Falcon Northwest FragBox 2 Evaluation

Whitewolf said:
But no company or person is perfect. Mistakes are made, even you at [H] have made a few over the years. :D It what is done to correct the mistakes that makes a company or person special. If FNW was willing to correct the mistake but Chris never let them then how would we know the full worth of FNW. I think Chris cut the review short by not following thru all the way. Wouldnt the overall mark be a lot higher if FNW actually got BF2 working properly? But they were not given a reasonable chance to do this.
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No company or person is perfect, otherwise we would have no reason to do these evaluations.

Just to be to the point, we are still in touch with Falcon and have yet to see the problem solved. When/if they do, we will update. I think they were and still are given a reasonable chance.

Again, they sold us a "BF2 Box" that will not play BF2. I tell you what, give me $3000 and I will send it to YOU. Do you want it?
 
xappie said:
I liked the article, and think that the final assessment was fair given that you asked for a machine configured to run a specific app, which it couldn't do.

However, I would've liked to see you continue to work with FNW to get the issue resolved, instead of ending the review. As it stands now, if I am considering buying a FNW system, I have no idea how far tech support will go to help me with a problem like this. Would they just refund me and tell me they can't build what I wanted? Would they offer a motherboard swap? Would they tell me its my problem and do nothing? Something else? Who knows!?? Would've been interesting/informative to see how/if they resolved this specific type of situation.
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I think it was stated several times in our evaluation that they would initiate their return service at which point you would either get a replacement with overnight service on both ends that they would pay for.

As of writing this, the issue has still not been solved as per the FragBox 2 locking up after several hours of BF2 play.
 
xappie said:
I liked the article, and think that the final assessment was fair given that you asked for a machine configured to run a specific app, which it couldn't do.

However, I would've liked to see you continue to work with FNW to get the issue resolved, instead of ending the review. As it stands now, if I am considering buying a FNW system, I have no idea how far tech support will go to help me with a problem like this. Would they just refund me and tell me they can't build what I wanted? Would they offer a motherboard swap? Would they tell me its my problem and do nothing? Something else? Who knows!?? Would've been interesting/informative to see how/if they resolved this specific type of situation.
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And yes, I would like to say that I agree with you. Why Chris did not go through their return procedure is a bit beyond me. It seemed like a perfect opportunity to test it. He seemed to think finding out the cause of the issue was more important, although this is not what the consumer would have done, I agree.

Next time, maybe Chris will make the call that the consumer would have been faced with.
 
Morley said:
I was frustrated to the point of returning it, and that was my feeling as a consumer who spent $3K on a system and several days of troubleshooting on it. At the point I cut the eval period off was when I decided that I would have sent the system back for a refund. I have no doubt that Falcon Northwest would have taken care of me as a customer and supplied me with a different solution, and enumerated as such in the article.
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This quote below Chris is exactly why you should have continued. We all want to be able to recommend good companies that will stand by there product to people that don't build there own computers. If you never followed thru then how would you know 100% what would happen?

xappie said:
I liked the article, and think that the final assessment was fair given that you asked for a machine configured to run a specific app, which it couldn't do.

However, I would've liked to see you continue to work with FNW to get the issue resolved, instead of ending the review. As it stands now, if I am considering buying a FNW system, I have no idea how far tech support will go to help me with a problem like this. Would they just refund me and tell me they can't build what I wanted? Would they offer a motherboard swap? Would they tell me its my problem and do nothing? Something else? Who knows!?? Would've been interesting/informative to see how/if they resolved this specific type of situation.
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Case in point what happened to me before I started building my own. I bought a dell 6 years ago. At that time I didn't know squat about computers. The computer was there very best one and cost me $3800 shipped. It worked ok for a month or two then it crashed on me. The tech help had me totally reformat my computer. Well from that point on it never ran worth a crap and was totally buggy. I was on the phone with them probably 12 times totally some 30 hours! I had that 3 year next day service that would send a tech out if they couldn't get it running properly. Well they would always tell me I would have to have a supervisor to approve it. They put you on hold and never come back. I guess they got demerits or something back then if they had to go to a supervisor. I hear they have improved again since that time. But this kind of business practice you don't expect when you have bought a warrantee but you cant collect on it. In the end I ended up asking gaming friends how to fix all the problems with the computer and started coming to formuns like [H] and learning myself. :p

But Chris you hardly went thru 1/100th of what I went thru with my crap dell. For the review you could have finished it thru and then made your judgment if they satisfied you in the end or not. Just my 2 cents. :D
 
I can tell you, from personal experience as the Production Manager at FNW, that this is a tough issue. Many of my friends still work there, and I know everyone there well.
(that having been said...if we could just get a winning softball team together...)

Should the issue have been caught? Yes.
It does not matter how easy/hard it is to test. The customer expects it, so you must deliver.

Could the problem have been prevented/mitigated? Hard to tell.
Burn-in procedures dictate that a system run a looping graphic intensive application (In my day, it was Q3Demo, Serious Sam or UT) overnight with no failures. The system won't ship if it fails unless the issue is corrected and re-tested. If something has changed at FNW since I left that allows this to occur, then the problem is obvious.

