The Real (and Virtual) Adventures of Nathan the IT Guy » P8P67 Deluxe

6 Series Motherboards now Shipping

Nathan Simon — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 00:53:37 +0000

As of Friday this month, manufacturers have started shipping new revisions of their mainboards.

Fremont, California (March 1, 2011) – As part of an overall recovery plan following the detection of the Intel® 6 Series chipset design error , ASUS expedited the manufacturing and delivery of new products containing the revised B3 stepping of the Intel 6 Series chipset (Cougar Point). Along with this rapid delivery plan, ASUS also implemented extensive product return and
replacement options along with a dedicated service hotline for its valued North American customers.

Limited Quantities will be available as people scramble to get replacement boards. I am going to wait till Mid-April when stocks should be plentiful. If you have an ASUS board like I do, specifically the P8P67 then check this PDF out for Free product replacement.

Sandy Bridge SATA Port Flaw

Nathan Simon — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 08:59:43 +0000

So you all heard the news, that there is a minor flaw in the new Sandy Bridge mainboards, I for one am not currently affected. I am using more than just SATA ports 0 and 1, but I do not have any SATA 6G devices, I will definitely take part in the mother board swap as I want to make sure I get the best experience possible. Here is a small insert from Xbitlabs.com. I also included a statement from ASUS, that links to an open letter to its customers on the issue and how they will proceed in rectifying the situation.

The four largest manufacturers of mainboards in the world said that they would take actions to ensure that the flaw discovered this week in Intel Corp.’s latest 6-series chipsets will not affect end-users. As a result, the companies will stop selling mainboards for Intel’s new Core i-series “Sandy Bridge” microprocessors and will either refund the motherboards or will replace/repair them when the error-free chipsets become available.

Firstly, all mainboards makers claim that Serial ATA ports 0 and 1 are not affected by the flaw of the Cougar Point design and should work just fine in Serial ATA-600 mode. The ports which performance can degrade over time are SATA ports 2, 3, 4 and 5. Secondly, all Serial ATA ports that are powered by a third-party controller will also work absolutely fine. Thirdly, despite of the fact that the SATA-related issues are not going to occur shortly, makers of mainboards are planning to either exchange, repair or refund their mainboards for LGA 1155 processors with P67 and H67 chipsets.

From Asus

“We will provide total warranty services to maximize computing and usability, as each Asus product is delivered with an uncompromising quality pledge,” wrote Asus on an open letter to customers.

What I can say right now, as an early adopter, is that I am thoroughly impressed with Sandy Bridge and the new Core i5 and i7 processors. The fact that only SATA ports are affected, I can safely continue to run my Asus P8P67 Deluxe Mainboard until April and enjoy all that is Sandy Bridge.

-NS

Core i5 2500k and the ASUS P8P67-Deluxe

Nathan Simon — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 03:13:06 +0000

Well I told you all that I would be getting the new Sandy Bridge, and I did! I bought a Core i5 2500k processor and an ASUS P8P67-Deluxe Mainboard, along with 8GB of Corsair Dominator Memory. Cost me about $650.00 with taxes. And let me tell you, what a great purchase. My processor when clocked at 3.9Ghz turbo boosts to 4.6Ghz, when running a Sisoft Benchmark, my processor almost bests a Core i7 950 at 3.5Ghz, it wins because of having 8 threads, whereas the Core i5 has raw Ghz.

All of my games have taken a huge jump in framerate, around 75%. My XFX 8800GT is holding it back, next purchase will be a DirectX 11 video card.

Intel you did it again!

-NS