was on it not even being there when I found Prime95 errors and Windows died.

As I wrote earlier the memory isn't on the QVL list and if I used EXPO 1 or 2 the system was extremely unstable. The Prime95 errors was while running the RAM at stock speed


EDIT: Repair with something like Circuit + from Loctite?
 
TheForumTroll said:
You think this might be the cause of the instability? Because as stated my money was on it not even being there when I found Prime95 errors and Windows died.

As I wrote earlier the memory isn't on the QVL list and if I used EXPO 1 or 2 the system was extremely unstable. The Prime95 errors was while running the RAM at stock speed (4800?).


Neither 😅 I already had them sent it back to me. I'm not wasting the energy fighting them. I'll use someone else from now on.


EDIT: Repair with something like Circuit + from Loctite?
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well i didnt really address any of that... but i dont think the board is bad, yet. id put your ram back in and manually set timings and bump the voltage a bit.
yes BUT that loctite kit is kinda expensive over there. see what a conductive silver pen costs ya on amazon
 
I doubt that damage is the cause of any issue you're having but you never know. We've all slipped when putting a screw in or something, sweat a little for the rest of the build, then it works fine in the end. That being said, I understand the position the seller took.
 
Update if anyone is interested. Had a local shop look at the board. They didn't think it could cause problems. They are Intel only so no hardware to test it with though.
 
Yes, I had to stop myself arguing with them. But at least it shows they are not the most professional shop in my opinion. "AMD has too many failures" they said. There's no other local shops left so now I'm trying to test with as little hardware as possible and no OS. If I don't get any wiser I'll have to send it somewhere next.
 
pendragon1 said:
like we all said.
thats kinda silly to be intel only nowadays...
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Yeah, silly. For desktops where I build my own, it's going to be AMD from now on, unless they stumble badly. For laptops, I have to look at the overall product and unfortunately I have bought two Lenovo Intel products in recent years.

My AMD boards have been rock-steady. With my ASUS ROG x570, once I got past some RAM issues which got fixed, I did not have one single BSOD in almost three years of operation. I am also partial to ASUS boards.
 
Another small update:
I have been running Memtest86 over and over again the last few days and I get a PASS again and again and then suddenly the system freezes. I have also gotten some actual errors but these came after I tried adding additional hardware (an old GPU) and I can't replicate it. One or two blocks of RAM seem to make no difference but I'm not sure. The system however cannot even start up to reach BIOS if I turn on EXPO, no matter if it is with EXPO and 5600mhz, 5200mhz or 4800mhz. My old I7 system had the exact same problem with XMP however so I'm not really surprised.

I'm planning on sending everything off to get each seperate component testet in a few days as I'm not getting any useful results from this as far as I can tell.
 
IMG_20230212_173856_copy_800x600~2.jpg
 
It happend again (haven't bumped voltage yet) but it is always test 8: random number. However it only fails in test 8 if it is after the other tests. Only running test 8 alone and it passes. Huh. Trying more voltage.

Edit:
This happens with a GPU installed. Now running with extra voltage. Just upping voltage made the system boot in Expo 1 @4800mhz, so progress I guess.
 
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I'm not really confident in how much or which voltages to change. 1.25. is the default it seems and the one in Expo settings. 1.35 made it boot and pass Memtest86 but it won't reboot and I have to turn off the power to make it start up again at all. I feel like I'm messing about in the dark. This only happens with a GPU installes otherwise it boots....
 
The first thing I did was buying a new Corsair RM1000x instead of my Seasonic so I'm confident that isn't it.
 
I see. I hadn't noticed any pattern. Thanks! Just send the RAM back to the shop i purchased from. I hope they test them enough to see the same error though I have my doubts.

Any explanation on why it happens in test 8 after the other tests but not in test 8 if done alone?
 
There is a bios update for that board that might correct the dram errors your getting with those modules as the update states Improved Dram compatibility. There can be several reasons for errors like the ones your having but generally it's caused by incorrect timings on the memory strobe or mismatched impedances all of which are worked out by bios engineers. You could work them out yourself if you wanted spend an excessive amount of time running memtest but why not just get memory that just works.
" Any explanation on why it happens in test 8 after the other tests but not in test 8 if done alone? " Short answer is temperature of the memory cells vs capacitior leakage/charge rate. Bit flipping in depth explanation.
 
TheForumTroll said:
So apparently after having installed PC components since my early teens around 30 years ago I absolutely ruined the last motherboard i installed (pictures here, here, here and here). I returned it to the seller because the PC was crashing. Only in one game but after testing it had an error once in Prime95. The PSU was too weak so i upgraded it which of course didn't help and then PC BSOD'ed and corrupted Windows. Then I returned RAM, motherboard and CPU for testing.

I'm shocked that there's so many tiny scratches as I see myself as both careful and used to installing components. The tech is seriously behind schedule and my first though was that it simply must be them having f'cked the motherboard while testing in a hurry but 1) I didn't take pictures before sending it in since I trusted the shop and 2) I would not really have any recourse anyway. So now I'm doubting if I am actually not carful enough or the boards are extremely easy to scratch. I've look at other boards and I see nothing like this even on my old P67 Sabertooth board that have been in and out of PCs lots of times.

So.... anyone know if boards have become easier to damage? Or have I just been lucky so far? What do you think of the damages?


Board: ASUS PRIME X670-P
Click to expand...
The scratches look like a non issue. They don't appear to be cutting into the board. From my personal experience with the X670 boards they tend to be touchy to begin with. It's like all the lessons that AMD learned from their previous generation with Ryzen 300-500 series chipsets was thrown out the window. I think more than likely you got a lemon. I have seen at least 2 myself.

Not certain what the failure rate is on the AM5 Platform but it was enough to push me into 13th Gen Intel and I have been completely happy with the change.
 
I already did the BIOS update before the tests.

A lemon what? CPU? I'll see what they find when testing the RAM and if nothing is found I'll have them test the CPU.
 
TheForumTroll said:
I already did the BIOS update before the tests.

A lemon what? CPU? I'll see what they find when testing the RAM and if nothing is found I'll have them test the CPU.
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I have had motherboard and DDR5 failures on AM5. The CPU is usually not the culprit. Especially now without pins that can be bent.
 
The RAM will be testet by the seller. If they find no fault I'll buy a motherboard, test if with the components and if it works keep it and otherwise send it back. Can't see what else I can do. Any happiness for the upgrade is gone which is what annoys me the most.
 
Just because the bios update stated improved Dram compatibility doesn't necessarily mean it was optimized for the dimms you purchased especially if they aren't on the QVL list. Many times vendors optimize for the most popular memory modules at the time and later bios updates optimize for less popular memory IC's. Do any of your local vendors sell these memory modules from G skill?

F5-6000J3238F16GX2-TZ5N​

 
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