Asus and Gigabyte to get fixed Intel chipsets next week

Matthew DeCarlo

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Motherboard manufacturers were undoubtedly displeased with having to pull their Sandy Bridge products off shelves as part of the 6 series chipset recall, but Intel hopes to set things right. DigiTimes reports that the chipmaker has finished negotiating with its partners and has agreed to eat the production and shipping costs of defective motherboards. Despite Intel's commitment to cover certain losses, motherboard makers may still take a hit as the issue is expected to "seriously damage" PC sales in the first quarter.


Major players such as Asus, Gigabyte, ECS, MSI, ASRock, Acer, Lenovo and Toshiba have issued recalls for affected hardware, which includes plenty of Sandy Bridge notebooks. Asus believes the mishap will cut into its first quarter revenue by about 2%, possibly making it the worst of the year. Nonetheless, the manufacturer notes that its second quarter results should prove better than expected because of the delayed demand.

Intel began mass production of its fixed chipsets today and expects to ship small orders to Asus and Gigabyte next week. Supply of B3 stepping Cougar Point chipsets should reach normal levels in April.

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So what does this mean for end-users looking to by a motherboard? I'm waiting to put together my first build and I have all the parts I want in my tower, including an i7 2600k, besides a 1155 socketed motherboard. By OEMs receiving small batches of the the fixed chipsets next week, does this mean we could begin purchasing pre-ordering them from retail the week after? Someone with a better understanding of the industry fill us in on the timeline here.
 
It's hard to say when boards with the fixed chipset will hit stores because I imagine the initial quantities will be allocated to customer replacements. Unless someone has specific numbers in front of them or a manufacturer chimes in, I wouldn't necessarily believe any estimates you read.

That said, I don't mind indulging you. I'd guess at least some boards will be available for purchase by March and I wouldn't be surprised if they're priced a little higher than before.
 
Hope the mobo makers let ya know via website ,what revision # there fix board is.. So user's know if they bought a new Fixed one or a new no-fixed one.Not a really big deal as long as you dont use more than port 0 &1. All is good.
 
Guest said:
So what does this mean for end-users looking to by a motherboard? I'm waiting to put together my first build and I have all the parts I want in my tower, including an i7 2600k, besides a 1155 socketed motherboard. By OEMs receiving small batches of the the fixed chipsets next week, does this mean we could begin purchasing pre-ordering them from retail the week after? Someone with a better understanding of the industry fill us in on the timeline here.

Supply of B3 stepping Cougar Point chipsets should reach normal levels in April.
 
RaiDeR55 said:
Hope the mobo makers let ya know via website ,what revision # there fix board is.. So user's know if they bought a new Fixed one or a new no-fixed one.Not a really big deal as long as you dont use more than port 0 &1. All is good.

Well tbh if u use more then 0 & 1 then just put the dvd/blueray drive or a hdd u dont use as much, i mean come on if u really think about it,k its a 5% decrease over a 3 year lifespan....I u hit the top usage.
I wouldnt give a rats*** about that as i dont use more then 2 hdd´s and a dvd and i still dont consider myself to be a superuser and at the end of the day, my pc cycle is way lower then 3 years. So i still dont consider this to be anything worth thining about, just thumps up for Intel its truely admireable how they handle this.
 
I hope they put a big B3 sticker on their motherboard boxes so that consumer will know that they're buying new hardware and not defective or refurbished stuff. I've read that MSI will be putting a sticker on their boxes exactly for this reason.
 
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