14 DAY TRIAL // Asus has just announced that the company is getting ready to start shipping new revised versions of its Sandy Bridge LGA 1155 motherboards later this week, immediately after the revised design is released by Intel.
The new motherboards, that feature the B3 stepping of the Cougar Point chipset, can be easily identified as all of the new boards will feature a sticker on the top right corner of the box which reads “New P67/H67 B3 Revision.”
In addition, the motherboards will also carry an on-board sticker and the UEFI BIOS reports that chipset version as the B3 stepping.
More methods to identify if the board is based on Intel's latest revision of the Cougar Point PCH are available by following this link.
On January 31, Intel released a notice announcing that almost all Sandy Bridge motherboards shipped until then were affected by a SATA bug which would, in time, slow the performance of the four SATA II 3Gbps ports.
At the heart of the problem is one of the transistors in the 3Gbps PLL clocking tree that was provided with too high of a voltage, resulting a leakage current which, over time, can cause the failure of the 3Gbps ports.
To correct this problem, Intel has started the fabrication of a new revision of the Cougar Point chipset, identified with the B3 stepping.
Shortly after, Asus announced that it will replace all the products affected by the bug with new revisions when they become available, provided that users register their motherboards, or laptops, on a special webpage which can be accessed by following this link.
According to Asus, customers will get the replacement products free of charge, delivery times varying by region.
An article detailing how to find out if your Sandy Bridge motherboard is affected by the issue is available here.