Also - while I doubt FNW can afford to honor individual requests for a FragBox, I know that, on multiple occasions, I have tested specific software on a Mach V system (more $) before it ships at a customer's request. It usually entails the customer asking about doing so, and they're required to provide the software.

Was Battlefield 2 tested? More than likely, yes... but not really.
Licensing limitations (and available resources) make it logistically impossible for FNW to install, patch, run and burn-in every major game on every produced system. So, my guess is that the BF2 demo was installed and tested, and did not exhibit an issue. If the BF2 demo was never installed, tested and used for burn-in, then all bets are off and the QA process is what failed, not the hardware. The BF2 demo is an obvious choice for burn-in and testing.

Also, the latest BF2 demo is v. 1.0.2446.12. The retail full-version is at 1.03. Maybe that makes a difference, maybe not.

In any case... Time will tell if anything changes at FNW to prevent this...

And, in response from a quote about FNW founder from the article:
Kelt Reeves is man of commitment, quality, and strong backbone and these are traits that he passes on to his company and its employees.
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There is much of that that I respectfully disagree with - from personal experience. I'm suprised that Kyle's opinions about him made it into the article. They have little relevance on the performance, value and reliability of this hardware. It's the employees that build the reputation of the company, and they are fantastic people. Props out to the support guys - they are, without a doubt, stellar individuals with a level of skill and ability that always amazed me. Your glowing review of their service never suprised me one bit. I expected it.

Great job on the article. FNW owes you one for the thorough and honest review...
 
As a note, we did make it clear that FNW installed and tested a full version of BF2 using our CD Key...

Thank you for your feedback...
 
More about ordering and delivering.

What is considered an acceptable amount of time from when you order a system to when it is shipped?
 
RedOctober said:
I'm suprised that Kyle's opinions about him made it into the article.

Great job on the article. FNW owes you one for the thorough and honest review...
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Yeah, I am not usually one to let me personal opinion be known. ;)

Thanks for the props and thanks for speaking your mind here. It is great to see this kind of feedback from someone that knows about both sides of the fence.
 
Morley said:
As a note, we did make it clear that FNW installed and tested a full version of BF2 using our CD Key...

Thank you for your feedback...
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Actually you simply said they offered the service, you did not state that you took advantage of it. I thought that this service did not happen from reading and editing your text.
 
The best part of this review is actually the motherboard in question. For someone who's building a small system that is based on mATX, I sometimes look at boutique places to see what parts they're using. I've already read about the ATi chipset having problems, but I can imagine someone looking at Falcon and saying, "They're using it, if it's good enough for them it's good enough for me."
 
Ok, I've thought a lot about some of the comments in this thread. I would like to post my views on some excellent points that have been brought up.

Yes, taking the support issue further would have made for a better article in that it would have shown more about how Falcon handles a return, how their Overnight Service fairs, etc.

However, I maintain that, as a customer, at the point of their offerring to bring the system back for repair, I was so fed up with the week that I had spent troubleshooting it that I would have returned the system. Period. I had enough information to rate FNW's support a 10, and nothing would have changed that. Even if they had fixed the issue I was not comfortable having spent $3200 on that system. I would not have trusted that system in day to day tasks from that point out. What if I was editing video and lost a project? What if, and I HAVE had this happen, the machine locked up without me closing Outlook properly and my .pst file got corrupted? I do way too much with my computer to settle for anything less than a product that I am 100% comfortable with. I simply wasn't comfortable with the FragBox 2.

Furthermore, as a consumer I am not a beta tester. I have a wife and child. I work my ass off and I'm a big boy who enjoys big toys. I have returned $300 network media players after 3 weeks because they required BIOS upgrades to patch functionality. I almost returned my $2000 HDTV because I was having trouble calibrating it to the point that I was happy. What do you think I would do with a $3200 computer that I was nearing the end of my 30 day money-back guarantee period? It's called risk management. I mitigate risk when I can, and the safest bet I had at that point was to return the FragBox 2. It's what I believe a smart consumer would have, and should have, done. The FragBox 2 isn't the only computer on the market, hell, it's not the only computer that FNW makes. I would have like to cut my losses and start over at that point.

That doesn't mean that my work as a [H] editor ended there. So when I decided that mentally I was to the point as a consumer I wanted a refund, I decided that I could break silence with FNW and we could all put our heads together to get this fixed.

What I should have done at that point was instead go through the motions of getting a return, ordered a Mach V, and just made a double header of the article. That would have made for a great article!

So thanks for taking the time to respond, I really want to deliver to you guys the best work I and my team can.
 
Wow. Over $3000 for this system ? That's full on crazy. Those parts alone are worth only half that amount. The custom case and power supply is "neato" and all, but how much value does anyone actually asign to that ? Support is certainly important to someone that isn't computer saavy, but if they offered to just build it, for say $2000, would you honestly pay $1000 for tech support ?

Thank the lord for our ability to build our own systems, eh ?
 
deadrody said:
Wow. Over $3000 for this system ? That's full on crazy. Those parts alone are worth only half that amount. The custom case and power supply is "neato" and all, but how much value does anyone actually asign to that ?

