My SFF Nightmare

by Noble
(St. Charles, MO, USA)

About a year ago I decided to build a small form factor from a "barebones kit" and it turned into one of the biggest money pits (outside of my sailboat) that I've ever had.

Here are the gory parts:
- motherboard arrived DOA.
- motherboard is a low volume almost custom job.
- replacement still "eats" two of the four memory sticks every 2 months, so I don't bother running 4GB anymore. (BTW, Charged twice on my credit card.)
- "barebones kit" seller closed their door (why did I pay for "extended warranty"? Stupid move).
- corrupt registry after last memory meltdown and could not salvage backup.

Now I didn't go cheap and I'm not green at building machines, but one bad experience can turn you off of building for a while.

It's been about a year and I'm starting to want a new machine, so I'll probably start looking again-- but I won't try to start with a Kit and I'll avoid any low volume, custom pieces.