After about one week of halted shipments, partners of Intel Corp. intend to resume shipments of personal computers based on Intel Core i-series "Sandy Bridge" microprocessors which designs are not impacted by chipset flaw. Intel will also resume shipments of its chipsets to those makers, who can guarantee the lack of core-logic-related issues.

Last week Intel revealed that Serial ATA-300 controllers of its 6-series chipsets contain an erratum, which may eventually lead to performance degradation of storage equipment. Since modern chipsets support many Serial ATA ports and SATA-600 controllers of the 6-series chipsets are not impacted, it should be possible to use those core-logic sets inside notebooks since such systems contain just one or two Serial ATA-based devices. Moreover, desktop system makers may also disable faulty SATA-300 ports and install an add-on Serial ATA card to provide necessary amount of storage ports. As a result, end-users' experience with PCs will not be compromised provided that computer manufacturers take care of this.

"Intel subsequently initiated extensive discussions with computer makers about this topic. [...]As a result of these discussions and specific requests from computer makers, Intel is resuming shipments of the Intel 6-series chipset for use only in PC system configurations that are not impacted by the design issue," Intel said in a statement.

In parallel, Intel has started manufacturing on a new version of this support chip. Intel now expects to begin shipping the new parts in mid February.

This resumption of shipments of the Intel 6-series chipset is not changing the company’s updated first quarter 2011 and full-year financial outlook published on January 31st, 2011.

Tags: Intel, Cougar Point, Failures, Core