Just bought one of these a couple weeks ago when Best Buy had them for $249 and so far been pretty disappointed. The box was factory sealed but when opening it up, I noticed the shielded bag had been opened and resealed which made me a bit skeptical. The card seemed to work ok in Windows but was never really stable in games, after installing it games would randomly BSOD and restart. Then I started getting random restarts when not in games. I put it in my testing rig and noticed that on startup when it spins up the fan, it had a slight ticking sound and when spinning it by hand there was a very slight resistance. Felt like the heatsink cover wasn't installed correctly or something. I lifted off one of the clips on the corner of the heatsink cover and the fan spins freely now, but the restarts are still happening in both systems.
Anyway, I did some research and although details are sketchy there are reports of others having problems with the first batch of BFG 8800GT's. I called BFG tech support and they said that the cards are not refurbs but there was a problem with the original BIOS they had and they were reopened and reflashed. They offered to RMA mine, but couldn't guarantee that I wouldn't get a refurb and it would take about 2 weeks. They wouldn't even let me buy a new one and then exchange/refund when I send this one back.
Checked with Best Buy and not much better. They were much nicer about it but there just isn't any stock in AZ (except for one reported in Tucson). I can try to hold it and hope they get more stock before my return time runs out, but who knows how long that will be.
Anyway, just wanted to vent a bit.
And warn anyone else considering one of these away from BFG, at least until they get the bugs worked out.
Anyway, I did some research and although details are sketchy there are reports of others having problems with the first batch of BFG 8800GT's. I called BFG tech support and they said that the cards are not refurbs but there was a problem with the original BIOS they had and they were reopened and reflashed. They offered to RMA mine, but couldn't guarantee that I wouldn't get a refurb and it would take about 2 weeks. They wouldn't even let me buy a new one and then exchange/refund when I send this one back.
Checked with Best Buy and not much better. They were much nicer about it but there just isn't any stock in AZ (except for one reported in Tucson). I can try to hold it and hope they get more stock before my return time runs out, but who knows how long that will be.
Anyway, just wanted to vent a bit.
And warn anyone else considering one of these away from BFG, at least until they get the bugs worked out.
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