Thank the lord for our ability to build our own systems, eh ?
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Although we have to say this numerous times a week, apparently people do not read the guidelines. This program and this forum are for evaluating OEM pc's. Most people who will buy an OEM product cannot build their own. If you can, great, there's no substitute, but don't recommend that people build their own in this forum. That's not what it's here for.

That said, I actually kind of like the idea of attaching an 'overall value' to the systems. We have a situation right now in the Bunker where we have two very similar systems from two different OEMs that have very unsimilar price tags. Thanks for the feedback, and we'll chew on this a bit.
 
We will be adding a 'Value' category to our evaluations. This is not an opportunity to compare Newegg parts costs to an entire company's ability to design, build, and support a full computer system.

Rather, we will be asking ourselves if we felt we got our money's worth. What has spurred this is the fact we have two similar systems in our labs right now with dissimilar price points.
 
Morley said:
What I should have done at that point was instead go through the motions of getting a return, ordered a Mach V, and just made a double header of the article. That would have made for a great article!
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Yep that would have rocked! :p
 
i've owned an msi rs480m2 board, and though it is a good board, it is one of the slowest microatx socket939 boards out there. it also doesn't have very much in the way of bios tweaks (the one i had could not even run memory at 1T).

i think it was a pretty poor choice component wise, by falcon northwest for a gaming system. there are plenty of better nforce4 based mATX boards out there.
 
Perhaps a good way to rate the value of the computer and the company would be to compare the price of the computer to the price of all the parts if you had purchased them online. The difference would be the money you spent not on the hardware but the warranty, the build quality, the time saved not building, the included tech service, custom parts, and whatnot. For example, the Dell was $500 over parts but the FNW was $1,000 over parts. The extra $500 may be worth it because it's more upgradable, and hey, it's not a Dell.

So what if the FNW computer costs $1,000 more than the sum of the parts? Some people would not be interested in that kind of "bargin", but some people will really be interested in the tech support, overnight shipping, custom case, and peace of mind knowing that they have a well built computer from a good company.

Although, according to Morley it would seem that the value was just not there.

Also, I have that exact same motherboard sitting behind me but it's not in a system. Can't wait to see if it'll work in BF2 or if it breaks!
 
evenglow said:
Perhaps a good way to rate the value of the computer and the company would be to compare the price of the computer to the price of all the parts if you had purchased them online. The difference would be the money you spent not on the hardware but the warranty, the build quality, the time saved not building, the included tech service, custom parts, and whatnot. For example, the Dell was $500 over parts but the FNW was $1,000 over parts. The extra $500 may be worth it because it's more upgradable, and hey, it's not a Dell.

So what if the FNW computer costs $1,000 more than the sum of the parts? Some people would not be interested in that kind of "bargin", but some people will really be interested in the tech support, overnight shipping, custom case, and peace of mind knowing that they have a well built computer from a good company.

Although, according to Morley it would seem that the value was just not there.

Also, I have that exact same motherboard sitting behind me but it's not in a system. Can't wait to see if it'll work in BF2 or if it breaks!
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One thing we will be staying far away from is comparing a system builder to your random kid down the block with access to Newegg...
 
I agree. I hear "it's cheaper online" or "I could build it myself for less" all the time.

I was just thinking on how to rate the value of buying pre-built or comparing pre-builts without adding together the scores of the individual ratings.Usually people will compare brand A with brand B without getting into the deatils and just look at the final price.
 
You make some good points.

With the new site design, comparisons between the different systems that we evaluate will be very convenient.
 
While I agree that Newegg isn't an alternative for someone who wants an OEM, it's a good reference on how high the markup for service and such is. Think of it not as an alternative, but a benchmark of some sort.
 
PCJ said:
While I agree that Newegg isn't an alternative for someone who wants an OEM, it's a good reference on how high the markup for service and such is. Think of it not as an alternative, but a benchmark of some sort.
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Cost of good sold (COGS) includes more the price of parts. That is not a good yard stick as to how much a company's 'markup' is. There is no way that we can know for sure exactly how much a company's costs are.
 
While I agree that Newegg isn't an alternative for someone who wants an OEM, it's a good reference on how high the markup for service and such is. Think of it not as an alternative, but a benchmark of some sort.
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Cost of good sold (COGS) includes more the price of parts. That is not a good yard stick as to how much a company's 'markup' is. There is no way that we can know for sure exactly how much a company's costs are.
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Yes, but it's easy to have a fairly accurate educated guess. I can tell you from personal experience that, despite what a lot may think, it's no great mystery. There's a reason that over the years, many competitive OEM PC builders have emerged, and many of them have eclipsed FNWs unit volume and stature in the industry.

FNW buys the majority of its relatively small volume of computer components from half-dozen or so vendors (examples: Techdata, CDW, even NewEgg, etc..). They have some "ins" with a few big boys (Intel, AMD, ATI, etc...) that get them evaluation hardware and volume pricing on unit quantities. They employ hard-working guys at min.wage + a few dollars to assemble the systems. There's really not a whole lot of mystery around it.
 
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