MSI sued by company claiming motherboard flaws

2 Jun, 2004 at 8:38pm ET Article published in Tech

MSI, one of the world’s top makers of computer motherboards, has been sued by a Vermont company seeking class-action status over claims that MSI’s boards use a defective technology and are prone to fail.

In its lawsuit, Electronic Connection Services said that MSI has known for years that its capacitors were made with an improperly-formulated electrolyte solution and that they are prone to leak or even explode. “The motherboards are of such a low quality and are so defective that MSI knows they consistently fail and that consumers may lose massive amounts of information, time and money upon the failure of each motherboard,” the suit said. The lawsuit cited industry magazines reporting as far back as late 2002 that manufacturers were having problems with motherboards from a number of companies that exhibited problems with leaky or exploding capacitors.

How many times to I have to say it? Buy Abit!

Source: Reuters

Comments

2 Jun 2004 ~ 8:49pm KingFish As one who has had an MSI board go bust I'd tend to agree with the capacitor theory. Keep the lawyers away and let the market decide MSI's fate. Who ever invited the lawyers to the tech party anyway?

KF
2 Jun 2004 ~ 8:51pm primesuspect I have a pile of dead abit boards due to burst and leaky caps. ABIT is no better. Most taiwanese manufacturers got those bad caps at some point.
2 Jun 2004 ~ 9:09pm MJO I agree with prime on this one.
Almost all motherboard makers used bad caps at one point.

Actually industrial espionage is said to be the source of this "scandal"
Some cap maker got hold of an incomplete "recipe" and that's why the caps fail prematurely.

Here's more info:
http://motherboardrepair.com/

I have a dead KT7A-Raid (awaiting new caps)

And have a look at this picture. It describes the problem pretty good.
2 Jun 2004 ~ 9:28pm Spinner

primesuspect wrote:

I have a pile of dead abit boards due to burst and leaky caps. ABIT is no better. Most taiwanese manufacturers got those bad caps at some point.

I was just joking, I was just trying to add a little personality to the news post. I wasn't trying to make a serious statement.
2 Jun 2004 ~ 10:59pm Thrax If anyone should get sued for flawed boards; dammit, it should be EPoX.
2 Jun 2004 ~ 11:10pm muddocktor

Thrax wrote:

If anyone should get sued for flawed boards; dammit, it should be EPoX.

I agree. They are another company that was still using bad caps on their mobos as late as when they introduced the 8RDA+ series of mobos. At least Abit learned from their experience and use quality caps now. They also will fix out of warrantee mobos here in the US for $25, which is cheaper than buying all those caps and replacing them yourself.
2 Jun 2004 ~ 11:30pm Thrax I got shafted by EPoX for not one, not TWO, but THREE generations of chipsets.
3 Jun 2004 ~ 12:02am Templar

Thrax wrote:

I got shafted by EPoX for not one, not TWO, but THREE generations of chipsets.

I hope you arn't buying from them again
3 Jun 2004 ~ 12:03am qparadox The problem is that really the board manufacturers should be paying *all* costs related to replacing these capacitors. They knowningly used defective products on their motherboards and sold them as working products. Ever noticed what happens in any other industry when manufacturers do this? A complete and unequivocal recall. This is what the board manufacturers should be required to do. I'm glad this guy is suing, I've got 3 MSI boards I'm more than willing to shove up their A$$.

My friend had a H2 gas explosion (small but enough to freak him) from a cap on a MSI board that leaked. Didn't do any damage to anything it was just loud.
3 Jun 2004 ~ 1:12am Thrax

Templar wrote:

I hope you arn't buying from them again

Fool me once: Shame on you.
Fool me twice: Shame on me.
Fool me thrice: Fsck you, your couch, and the horse you rode in on!
3 Jun 2004 ~ 1:17am Camman

primesuspect wrote:

I have a pile of dead abit boards due to burst and leaky caps. ABIT is no better. Most taiwanese manufacturers got those bad caps at some point.

Yeah, I agree, I had a Gigabyte board that I bought in 2002, only had it for maybe 4 months when the caps went bad and exploded on it. Luckily NewEgg rules and RMAed me a new Soyo Dragon Ultra board for Newegg, for bad caps
3 Jun 2004 ~ 7:00am Omega65

Thrax wrote:

I got shafted by EPoX for not one, not TWO, but THREE generations of chipsets.

