Repairing an out of warranty motherboard

quicky008

Technomancer
Recently my 6 years old Asus p8b75-v motherboard began malfunctioning-its onboard audio has stopped working for no rhyme of reason.

I tried all the troubleshooting techniques that i could think of to fix it but to no avail-it seems to resolve this issue i will either have to buy a discrete sound card or replace the motherboard altogether.

However most add-on sound cards that i could find were rather pricey and they would end up costing as much as a new mobo-also i could find no suitable replacements for my current motherboard either as lga 1155 being an older platform,motherboards for it are not easily available nowadays.

So it seems i will have to discard this entire system and build a new pc from scratch,but doing so would entail a considerable expenditure given that prices of new cpus and ddr4 memory have skyrocketed in recent times-so its not a viable option for me atm.

This makes me wonder can i possibly get my motherboard repaired?Does Asus' service centers provide any kind of repair facility for mobos that are no longer in warranty?Will they agree to perform a paid repair of my motherboard?

If i can get it repaired then i wont have to discard it and thus save a bit of money in the process.So please advise whether this is doable or not,thanks.
 

whitestar_999

Super Moderator
Staff member
Depends,if it is some minor level chip repair even then you are looking at a bill of ~400-500 minimum.If you want to risk it you can buy something like this:
*www.amazon.in/Zebronics-H61-Motherboard/dp/B074PRPTTF
Or you can look for used/2nd hand mobos on olx in your city or erodov forums(i remember few guys selling h61 mobos but they are quite old).

P.S. have you seen this sound card:
*www.amazon.in/Zebronics-4CH-Pci-So...1_3?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1536257817&sr=1-3
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
Actually a dealer whom i spoke to said that he can arrange an Asus p8 b75 m motherboard(its basically a matx version of my current board)for me and it would cost approximately 5500.While it looks pretty good the only problem is that it has VIA 1708S onboard audio,unlike my present board which has realtek audio.

The problem with most via devices is that drivers for them are pretty hard to find-for instance i tried searching for win 10 compatible drivers for the aforesaid audio chipset but couldn't find any at their official website-therefore i am hesitant to go for this board as if its onboard sound doesn't work in win 10 it would be of no use for me.

I have been thinking of buying a h61 board but the thing is they dont support usb 3 or sata 3,which is a real bummer-also that zebronics sound card doesn't seem to support 5.1 audio and it doesn't specify which audio chipset it comprises of-my guess is it uses some unknown/obscure chipset which is not compatible with most newer OSes-so i would like to steer clear of it for now.

Therefore as a last resort i am considering getting this motherboard repaired,provided Asus' service center in my city agrees to accept it for repair even though its no longer in warranty.Is it going to be possible?Will i send an email to asus-india's customer care and see what they might have to say on this issue?
 

whitestar_999

Super Moderator
Staff member
No mobo manufacturer provides repairing service for out of warranty mobos.Local pc shops are your only bet.for hdd sata 3 is irrelevant,they can't even fully utilize sata 2. As for usb 3 again unless you are copy pasting 100s of gb of data everyday it shouldn't matter.
 

rijinpk1

Aspiring Novelist
@quicky008, try aliexpress. b75 for rs.5500 is not worth it. you can find H77 and z77 boards there at cheaper rates.
For usb 3.0, you can get pcie to usb 3.0 adapter. I am using one on my h61 board. I got 4 port pcie to usb 3.0 adapter from aliexpress for around 470 rupees. you can try that option if you go for an h61 board.
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
Is aliexpress reliable? Do they provide any replacement options /warranty on their products? And does the customer need to pay import duties to have the item shipped from china(which is where aliexpress is based,i presume).

I have never bought anything from them and so i am a bit hesitant to order from their site-what are the chances of getting scammed on Ali express?Is it like ebay for all intents and purposes?And how much time do they take to ship stuff to india?

Sent from my XT1068 using Tapatalk
 
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rijinpk1

Aspiring Novelist
^^aliexpress is only a mediator just like amazon ebay and flipkart. Some sellers do provide warranty on even used items from their store. I have purchased a handful of items from them(every purchases were under rs.500) and never had any issues.
Do not blindly go with the lowest price, check the seller rating, read the product page thoroughly and after all,read the comments from the buyers.
Shipping usually takes around 20 days or even 10 days depending on location.
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
i don't really wish to order anything from aliexpress right away as i had some pretty harrowing experience after buying a ddr3 ram module from ebay recently that turned out to be fake-i returned it but the seller was a scammer who claimed that he didn't get it back and so ebay didn't issue my refund and i ended up losing all the money that i had spent on that item.

