Hello McFly! Attn HARDOCP the BFG motherboard is a Chaintech board!

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Diseaseboy

[H]ard|Gawd
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Good article about BFGRNF4U motherboard, however I think credit should be due to the right company. The BFG board is nothing more than a rebadged Chaintech VNF4 Ultra ZENITH VE with a fancy fan- although I think Chaintech now includeds a fan in their current revision. The Chaintech was one of the first Nforce4 boards available and has gathered good reviews from hardware sights and users. It seems you guys in so caught up in proclaiming BFG's greatness that you were totally blinded by this. You guys disappoint me :(
 
I swear it looked like a Chaintech board judging from the ATX power connection placement and the nF4 heatsink. Good eye.

I don't like the layout.
 
This was actually mentioned here on the forums months ago when I was looking at it. Surprised it did not get mentioned by the staff, guess just a minor overlook I guess. You still get a good "out of the box" review. It seems as if this board is a bit of a "dip your toe in the water" deal, which is why its currently being leaked out of Chumbo only, and why it wasn't heralded as the second coming of Christ by BFG and blasted out to every review site on the planet. There certainly is not anything overly impressive for the price, which Kyle pointed out. Still a good review though...and there certainly isn't any bias toward it since if he mentioned it off the bat you might have a skewed review. ;)
 
They also need to edit the review or post a followup: the board is currently available from online vendors (Newegg and ZZF for example) for $129/shipped. Many people reading the review will see the mention of it costing $179 and be scared off.
 
The BFG board goes for $125 at Newegg and the Chaintech goes for $86 at Newegg also. So why pay $40 more for the same exact board.

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Diseaseboy said:
Good article about BFGRNF4U motherboard, however I think credit should be due to the right company. The BFG board is nothing more than a rebadged Chaintech VNF4 Ultra ZENITH VE with a fancy fan- although I think Chaintech now includeds a fan in their current revision. The Chaintech was one of the first Nforce4 boards available and has gathered good reviews from hardware sights and users. It seems you guys in so caught up in proclaiming BFG's greatness that you were totally blinded by this. You guys disappoint me :(
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Yes, the board was built by Chaintech. That does not mean it is the SAME board. Actually I tested the first Chaintech board and it will not compare to this board in terms of stability.

Maybe you would be better off asking questions instead of offering half baked accusations?
 
ir0nw0lf said:
They also need to edit the review or post a followup: the board is currently available from online vendors (Newegg and ZZF for example) for $129/shipped. Many people reading the review will see the mention of it costing $179 and be scared off.
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Thanks, I was not aware of this. My thoughts were written a bit over a month ago. I will change this now.
 
Bio-Hazard said:
The BFG board goes for $125 at Newegg and the Chaintech goes for $86 at Newegg also. So why pay $40 more for the same exact board.
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So outside of a picture that shows the same component layout, how do you know they are "the exact same board" and I am not even going to touch on 3 year warranty and 24/7 support from BFG?
 
Syndicated_Death said:
Is this by chance an Nvidia reference design? wouldn't suprise me as alot of the Nvidia based vid cards are pretty much all reference design
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I dont recall off hand, but I would guess that no it is not and I dont have the ref board anymore. In fact, I dont think I ever had a single x16 PCIe NF4U....
 
Diseaseboy said:
"BFG chose to design their initial motherboard on the popular NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra chipset"

"For their first retail board, BFG did a knockout job with component placement"

"BFG chose to include the following ports in the BFGRNF4U’s rear panel: PS/2 keyboard and mouse ports; 2 com ports and a parallel port; 4 USB 2.0 ports; 1 NVIDIA Gigabit LAN Ethernet port; and 6 analogue audio ports."

So you mean to tell me that someone wouldn't read this and think BFG did the designing, enginerring, etc exculsively for the board. BFG didn't "chose" to do anything- Chaintech did. FYI- the BFG board came out at the same time Chaintech released an updated revision of their board with a fan/heatsink on the chipset and after many bios revisions. They are the same board and if you test the latest Chaintech with the BFG I'll bet you'll see no difference. Your review gives the false impression that this is an exclusive BFG product from the ground up- it isn't. That is my point. Do you think Motor Trend could get away with reviewing GM's Pontiac Vibe and give all the accolades to GM for their design and engineering without acknowledging that Toyota actually helped designed and assemble the car and sells their own version of the car (Matrix)? It would be irresponsible journalism if they did.
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Thanks for your thoughts, we stand by all of our statements.
 
BTW i have to side with Kyle on this because even though they are the same PCB the brands choose thie own add-ons for the board and have their own bios revisions usually. Kyle may miss a few things, hell he is human - any one of us might miss a few things here and there. But if you were to review a GM car that was Pontiac and Chevy with the same body style but slighty different molding/add-ons you still title the review with the appropriate names (EG: Pontiac Sunbird VS. Chevy Cavalier). It might have helped to know if the board was a chaintech board concerning the basic PCB, but there have been other boards that have been rebagged (and video cards) with just a few add-ons and color variations or a different fan, but you still do a review with the name brand that is on the mobo and you hold that company accountable for the stability, overclockability of the board. Was kyle supposed to give props to Chaintech for superb nice overclockability of the board? At least BFG did implement their own chipset cooler on it which is probably what gave it stability under higher clocks. And BFG does have a nice warranty (3 years).
 
I would pay the extra 40.00 for the warranty and the technical support.

I called at 22:00 one night and actually talk to a live person and wasn't on hold for 2 hrs. I had an RMA number after a few t/s procedures. BFG is one of the better companies on its tech/customer support. Until they prove other wise I will be a BFG supporter for life.. just as I'm a Newegg supporter.
 
actually the bios looks (from what I can see of these pics) like it might be the only thing that makes these 2 different.. in the pic I see here they even seem to be using the same ICs, so yeah that's my observation.
 
