I've had it with Leadtek.

[BobDaMenkey]

Back in January of 05 I bought a 6800GT. Set me back $377. It came in the mail and I gleefully stuck it in my computer. It produced artifacts from POSTing, and terrible artifacts on my desktop. I RMAed it to the etailer I bought it from. They sent me another one, that was obviously used. It didn't even POST. I couldn't get ahold of them a second time, they wouldn't awnser the phone or return my emails.

So I contacted Leadtek. It took a while longer than the etailer to go for doing an RMA, but they did. The card I got back from Leadtek(3 weeks later, because they were so backed up with RMAs, and had to wait for new cards to fufill RMAs) it finally worked. And all was well.

2 weeks ago, my card died, mid game. I was not happy. It wouldn't produce video anymore, at all, no post, no nothing. I stuck my 4800SE in and started the RMA process with Leadtek again.

Today I got my 'new' 6800GT in the mail. I stuck it in my PC, and guess what? Mad artifacts EVERYWHERE. Not just random pixels, whole leters like Sigma randomly on the POST screens. So now I get to start the RMA process over again, and spend another week plus without my gaming videocard.

Do they even bother to test their own cards before they send them back? I mean this is rediculous.

 

[TheRyuu]

/rant?

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Yep pretty much. It's REALLY annoying to have to keep dealing with these dead cards. And mostly annoyed by the fact that I keep getting dead ones from RMA. It wouldn't be so bad if I only had to send it back twice. But this is like the 4th time I'm going to have to pay for shipping to california. I'll end up having spent $60+ in shipping for cards that are defective. REALLY annoying.

 

[schneiderguy]

ive bought two leadtek's in the last two years (6800nu & 7300gt) and ive got nothing but good things to say about them :thumbsup:

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Well you're a lucky git, because this is driving me insane.

 

[tuteja1986]

i hate leadtek too :*( Look at the capicator :! are they leaking :?

 

[postmortemIA]

do you have decent or POS power supply?

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Originally posted by: postmortemIA
do you have decent or POS power supply?

I got this when the card died to ditch my crap Aspire that it had been on for a while before. Which yes, lead to the demise of my last GT or at least quickened it I'm sure. However that doesn't make up for the fact that this is the 3rd time I've recieved defective parts off the bat.

 

[Cookie Monster]

It could be drivers your using. Virus? Not quite sure, but im also sure nVIDIA stopepd production on the 6800GT ALONG time ago. Its true that almost all companies dont have much left in stock for the incoming RMA. Could be one of the faulty cards.

Personally i believe leadtek is one of the best brands for nVIDIA.

 

[Zap]

Anyone notice Leadtek 6800 series cards are the most common of those series on Newegg refurb^H^H^H ahem, open box?

I had gotten one and it was basically DOA. Search the Hot Deals archives and you'll see that Newegg had a huge batch of them as refurbs, and about 50% RMA rate on them.

 

[Zebo]

Good to know thanks for sharing. I don't understand the people who come in these types of threads and say stuff like "I love leadtek, never had a problem with them" Like that matters. Stating the obvious, the vast majority don't have problems or they could'nt stay in business for more than a week RMAing every card they sell. What separates the good from bad companies is when you do have a problem how they deal with it. Lets try and stay relevent.

OP I forgot to ask you what's your PSU? Is it up to snuff..could be killin them?

 

[postmortemIA]

You didn't forget to ask him about PSU, you forgot to read whole thread.

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster
It could be drivers your using. Virus? Not quite sure, but im also sure nVIDIA stopepd production on the 6800GT ALONG time ago. Its true that almost all companies dont have much left in stock for the incoming RMA. Could be one of the faulty cards.

Personally i believe leadtek is one of the best brands for nVIDIA.

How could either of those affect the computer even before it finishes POSTing? The 'new' card I got from Leadtek yesterday produced artifacts while the card itself was POSTing, before the computer even hit it's own POST routine.

You know when you turn your computer on, it'll put some info about your graphics card up in the top left corner? That was all garbled and there were some random white anomolies around the rest of the screen.

And my computer is working fine with my old 4800SE, so it's not the drivers, or a virus. I also tested the card in my final backup rig that has AGP, and it wouldn't display anything there either. It's not even worth bothering to plug this one into the other computer. It's obviously defective, which is a horrible way to do buisness with a customer who's already obviously experienced problems.

"Yes, well, this chap over here had his video card break on him. Lets send him the other one that someone had break on them and hope he doesn't notice". I mean they pretty obviously didn't check to see if the card functioned right. Theres NO WAY that you could miss this kind of crap. I'm very tempted to make a video of it posting and YouTube it for you guys before I try and get an RMA over the phone with some better level of service this afternoon.

People have said they've had no problems with Leadtek before, and that's great. I've read other stories where Leadtek will overnight you a replacement card that actually works and pick up your own shipping. THAT would be customer service. What I've experianced with Leadtek has turned me off from the company totally. They're not going to get my money again. BFG or eVGA are the only companies in the future I'm going to bother with. Because I know when I finally DO get one that works, it'll just break again another year down the road.


