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Hi fellow members,

I bought a week ago Asus rampage iv extreme from republic of gamers store aka Tarek Khalidi, he put the item on sale for 420$ which appeared to be a catch.

So i bought the motherboard.

After arriving home i started opening the box and signs of recent opening started to appear like back panel out of packing, i contacted the guy and he ensured that the board is new.

I got the cpu 3930k and removed the protective cover on the cpu socket, the surprise was that some pins were bent i contacted him and sent him images of the socket and he told this is normal although it is clear it is not supposed to be bent he told to try the cpu.
note a fingerprint inside socket was found which clearly indicates it was opened before.

I tried and system didnt boot gave me on led error 65 which is related to cpu socket.
I contacted the guy and asked for full refund because i was clearly scammed and cheated he refused and told me i dont return money.

what do you suggest i do? please assist

Note i bought another motherboard from pcandparts ( msi x79 gaming) and the system booted.
Sue him. And contact Asus of him falsely being an "official" retailer/distributor.
I believe he has an account here on the forum, someone invite him to reply and tell his side of the story, if this is true then its a big shame, I never bought anything from him as his prices are way too expensive.
Well its pretty sure the suing part wont go anywhere here in Lebanon.
Contacting Asus seems to be a great idea, why dont we help him out on how to, and stuff.

Also, you can post it on their Facebook page.
Aly wroteI believe he has an account here on the forum, someone invite him to reply and tell his side of the story, if this is true then its a big shame, I never bought anything from him as his prices are way too expensive.
Not a very active account.
thanks guys for the reply.

i'm going to contact asus later today and will post some pictures to see what i mean.

And i think i will proceed with the law suit.
As Avo said , contacting Asus MIGHT be the best solution. I can't believe even the so-called " high quality and expensive" sellers are just liars and jerks. I'm going to watch out when I buy stuff for my rig.





bent pins are down left corner
Hi Cmwic;

The first thing you should do is contact him(maybe by phone), and tell him that you opened a thread for the issue, he will then respond because his reputation on the line.
Also have you asked him to come to your house and try booting the rig?, maybe you are missing something. Anyhow you should have tried to resolve the asus mobo issue before buying another one !

Regards.
Use bobby-pins, magnifying glasses and a strong source of light (like your phone's flash) and try to fix the pins. I've fixed a friend's Maximus V Formula like this. You can also contact Amazon (The so called "reseller" buys and sells from amazon in case you're wondering) Maximus boards have like 3-5 year warranties, you can tell them the story. If they don't agree on replacing the board (since it has bent pins) Directly contact Asus and tell them your story. I'm sure they'll help.
AvoK95 wroteUse bobby-pins, magnifying glasses and a strong source of light (like your phone's flash) and try to fix the pins. I've fixed a friend's Maximus V Formula like this. You can also contact Amazon (The so called "reseller" buys and sells from amazon in case you're wondering) Maximus boards have like 3-5 year warranties, you can tell them the story. If they don't agree on replacing the board (since it has bent pins) Directly contact Asus and tell them your story. I'm sure they'll help.
He doesn't use Amazon.

cmwic, before doing ANYTHING to that board force him to return it!
Just read this on ROG official site. And from AvoK95's list, ASUS doesn't have an official distributor here.
Which also gave me the idea of posting on their forums. Keep in mind that sueing him will have cost much higher than you paid for the MB.
now he wants to do RMA which he says will take 2 month ( which is too long) and i dont trust him to do RMA, I think he is messing around.

i contacted asus via email and they said they will take action and told me to call nearest asus reseller for further help.
hey cmwic, long story short, i also had a bad experience with the guy:

Last year i bought an ASUS ROG g75vw ( laptop) from france (fnac.fr) with a year of international warrenty, after 3 month the DvD reader fails so i contact the guy to ask him what could i do about it and/or if HE could do something (being an "official reseller").

the guy answers me in an aggressive and self righteous way that i should had bought it from him (even if it was 900$ more expensive) and his "contract" with ASUS dosen't allow him to repair it, and i'm quoting here :
"since you have not purchased that item from me neither “My Warranty nor My Service” can apply on this purchase yet it could violate my “ASUS Agreement Chip”."
That sentence was followed by some 2cent psychology about how i feel from not buying from him and how now i am F***** as he is the only one in Lebanon that could have helped me. (again, very professional)

Then we had a long conversation him and I, which clearly shows that the guy is a scam. If you want to go further about exposing him, feel free to PM me so i can try to help i anyway i can.
Woah man this guy didn't only scam you cmwic, there is another "scammed" one too. Draguen what happened to your laptop after that?
Off topic:
i tried to forget my absolutely awesome feelings toward the guy for a moment and proposed to pay him for the service and the hardware ( a new dvd reader), if he could fix it, as if i hadn't had a warranty, again, he refused.
At the end i just went to a computer store in Mansourieh, the place fixed it for 60$ (service included) within a day.
2 month RMA?? Really? Then let me tell you my story. Bought an Asus Formula V Maximus from him in late October 2012. Simply DOA. only 1 memory dimm works out of the 4. Then i get some BS from him that this is a bug from Intel Z77 chipset (although i have a gigabyte UD3 Z77 board working just right). He told me then he'll RMA the board (and I didn't even get to use it for 1 day), and lend me an Asus Maximum IV Extreme (probably it is the board that he sold you cmwic). He said the board was his so it doesn't matter for him. I simply rejected since it is a liability. I already have a working gigabyte board so I can wait. So far board still under RMA process. 8 months passed by and board still under RMA. Last time I asked him about the RMA process he said there was a small delay from the ASUS company. I am fed up with this. This board aint cheap; costed me 450$ and came DOA. He is supposed to replace it ASAP with the same exact model. If he doesn't have spare stock, well guess what? It ain't my problem bro.

cmwic, RMA ain't going to take 2 months as he is claiming. Be prepared to wait a year.

And me, still waiting for the "new" board to come back. Maybe some kind of miracle will happen.
@MrClass

I know he is a cheater and a scammer and that's why i bought a new motherboard from pcandparts.

RMA is supposed to be instant for such expensive boards supposedly sold as brand new.