Mainstream Intel Corp.’s Pentium 4 chips in LGA775 form-factor are claimed to be in tight supply in Taiwan and the situation can worsen in the coming months, according to a report from Taiwanese web-site DigiTimes. The reasons for the shortage are not clear, so are consequences.

An article over the web-site claims that the current supply of Intel Pentium 4 CPUs for LGA775 platforms, such as the Pentium 4 530 (3.00GHz) and 520 (2.80GHz), is insufficient in Taiwan, especially in the channel. Some PC OEMs had reportedly tried to buy the microprocessors from the channel, although Intel usually gives supply priority to them. In addition, some distributors in the channel said Intel had informed them that it could only deliver 30% of the mainstream chips they require for the first quarter of next year.

The reasons for the tight supply of the chips are not clear, but it could be higher-than-expected demand, shift of production capacity to some other products or some other reasons, such as lower-than-expected yield. Depending on the reason for the shortages, the consequences of the tight-supply of the mainstream Intel Pentium 4 chips can be different.

According to some other market reports, currently only about 15% of Intel Pentium 4 processors are intended for LGA775 platform and that this figure would go up to 30% in the Q1 2005.

Virtually all of Intel Pentium 4 processors for Socket 775 mainboards are manufactured using 90nm process technology. The 90nm fabrication process is also used to make Intel Pentium 4 chips for Socket 478 platforms, Intel Pentium M and Intel Mobile Pentium 4 products as well as Intel Celeron D microprocessors for LGA775 and mPGA478 form-factors.

It is unclear, whether there are shortages of the mentioned Intel products in other countries.

Intel usually does not comment on its business-related issues to the press.