Must have been Bad Karma!

Epox Forever!
3 Jun 2004 ~ 9:58am GHoosdum Somehow the first Abit board I ever bought was bad because of the bad caps issue... I bought another Abit, eventually. The only problem I've had on my NF7-S is the (inevitable) failure of the NB fan...

I still have never ever had a problem with any Asus board I've ever owned (except for one I bought from Newegg RMA that had a screwdriver gouge across the traces from the previous owner)... did Asus ever wind up with a batch of these bad caps?
3 Jun 2004 ~ 11:10am Spinner

GHoosdum wrote:

Somehow the first Abit board I ever bought was bad because of the bad caps issue... I bought another Abit, eventually. The only problem I've had on my NF7-S is the (inevitable) failure of the NB fan...

Every ABIT board I've had has had problems with the NB fan. KT7, KR7A and my latest the NF7-S v2. I've had to swap it out on all of them.
3 Jun 2004 ~ 4:17pm MJO

GHoosdum wrote:

Somehow the first Abit board I ever bought was bad because of the bad caps issue... I bought another Abit, eventually. The only problem I've had on my NF7-S is the (inevitable) failure of the NB fan...

I still have never ever had a problem with any Asus board I've ever owned (except for one I bought from Newegg RMA that had a screwdriver gouge across the traces from the previous owner)... did Asus ever wind up with a batch of these bad caps?

The fan on my NF7-S rev. 2.0 began making some odd noises a while ago.
I gave it a drop of oil 4-5 months ago, I haven't had any issues with the NB fan since.

I believe Asus got their share of bad caps as well.
Asus has even used bad caps on some of their new Athlon64 boards.
3 Jun 2004 ~ 4:21pm Thrax I have five NF7-S 2.0 boards as old as a year or more, and none of them have made noise, or had to have their NB fan replaced.
3 Jun 2004 ~ 4:56pm GHoosdum My fan isn't spinning any more at all, I doubt a drop of oil will cure it...
3 Jun 2004 ~ 5:56pm MJO

GHoosdum wrote:

My fan isn't spinning any more at all, I doubt a drop of oil will cure it...

Well the oil prevents the fan from grinding to a halt.
You should have given it oil earlier, wasn't it noisy before it died on you?

The original (dead) fan on my Radeon is totally wrecked, it can't even turn anymore.
4 Jun 2004 ~ 8:29am GHoosdum At the time it died, I couldn't hear the noise of the NB fan above the ruckus of 5 80MM case fans moving air through all the tiny crevices in the plastic case fascia.
4 Jun 2004 ~ 4:59pm MJO Well allright, I can accept that excuse.

I could hear my fan making odd noises before it would have died.
At the time I was using a Silent Viking to cool the CPU and a Papst case fan.
Therefore there wasn't much noise in my case.
24 Dec 2005 ~ 11:34pm digger_gold MSI sued again, but this time for fraud.

Trial date looms as MSI Computer Corp. and parent company MicroStar International Co. Ltd., face lawsuit in Superior Court of Orange County, for fraud, conversion, and breach of contract.

http://www.msi-sued.blogspot.com

Original Press Release (portionized)
MSI COMPUTER CORP. AND PARENT COMPANY MICRO-STAR INTERNATIONAL CO. LTD AMOUNGST OTHERS, SUED FOR FRAUD, CONVERSION AND BREACH OF CONTRACT BY FORMER DEALER AND GLOBAL BUSINESS PARTNER.

ORANGE COUNTY, December 5, 2005 -- Dates for deposition of defendants MSI Computer Corp, and others are set to take place over the next several weeks by lawyers for plaintiff Integration Dynamics Corp. (IDC). The suit (# 04CC12623) filed in Superior Court of the State of California for the County of Orange almost a year ago, names MSI Computer Corp., and parent company Micro-Star International Co., Ltd., (MSI) (Taiwan Stock Exchange:Ticker Symbol 2377) amongst others, as co-Defendants, and claims defendants have perpetrated fraud, conversion, breach of contract, and intentional interference with prospective business.

View it all at http://msi_sued_for_fraud.irocx.com/PR/IDCvMSI_PR12052005.htm