Computer motherboard faulty?

I ebayed a mother board complete with RAM and CPU. The buyer has raised a case saying that the package arrived squashed and the heat sink was 'loose'. He's saying that after he reseated the CPU, installed a new PSU and graphics card and switched on, nothing happened and there was no signal to the monitor. He says that he's had a 'Dell engineer' have a look and test the PSU and graphics card and the engineer says the m/b is blown.

It all seems a little unlikely: I can't see how a motherboard can be 'blown' in these circumstances. Anyone care to enlighten me?

Reply to
F
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On Saturday 16 November 2013 10:21 F wrote in uk.d-i-y:

Ask the buyer to email you a phone-snap of the packaging and the board.

Which courier did you use?

Reply to
Tim Watts

I used to work for a company which often received PCs from customers (supposedly working) and it was not at all uncommon for them to be DOA. Very common for the CPU heatsink to come off, and the CPU to come partially out of the socket, the symptoms of which are that nothing happens at all when you try to power up the system. You need to go around the motherboard and re-seat everything that's socketed.

In a PC, the motherboard is well supported. In a package it isn't, and with the CPU and heatsink fitted, I would think that's a high chance of the board being flexed during transport, which can easily break a track somewhere.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

How big was the heatsink?? my brother built me a computer last year, as it was designed to run overclocked it had a feckin enormous heatsink, and i had strict instructions to never transport the computer upright, or the weight of the heatsink will pull the cpu off the board... if i was lucky... more likely to pull half the MB with it.

The other thing could be that the buyer had exactly the same MB and cpu, but blown, and it trying to pass his old stuff as yours so he gets his computer fixed for free, Seem's to be getting fairly common judging by the number of ebay sellers who put that they will be recording serial numbers, taking photo's, marking in hidden places and so on,

Of course ebay wont accept any of that and will refund the buyer, as it's always the seller that's trying to pull a fast one,

Mind, courier companies arent exactly renowned for treating packages like boxes of eggs, so it could well have been dropped/sat on/played football with, but how to prove it was that which did the dammage.

Reply to
Gazz

That's exactly what I'm wondering...

And that's exactly what I'm expecting...

And that's exactly my problem...

I now have images of the packaging but, of course, they don't show if the squash occurred before or after delivery...

Reply to
F

On Saturday 16 November 2013 12:04 F wrote in uk.d-i-y:

I think you have to check his buyer ratings on ebay and if nothing bad shows there, accept it was a transport failure.

Reply to
Tim Watts

Hope you marked your one in some way. Handwritten post code, etc.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

I did, but something reasonably subtle so he can't copy it onto a duff board, and the buyer is now aware that there are markings.

I've been in touch with Ebay for advice and am quite impressed with the help I got and the supportive attitude when I said I thought I might be being scammed.

Reply to
F

To be fair I've had getting on for a thousand Ebay transactions both as buyer and seller, and only once had an attempted scam of this sort. Which Ebay sorted out quickly.

You are entitled to ask for pics of any alleged damage, and for the goods to be returned before giving a re-fund. Stay your ground, but keep cool.

(I sold some Matchbox models on behalf of a friend. Some 40. All were packed in the same way. One buyer complained it had arrived damaged and wanted a partial refund. I asked for a pic. Said it was too much trouble (even although he dealt in them). So I asked him to send it back for a re-fund. He didn't want this - just some money back. Chancer.)

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Unfortunately there is no way of warning other sellers about dodgy buyers, buying only accounts have 100% feedback...

Reply to
Adam Aglionby

If its been flexed these tend to be multi layered boards and inner layers can be cracked. Brian

Reply to
Brian Gaff

I've had something similar once before.

I sold a DVD recorder and the buyer wanted a refund as 'it didn't play'. He said it must have been bumped and 'gone out of alignment'. He said he'd 'seen it before'. I asked for it to be returned but heard no more...

I know that things can, and do go wrong, but being scammed isn't nice when you're trying to do things right...

Reply to
F

I do some casual computer repair work for a local phone and computer shop, and they also sell new laptops.

Anyway this guy bought one of the new laptops which had an i5 cpu and

4gb ddr3 ram. After about a week, he and his teenage son came back with it while I was in the shop.

He said that the top part of the case was cracked, and had pulled a sticker off to show where the crack was. He also said his son had tried to download some games but 'it' said the computer was not fast enough. The shop owner examined the laptop and found more damage to one of the usb ports, and told the guy it had been dropped, as one of the hinges was showing signs of damage.

All he wanted was his money back.

I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions.

Reply to
Bob H

I know someone in retail that sold a laptop and they came back the following day and claimed that when they opened the box there was only a lump of wood in the box and wanted a refund.

Reply to
dennis

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