Dead GA-990FXA-UD3

psy81

psy81

Gawd
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Feb 18, 2011
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After 10 years of service my GA-990FXA-UD3 board died on me. It was an awesome board and definitely reasonably priced compared to today's prices.

Symptoms were as follows: started with random freezing, bios settings not working, then all of a sudden no signal to the monitor when powering on the computer (although fans and LEDs still powered on). Tried changing the battery, bought and tested another FX-8350, tested with various DIMMS, tried using a different PSU and by process of elimination concluded the motherboard died. The capacitors all look fine so not sure what caused it. Worth noting that I had the CPU overclocked to 4.5GHz @ 1.5375 volts for a good 6 years before I ran into system instability issues.

Just wanted to share my experience in case anyone else runs into an issue of dead motherboard. If anyone has the same motherboard (GA-990FXA-UD3) and willing to let it go for a reasonable price PM me. Super bummed about the dead AMD motherboard. It was perfect for retro gaming as I had it in dual boot and could use it for both Windows XP gaming and enough to play most Windows 7 era games @ 1080p. I still have a Phenom II 965 system that has Windows XP/7 and games installed on it but its at my parents house... Sucks when parts fail randomly.

I ended up buying a used PC for $300 CAD (4790K, MSI Z97 Gaming 5 motherboard, 16GB DDR3@1600MHz, 750 watt PSU with a GTX 970) but later realized that although the 4790K works for Windows 7 the Z97 chipset does not support Windows XP.
 
That sucker won (or was in the top-3) the award for worst board ever here on [H] :mad:. Glad yours worked, but I took mine out, took a literal shit on it, and lit that fucker on fire when I retired it. God DAMN the amount of time I wasted on that. I'd sell the remains to you, but I don't think you want them.
 
lopoetve said:
That sucker won (or was in the top-3) the award for worst board ever here on [H] :mad:. Glad yours worked, but I took mine out, took a literal shit on it, and lit that fucker on fire when I retired it. God DAMN the amount of time I wasted on that. I'd sell the remains to you, but I don't think you want them.
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Lol really?!?! When I was trying to troubleshoot I did notice extensive threads on the motherboard and how people were having the same no signal issue. Maybe I will look for an Asus or MSI 990fx motherboard instead lol
 
psy81 said:
Lol really?!?! When I was trying to troubleshoot I did notice extensive threads on the motherboard and how people were having the same no signal issue. Maybe I will look for an Asus or MSI 990fx motherboard instead lol
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Yeah. USB issues, the RAID controller never worked for anyone (Linux OR windows), SATA issues beyond that, USB keyboards didn't work in the BIOS (for most people - I still have the PS2 keyboard I kept around just for BIOS on it), weird windows issues with the gigabyte utilities - there's a reason there's something like 9 revisions of the hardware layout! None of the 990FX boards were "great" - but the FXA was one of the worst for almost ~everyone~ - except you, somehow. Nicely done.
 
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lopoetve said:
That sucker won (or was in the top-3) the award for worst board ever here on [H] :mad:. Glad yours worked, but I took mine out, took a literal shit on it, and lit that fucker on fire when I retired it. God DAMN the amount of time I wasted on that. I'd sell the remains to you, but I don't think you want them.
Click to expand...
I wrote that article. It was based on a forum post I did which can be found here. It wasn't the GIGABYTE 990FXA-UD3 but rather the 990FXA-UD7 that I called out as being one of the worst motherboards of all time. To be fair, all of the 990FX chipset based boards were terrible prior to the Bulldozer launch.

Essentially, the CPUs were delayed and the motherboards released a few months ahead of the CPU's and due to broad CPU compatibility, it should have worked. Especially since the 990FX chipset was a slight revision of the 890FX chipset. However, changes in the BIOS, microcode and VRM design created numerous problems with the Phenom II CPU's that were available at the time. All of the 990FX boards we looked at were so problematic that we didn't do anymore reviews on them until Bulldozer came out. I think we had done three 990FX articles and stopped after that. When it launched, Bulldozer was so bad that Kyle essentially decided we wouldn't be doing many AMD motherboard reviews as the enthusiasts were all going Intel at the time.
 