And Finally, I'm aware they stopped producing 6800GTs a long time ago. However they have a 3 year warrenty that states if no exact replacement can be provided, they will replace the card in question with the next best equivelent. To me that sounds like a 7600GS(slower) or a 7600GT(little faster, and also Leadtek is the only one that makes them). Trying to send back already defective inventory doesn't please me, and it'll only make me keep sending the cards back wasting both parties time and money on this whole ordeal.

 

[BobDaMenkey]

And no one in the RMA department awnsers their phone. This is great. (For clarifacation, there are 3 people, not a single one awnsered their phone)

So I've left a message referencing my last RMA number, the Serial # on my current card, the issue it had, my email and cellphone number. It would be NICE if they would try and do something to get the problem resolved. It's a sit and wait now.

 

[secretanchitman]

have a 6600GT AGP from leadtek and it runs just fine.

 

[Cheex]

Originally posted by: secretanchitman
have a 6600GT AGP from leadtek and it runs just fine.

Same here except that i upgraded. Ran perfect for me.
Leadtek actually got the the best review from AT on the 6600GT GPU line.
Second was XFX. I don't remember who was third.

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Originally posted by: secretanchitman
have a 6600GT AGP from leadtek and it runs just fine.

I pray for you that you never have to deal with their RMA department. No one is there to awnser the phones and they're just going to send you a 'certified refurbished' card that doesn't work right either.

But I haven't heard about too many 6600GTs having issues. It's the 6800GTs that seem to have them crop up.

 

[CKXP]

what revision is your 6800GT, A1 or B1? you can do a google search leadtek bad batch and see that you are not alone. supposedly revision A1 were shipped with a bad batch of memory, rev. B1 was introduced later as a fix.

i had a leadtek rev. B1, that also went bad, i did the RMA and recieved another rev. B1 that worked fine and later gave to a friend.

 

[Cookie Monster]

I guess your the really unlucky one then. If its not your 500W PSU, then it surely (defitnately) must be the card itself.

Maybe you could be lucky the fourth time? with a new 7600GT AGP replacement?

 

[MrWizzard]

I might know what the problem is maybe

The problem isssssssssss you are using an ECS board.

Seriously, I have a guy I work with that had the same problem, exact same problem you are having. His ECS mobo just did not play nice with his graphics card. The cards worked 100% ok in other systems too I tested them. He eventually just got another video card model.

Did you ever test the vid card in another computer?

I know this might sound weird but he was having the exact problem you were, the card even worked for a couple months too. Then the whole weird text thing happened. I even swapped out the exact same card with another of the exact brand and model and had the same problem.

You may want to consider changing chipsets up or down get a 7900 or go to ATI.

It's a weird problem and I spend a while tring to figure out what it was. I told him not to get an super cheap ECS board too..... I used to like them but I have seen some weird problems lately from them, I am sure they make some good boards but every once in a while these funky picky ones come out.

Good Luck

 

[Cookie Monster]

Actually before you RMA, do what MrWizzard suggested. Put the card in a different setup and see if it works.

 

[aka1nas]

That ECS board of yours might undervolt the AGP slot also FWIW. My Bro has the same board and IIRC we did have to up the AGP voltage a tiny bit. I actually just gave him my Leadtek 6800 so hopefully he has good luck with it.

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Originally posted by: MrWizzard
I might know what the problem is maybe

The problem isssssssssss you are using an ECS board.

While I agree ECS is far from the best company(And also on my future do not buy from list), I doubt it's my NF3 board, because my NF2 board(Also, sigh, ECS) is doing the same deal. Both motherboards have been serving me quite well and happily for a year+ each now, and I cannot place the blame on them. The NF2 board was done as a pure testbed setup, CPU, HSF, 512mb RAM, and the card itself. Produced wonderfully similar artifacts, this time blue instead of yellow on the actual POST.

Also, the card I have seems to be a B1 card. At least that's what I'm guessing the big white letters between the HSF and connectors mean.

And finally, trying to get a response from Leadtek via phone is impossible. I've come to the conclusion that Leadtek has but one poor soul who is responsible for all of the RMAs in North America, and that he doesn't take the time to properly test replacement equipment, nor check his phone messages. He's not too bad about email though. You just have to be willing to go 12+ hours without hearing from him.

"We make dreams a reality", my arse.

 

[Cookie Monster]

Have you put the card in a different PC rig?

 

[BobDaMenkey]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster
Have you put the card in a different PC rig?

Yes

Originally posted by: BobDaMenkey

While I agree ECS is far from the best company(And also on my future do not buy from list), I doubt it's my NF3 board, because my NF2 board(Also, sigh, ECS) is doing the same deal. Both motherboards have been serving me quite well and happily for a year+ each now, and I cannot place the blame on them. The NF2 board was done as a pure testbed setup, CPU, HSF, 512mb RAM, and the card itself. Produced wonderfully similar artifacts, this time blue instead of yellow on the actual POST.