EPOX 8K7A UPDATE

[jwells777]

For anyone who has had concerns about ordering this board due to the parallel port problem, I figured that I should share my experience. I ordered the board about a month and a half ago and was quite pleased except that I had the printer port problem. I contacted EPOX support and they suggested that I return the board and get a new one since they had incorporated the fix into the newer boards that were being produced. Sure enough, with the exact same equipment, I am not having any port problems whatsoever. So for anyone ordering a new board(esp. form Newegg.com) I would not be concerned about this issue as it appears to have been fixed. As an added bonus, my old board would do about 148 Mhz FSB with 88822222 settings on the memory which I was pleased with. Now, the new board is doing the 88822222 setting at 164 Mhz. Same components and same memory, but it appears that the board has been improved a bit. Or maybe I just got lucky...either way, I am now overly satisfied with this board.

 

[greenpoint]

How do you know which board is new and which one is old? Date? Version? etc?
How can one order a "newer" board? Particularly outside the US?

greenpoint

 

[jwells777]

As far as I know, there is not a good way to identify the difference because I was wondering the same thing when I spoke to EPOX. They informed me that this was a basically and Engineering Change in the assembly process ( I think that it involved changing or removing a transistor) and it was not a new revision of the board or anything major. At the time I spoke to them (roughly 3-4 weeks ago), the change had been implemented 2 weeks prior. The CSR said that most of the direct suppliers inventory of the old board had probably been cleared out within the 2 weeks. I asked about Newegg.com and was told they are not a direct supplier so it might take another couple of weeks for them to clear out their inventory from other direct suppliers. At that time, I figured that with as much inventory as Newegg.com moves, I was probably safe (esp. since when I went to order they were out of stock.) As far as outside the U.S., I am not too sure. If Newegg.com ships outside I would say give them a shot since they usually have about the lowest price. Otherwise, I would try ordering from someone local who you suspect does not have large quantities of inventory moving slowly. Best of luck.