I am still reeling from that experience and so i dont wish to get burned one more time after buying something as costly as a motherboard from a site with a dubious reputation like aliexpress-more so as its based in china which is basically out of our reach.

The way the situation stands now,i will either have to procure a new motherboard for my system somehow,as there doesn't seem to be any possible way to get my existing mobo repaired from any of asus' authorized service centers-and i am wary of giving it to any 3rd party chip-level repairing center as i am not sure how reliable they really are-they might end up doing more harm than good while trying to fix the board.

However if i am unable to get a new board then i will have to get a new cpu+mobo+ram combo,preferably based on AMD's zen platform,but due to my financial constraints i am reluctant to take this route as of now.

Update:Found a seller on olx who is offering a 3 yrs old gigabyte b75m d3h-but he's demanding 3500 for it.Is it worth buying or should i just go for a new system?
 
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rijinpk1

Aspiring Novelist
buying used motherboard,be it on olx or anywhere is a risk. your best option ,I think is to get a new H61 board with warranty. For usb 3.0, you can get good adapters. As I mentioned I bought one from aliexpress and it has 4 usb 3.0 ports. sata 3 is not of a much difference for normal use even with ssd unless you want to transfer large amount of data daily. I have an 860 evo on a sata 2 port and have an h61 board too!
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
buying used motherboard,be it on olx or anywhere is a risk. your best option ,I think is to get a new H61 board with warranty. For usb 3.0, you can get good adapters. As I mentioned I bought one from aliexpress and it has 4 usb 3.0 ports. sata 3 is not of a much difference for normal use even with ssd unless you want to transfer large amount of data daily. I have an 860 evo on a sata 2 port and have an h61 board too!
^true,besides the sum that the seller is demanding for a 3 yrs old mobo with no warranty is simply too much imho.

I really wish i had bought an amd cpu rather than intel back when i built this system-then i wouldn't be stuck in a situation like this today.I think one can still get new mobos for older amd cpus like Fx series,phenom etc but the same can't be said for intel's older gen cpus,which is really unfortunate.

I hope things don't come to a point where i am forced to discard a perfectly good cpu with memory,all because i couldn't find any decent motherboard for it.

Intel's h61 was originally meant for intel's sandybridge cpus-will they work seamlessly with 3rd gen i5 processors?Which particular h61 board did you buy when your older mobo died?
 
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rijinpk1

Aspiring Novelist
Intel's h61 was originally meant for intel's sandybridge cpus-will they work seamlessly with 3rd gen i5 processors?Which particular h61 board did you buy when your older mobo died?

it will surely work. I have 3rd gen i7 and I did not face any issue with my motherboard. I bought ECS h61-h2mv from a local shop.
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
^Do you have any experience with via onboard audio chipsets?As i've mentioned earlier,an Asus b75 mobo is available-but i am holding off on buying it as it has via onboard audio(instead of the more ubiquitous realtek) and i have a sort of aversion to via devices,mainly because of via's poor driver support.

Do you think this chipset ie via vt 1708s might have any compatibility issues with win 10?For if it doesn't work as expected then i will be back to square one with no audio.
 

rijinpk1

Aspiring Novelist
^I am using windows 10 provided default drivers. did not have any issues yet. not sure about the compatibility though
 

topgear

Super Moderator
Staff member
search some shops in chadni and you will get some decent sound card around 1 - 1.5k or you can try ProElite 6 Channel External Sound Card .
 
OP
quicky008

quicky008

Technomancer
Earlier creative's sb live pci sound cards were available everywhere-but they seem to be out of stock in most shops right now.Is it because very few people buy such sound cards nowadays?
 

topgear

Super Moderator
Staff member
Earlier creative's sb live pci sound cards were available everywhere-but they seem to be out of stock in most shops right now.Is it because very few people buy such sound cards nowadays?

Indeed and if one's onboard sound gets fried then mostly one goes for USb sound card mostly unless they are really into quality audio. BTW, look in Ali express - you may find some thing there.
 

ranjan2001

Cyborg Agent
Your thread is posted same month when I started having problems with my motherboard Asus P5b dlx bought in 2007 much older than yours.
Finally got it repaired for 500/- at a delhi shop which also arranged me a used intel motherboard in case repair doesn't work.

Here is my original post.
Windows 10 x64 inaccessible boot device, persistant error
 
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