Here's another benefit of sole sourcing your motherboards and chips from one manufacturer... This news initially came out about a month ago, only at that time Intel was trying to blame the memory manufacturers for the problem...
John
Intel to replace defective PC motherboards
By Melanie Austria Farmer
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
May 10, 2000, 8:45 a.m. PT
update Intel today said it plans to replace PC motherboards due to a defective component that can corrupt data or cause computers to unexpectedly reboot.
The company said it is working with customers to replace motherboards that have a defective component called a memory translator hub, which translates signals from PC memory chips to Intel's 820 chipset. "Motherboard" is an industry term for a computer's main circuit board, and chipsets serve as a communications conduit for PCs.
Arcane as it sounds, the memory translator hub has emerged as a fairly important piece of silicon. The chip allows computer makers to use Intel's 820 chipset, the company's latest and fastest, as a way to get around adopting the more expensive, and often difficult-to-find, Rambus memory.
Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research, has estimated that 75 percent of the Pentium III systems that contain the 820 chipset also contain the hub. By contrast, Intel estimates that the majority of 820 systems contain Rambus memory. The problem potentially will exist in a number of Pentium III systems bought since November.
For Intel, the fix will likely be expensive. The company said it will fix computers bought from it directly by replacing standard computer memory inside these systems with Rambus RDRAM. Currently, the cost of Rambus RDRAM is about two to three times that of standard memory, according to a number of estimates. Intel will also replace the motherboards.
"We know that the number of PCs with this particular configuration is less than 1 million," said Intel spokesman Michael Sullivan. "It's not the bulk by any means, but we will replace boards if the user would like to have a replacement instead."
Intel, which is setting aside funds related to the cost of the motherboard replacements, said the final amount of the cost reserve could be "material" to the company's financials.
System noise problems were found with the hub that can cause some computer systems to reset or reboot as well as potentially cause data corruption, the company said in a statement. Intel said systems shipped before that time are unaffected by the noise issue.
The company said customers can contact PC makers for more information or download a utility from Intel's Web site that identifies PCs containing the defective component.
In February, Intel discovered a bug that affected some server and workstation computers using the recently released Intel 840 and 820 chipsets. Though the glitch occurred somewhat rarely, three motherboard designs were canceled in response. |