That ATX connector placement is the deal-breaker for me. Why Epox and others continue to put the ATX near the I/O baffles me.
 
Torquemada XP said:
That ATX connector placement is the deal-breaker for me. Why Epox and others continue to put the ATX near the I/O baffles me.
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i know what you mean.. used to have an Msi board with the plugs higher up on the board.. my wires wouldnt even had fit if i had that board
 
Diseaseboy said:
"BFG chose to design their initial motherboard on the popular NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra chipset"

"For their first retail board, BFG did a knockout job with component placement"

"BFG chose to include the following ports in the BFGRNF4U’s rear panel: PS/2 keyboard and mouse ports; 2 com ports and a parallel port; 4 USB 2.0 ports; 1 NVIDIA Gigabit LAN Ethernet port; and 6 analogue audio ports."

So you mean to tell me that someone wouldn't read this and think BFG did the designing, enginerring, etc exculsively for the board. BFG didn't "chose" to do anything- Chaintech did. FYI- the BFG board came out at the same time Chaintech released an updated revision of their board with a fan/heatsink on the chipset and after many bios revisions. They are the same board and if you test the latest Chaintech with the BFG I'll bet you'll see no difference. Your review gives the false impression that this is an exclusive BFG product from the ground up- it isn't. That is my point. Do you think Motor Trend could get away with reviewing GM's Pontiac Vibe and give all the accolades to GM for their design and engineering without acknowledging that Toyota actually helped designed and assemble the car and sells their own version of the car (Matrix)? It would be irresponsible journalism if they did.
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I agree 100%, it could be very misleading. it would be a good PR move to say "whoooops" we goofed this one, our bad.
 
Torquemada XP said:
That ATX connector placement is the deal-breaker for me. Why Epox and others continue to put the ATX near the I/O baffles me.
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Closer to the board voltage regulators. You'll notice the square four-pin +12V connector nearby where the CPU gets it's power.
 
I wonder if there are any problems with the venice core like some others are/were having? Also , just how much of a pain is it for the ATX plug to be where it is?
 
Steel Chicken said:
I agree 100%, it could be very misleading. it would be a good PR move to say "whoooops" we goofed this one, our bad.
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We did not goof on anything. I am always more than happy to lay it on the line when we screw up but we have done nothing even close to wrong here. We have mislead no one. Chaintech is not going to have anything to do with the product when you need service or support. It is BFG's baby.

Some of you seem to think that a PCB layout that looks the same makes the products the same and you could not be more wrong.

You would think this is the first instance of one brand name coming out the doors of another brand's factory and the fact of the matter is that it is common place in Taiwan and China. I have no idea why it should be any different with this product. They have their OWN SPECS, it is their product. That simple.
 
Dudeyourlame said:
i know what you mean.. used to have an Msi board with the plugs higher up on the board.. my wires wouldnt even had fit if i had that board
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All the power handling circuitry is prolly right there. shorter traces => less interference/resistance often means better stability
 
SupaMan said:
All the power handling circuitry is prolly right there. shorter traces => less interference/resistance often means better stability
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There are a huge amount of things that can be done to a motherboard that are costly, but can give great leaps in stability. Spending an extra $5 on a motherboard can seperate the men from the boys and many times the difference is not easily identifiable by an engineer's eye. If it were so simple, everyone would make good motherboards and there would be no need for sites like HardOCP....
 
Bio-Hazard said:
The BFG board goes for $125 at Newegg and the Chaintech goes for $86 at Newegg also. So why pay $40 more for the same exact board.

13-152-049-02.JPG

13-189-001-02.JPG
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Yeah I mentioned this when the BFG first circled being that I bought a chaintech as one of the first nf4 boards out. Even at BFG's site, you just know a picture of your board when you see one even if it's made blue!!! Ah well no real foul on [H] just that there is really no reason for $40 more. I have another chaintech, a newer one because I toasted mine... they even have a HSF on the nb that looks a lot like the BFG one now :D I'd post a pic but last contender is on! Must go....

edit: now I read the whole thread. I dunno but my chaintech's can run like that with a new BIOS. How many boards are even narrow like this? If my chaintech was hooked up I'd put a BFG bios on it no problem. If I had the BFG in hand I'd like to look over it closely to find some differences, even if it's just the caps, this would certainly add to the discussion. Because otherwise I'm not so sure their is any secret sauce in a bluer BFG. I mean any difference at all?
 
eek this place is fired up :D

So as I type this I have a chaintech motherboard that looks like the BFG board, the board is sitting on the desk next to me dead... had power didnt want to post. emailed chaintech support a while ago and still waiting for a response, other than the automated "we are busy so your gonna have to wait your turn".



Ill take the 24hour support and 3 year warrenty for 40 alex :)
 
imho i dont see how hardocp was misleading. they got a product reviewed it and posted results. if you think/know its a rebagged chaintech thats something to take up with bfg.what point would there be for hardocp to point out its a rebagged chaintech? there isent. it wasnt hardocps job to point it out. :)
 
Also, there's a big difference between "rebadged", and "took a design and reworked it in ways that may or may not be visible to the naked eye". Add in warranty, support, different bios, and bling factor (some people really care about this stuff.....not I, but....), and that might warrant $40, especially when you factor in that it MAY run faster than current revisions by chaintech.

When will people learn to read a whole thread before posting? When will people learn to not judge a book by its cover?
 
I find it truly sad that some of you think that because something looks the same it is the same.


I stand by our review 100%. I have answered the thread starters observations repeatedly and will not be repeating myself again.
 
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