Did I get a counterfeit Asus P3BF motherboard ?

[jaytone]

Hi
I ordered online an Asus P3BF, 6 PCI version and its the latest Rev # which is 104, made in Taiwan. I already have a P3BF which I bought a year ago that has 5PCI, but he board looks alot different.
It was being sold as a White Box and came with cables, manual, cdrom in a white box marked ASUS.
My concern is what the board looks like, here is my concern
1. the board is green and not brown like by older P3BF
2. The two chipsets onboard say Asus, but there is no printed "Asus P3BF" as it is printed on older one.
3. There is a sticker that says Asus on the board
4. Between the PCI slots the following is printed " OLI-BX3"
5. Again, my older board is brown, with a revision number of 103 and this one is 104. Also on the cover of my original manual does not say support for Coppermine, but the new manual that came with this board is identical but on the cover is added "support for coppermine."
So, did I get screwed or is a White Box version different than retail making this ok.
I have not installed it yet.

 

[Braxus]

yikes... sounds like a counterfeit to me. You can always call ASUS and give them the serial number on the board to make sure.

 

[jonnyGURU]

Dude.

ALL Asus boards, even the ones that are made for Hewlett Packard machines, are marked with their model number. And, NO BX board that Asus has ever put out, came in a white box. All Asus manuals say Asus on them as well, even when they DO come in a white box.

And what's with the Green PCB? Even my old Asus 386 board had a gold PCB.

The OLI sort of points to OLIDATA in italy, which is a company that builds PCs with Asus boards, but even on their site, they show the BX board as a P3BF with a Gold PCB and the word Asus silk screened on the board. Besides, OLI-BX3 is not one of their part numbers.

Now, Epox has a BX3 model and it is on a green PCB. This makes more sense to me. That and Epox boards nearly never say "Epox" right on them.

Scan the board or take a digi pic. I'll ID it for you (or exhaust myself trying).

 

[Jugernot]

Maybe a Tyan board?

 

[BT7990]

Check out ASUS page on how to spot a counterfeit

http://www.asus.com/company/right.html

 

[jonnyGURU]

Jugernot; E for effort, but the only characteristic that points to Tyan is the green color!

BT7990; Nice link, but there they are implying that all Asus boards come in retail boxes! :Q Anyway, it doesn't say anything about PCB color or model number markings, but the TX97E they show in their pictures is gold and those boards do say "TX97" between the PCI slots!

As for the cable package and static bag inconsistancies, I have to admit, as I'm sure several techs here that work on 10 or 12 machines at a time, that I mix up static bags and cables all of the time! :Q Let's not make that page too public of knowledge or someone is going to accuse me of shipping a fake board because I stuck the board in a Biostar bag and threw in a cable pack from an FIC! :Q :Q :Q

 

[rosarian007]

That is a counterfeit.

 

[BT7990]

smells like a rat...