POST Diagnostic PCI Card

kinggeorge1987

I have been stocking up on some basic tools of the trade for my new job. (Yes I finally got my foot creeping into the door). It's just a small PC Repair Shop about 15 miles away. Pretty good business and they pay isn't too bad either. Unfortunately, the man that owns it opened it only because his grandson, who was one of those 'know it all' but didn't know jack besides how to format and reinstall the OS to fix every problem kind of guys, so now the grandson pulled too many complaints out of his rear end and his grandfather had to fire him and look for a new tech(had already invested too much money to just shut it down I suppose). Anyway, I've been searching and searching for a POST diagnostic card that is compatible with PCI slots, and I keep coming across the StarTech brand, which is the highest priced one I found, but has the worst reviews I have ever seen.

Anyone have any recommendations ? Is StarTech a good brand to be purchasing a card from and these are just several "bad apples" ?

TheShadow

If you are just talking about the post card itself there is no such thing as good. The logic is basically the same as found on a high end motherboard. Some come with extra parts like slot voltage monitoring, an extra display on a cable and remote reset. It is just creeping featuritis. Some come with extra software which I never found worth the price. Check ebay with a post card search and you will find many models most shipped from China fairly quickly. In this day they are only good for eliminating RAM, BIOS, from a toasted motherboard. It is nice to have one that does laptops via usb for peace of mind. After a while you will realize that level of troubleshooting is a loss leader better left to model specific bed of nails factory depot testers.