14 DAY TRIAL // As most other motherboard manufacturers have done, ECS US has also announced its position regarding the SATA bug that affected Intel's Cougar Point chipset, the company offering its customers the option of choosing between a full refund and a product swap, once the new B3 revision PCH becomes available.
For starters, ECS has suspended all the sales of Intel 6-series Express chipsets in its channel.
“All motherboard manufacturers are affected by this news, but we want to minimize our customers’ exposure to the error detailed by Intel.
“This is why we want to offer our faithful customers the opportunity to get a refund.
“Or, if they want to wait for the fix we can get them a brand-new motherboard delivered to them at no charge” commented Ray Lin, vice president of Motherboard and Graphics Card Business Unit of ECS USA.
Refunds will be offered at the original point of purchase, and users who have any issue returning the product can contact ECS USA to arrange for a replacement to be set their way once the B3 revision of the chipset becomes available in April.
Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, and most other of Intel's board partners as well as OEM's and retailers, have already announced similar measures by now.
The issue came to light on January 31 when Intel released a notice regarding a SATA bug that has affected almost all Sandy Bridge motherboards shipped until then.
At the hart 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 disabled this transistor all together, but this requires the fabrication of a new revision of the Cougar Point chipset, identified with the B3 stepping.
An article detailing how to see if your Sandy Bridge motherboard is affected by the issue is available here.