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Dan_D said:
I wrote that article. It was based on a forum post I did which can be found here. It wasn't the GIGABYTE 990FXA-UD3 but rather the 990FXA-UD7 that I called out as being one of the worst motherboards of all time. To be fair, all of the 990FX chipset based boards were terrible prior to the Bulldozer launch.

Essentially, the CPUs were delayed and the motherboards released a few months ahead of the CPU's and due to broad CPU compatibility, it should have worked. Especially since the 990FX chipset was a slight revision of the 890FX chipset. However, changes in the BIOS, microcode and VRM design created numerous problems with the Phenom II CPU's that were available at the time. All of the 990FX boards we looked at were so problematic that we didn't do anymore reviews on them until Bulldozer came out. I think we had done three 990FX articles and stopped after that. When it launched, Bulldozer was so bad that Kyle essentially decided we wouldn't be doing many AMD motherboard reviews as the enthusiasts were all going Intel at the time.
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IIRC, the UD3 was just a fewer-pcie-slot version of the same board, wasn't it? The 3/5/7 had to do with size/slot count, but with the same basic design (and same issues with BIOS/RAID).
 
lopoetve said:
IIRC, the UD3 was just a fewer-pcie-slot version of the same board, wasn't it? The 3/5/7 had to do with size/slot count, but with the same basic design (and same issues with BIOS/RAID).
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I don't think the VRM's were the same and thus, the BIOS would be slightly different in that it wouldn't have the same adjustment range as the higher end boards do. It probably had a lower end voltage controller and things like that. But yes, PCIe lane count and switching capability were likely other differences. Generally, if the top end of the stack is terrible, the lower end models will be too.
 
lopoetve said:
IIRC, the UD3 was just a fewer-pcie-slot version of the same board, wasn't it? The 3/5/7 had to do with size/slot count, but with the same basic design (and same issues with BIOS/RAID).
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from what i understand, the UD3/5/7 is the generation of the "ultra durable" line, not the slot count.


Dan_D said:
I don't think the VRM's were the same and thus, the BIOS would be slightly different in that it wouldn't have the same adjustment range as the higher end boards do. It probably had a lower end voltage controller and things like that. But yes, PCIe lane count and switching capability were likely other differences. Generally, if the top end of the stack is terrible, the lower end models will be too.
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it was the VRM and a couple other things, maybe 4 slot sli/cf...



op, find yourself a cheapo 970 board and drop that in, you wont notice a difference unless youre trying to get over 4.6-4.8Ghz.... nm, you grabbed a bundle for a decent price.
 
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pendragon1 said:
from what i understand, the UD3/5/7 is the generation of the "ultra durable" line, not the slot count.



it was the VRM and a couple other things, maybe 4 slot sli/cf...



op, find yourself a cheapo 970 board and drop that in, you wont notice a difference unless youre trying to get over 4.6-4.8Ghz.... nm, you grabbed a bundle for a decent price.
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Back in those days, a lot of the cheaper boards did support Crossfire at the very least and usually SLi. However, they often only supported 2-Way SLi and you needed the higher end boards like the UD7 to do 3-Way and 4-Way SLI.
 
pendragon1 said:
op, find yourself a cheapo 970 board and drop that in, you wont notice a difference unless youre trying to get over 4.6-4.8Ghz.... nm, you grabbed a bundle for a decent price.
Click to expand...

I might just do that. I have all the parts including case, psu, cpu, cpu cooler, gpu, ram minus the motherboard so have it as a spare just in case. I also has 2 FX-8350s as I orginally thought my CPU was the issue and bought another one...
 
Dan_D said:
Back in those days, a lot of the cheaper boards did support Crossfire at the very least and usually SLi. However, they often only supported 2-Way SLi and you needed the higher end boards like the UD7 to do 3-Way and 4-Way SLI.
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yeah, thats what i was saying(trying), the ud3 had 4-way, the lower boards/chipsets probably only have 2-way, it think thats all my 970fx had.
 
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