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In the days following our
discovery, we went back to
FunKey Computers in Bellevue, WA (now out of business) and explained the problem to
them. They provided us with two, brand new cases still shrink-wrapped in
the box. We
verified that the defect also existed in those cases. We then went down the
road to Computer Stop where we tested one case, and then to PC Club where we
tested another brand-new case. All Xaser III cases we tested were defective.
During this testing, we came up with a fairly quick way to test for the defect.
That procedure is discussed in the next section. In the days that followed our
testing, it became clear that the problem was not limited to a particular lot
destined for the Pacific Northwest. The problem's just weird enough that most
people assume they did something wrong, not Thermaltake. Further,
the problem will only be seen by people who actually use the 1394 socket, which
means they have a relatively new motherboard that offers the pins necessary to
connect the 1394 port on the case - and they'll either have to connect a bus-powered
FireWire device or a device that uses a 6-pin to 4-pin FireWire cable before the damage occurs.
Conditions necessary
to be affected by this defect
- The customer purchased a
Thermaltake Xaser III PC case (any color or style), or any of the similar
cases created by the same OEM as described on the home
page.
- The customer installs a
motherboard with an on-board 1394 header that will allow connection of the
top 1394 socket, such as the
Asus
A7N8X
Deluxe motherboard.
- The customer decides to
use the top 1394 socket instead of the back-plane connector supplied by the
motherboard manufacturer.
- The customer correctly
wires the case 1394 socket to the motherboard, making sure each signal on the
motherboard correctly matches the printed signal name on the 1394 cable - Pin
for Pin.
- The customer connects a
BUS-POWERED 1394 device to the top connector using a standard 6-pin cable,
such as a FireWire Web Camera or a small, bus-powered portable hard drive
or they use a 6-pin to 4-pin 1394 cable and connect a device such as a
Creative
Nomad Zen or
Jukebox
3. "Regular", non-bus powered devices such as
external CD-R enclosures or any other devices which use either a power supply
or AC directly from the wall may not be affected by this problem since the
1394 socket power supply pins are not usually used with these devices (they aren't
connected internally to the device since the device's built-in power supply is
used instead).
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