X99 Extreme 4/3.1 - wrong firmware flashed

gravelc wrote: I'm hoping it will be all sorted amicably.

So are we all here. Keep us posted.

Best of luck to you 

If it is still under warranty you shouldn't accept the credit, you need to demand they replace the product. If you have all your receipts and documentation that is. As I said in my last post, get them to look up the serial number of the board you have on their system, if it came from their store they should have a record of it, if they do then that proves that they made a mistake and gave you the wrong board for your box. Unfortunately, if it was a return where the previous owner swapped out the board then it will be impossible to prove.

gravelc wrote: Is the SN alright - same format and is the yellow sticker in the image from the last post.  Definitely the serial number on the box and mobo itself do not match.  Interestingly, the mobo says 'made in China' while the box says 'made in Vietnam' - so didn't happen at the factory step of the supply chain.

I can confirm on a different ASRock board (Z87 Extreme6) that the yellow sticker on the RJ45 Ethernet port has the board's serial number on it. That board happens to be in its box, so it was easy to check both at the same time.

The serial number on the yellow sticker matched exactly the serial number on the large sticker on the board's box. Both the mother board and this sticker said "Made In China".

I can add some speculation based upon other information that I know to be true.

Vietnam production of ASRock boards is relatively new. My ASRock Z170 Extreme7+ board was made in Vietnam, according to the board's label and the label on its box.

X99 boards in general are in production longer than most other Intel chipset boards, because the Intel HEDT platform is designed to work with two processor generations. In this case, Haswell-E and Broadwell-E.

The original production of the X99 Extreme4, whose first UEFI/BIOS date is 8/8/2014, is quite likely China.

The X99 Extreme4/3.1 has a first UEFI/BIOS date of 3/30/2015.

The first UEFI/BIOS date of one ASRock Z170 board that still had the first version available for download, is 6/30/2015.

IMO, it is very likely that the X99 Extreme4/3.1 boards were made in Vietnam.

So what happened to you and your board? Did someone buy an X99 Extreme4/3.1 board, that already had an X99 Extreme4 (China production) board, swapped his old board into the box, kept the new one, and returned it to UMart?

You said the box was sealed when you got it, was that with clear cellophane wrap around the entire box? Or was it with clear or opaque, round, sticky seals that you see on some boxes?

If it was clear cellophane wrap around the entire box, it is possible for a store to rewrap a box in what is called shrink wrap. I worked at a big retailer in the USA, and watched a lady I worked with many times working on re-wrap, putting clear, cellophane "shrink wrap" around boxes. It came in large rolls, which was wrapped around the box, the three open edges sealed with a heated clamp device, and then the "bag" of cellophane she just made around the box was shrunk tight with a heat gun, like a hair dryer. This was done to boxes containing kids toys, when the cellophane was torn by little fingers, etc. They did not do that to returned items.

Do I know if UMart does rewrap like that? No I don't, no idea whatsoever. Just saying I know it is possible, I've seen it personally.

While you know your board is not what it should be, I noticed something else in the pictures of these two boards on ASRock's website. The original X99 Extreme4 board has small text above the PCIE2 slot that says, "REV. 1.00". The newer X99 Extreme4/3.1 board has "REV. 1.04" in the same location. I highly doubt that any X99 Extreme4/3.1 board would not have "REV. 1.04" on it.

Good luck dealing with UMart, that is one weird situation.

gravelc wrote: There's a yellow sticker on the ethernet port that has a serial number - this doesn't match the one on the box.  Should it?

That is most likely the NIC's MAC ID displayed there. Does it somewhat match, in terms of format, what the SN on the box reads? It's possible ...... that that's the SN

ASRock > Support > SN Finding:
http://www.asrock.com/support/index.asp?cat=FindSN