BAD HARDWARE WEEK

Intel admits $700 million hit for Sandy Bridge chipset problems
In some cases, the Serial-ATA (SATA) ports within the chipsets may degrade over time, potentially impacting the performance or functionality of SATA-linked devices such as hard disk drives and DVD drives
SANDY BRIDGE processors are going to take longer to reach market because Intel has to replace thousands of the faulty Intel 6 series Cougar Point support chips it has shipped. The fault is said to have been solved after it was detected this month. Over 100,000 units of the Sandy Bridge chipsets with the faulty Cougar Point support chips have been shipped since the fourth quarter of 2010.

And it's on one of the later layers of metal so Intel actually can utilize all the chipset pipeline that has been there and is there in the fab right now. Because the chipset is built in a relatively mature 65-nm process, Smith said there is confidence that the corrected chip can ramp up production quickly.