Intels Sandy Bridge goes underground until late April

Intel has been talking to motheboard manufacturers and partners regarding Sandy Bridge, and when motherboard makers now release more detailed information on returns it is both good and bad news. The good is that all customers have a right to exchange, the bad is that new motherboards are not expected until late April.

This means that Intel's otherwise very nice Sandy Bridge platform will go underground for 3 months and millions healthy and fresh processors will be unusable in the wait for motherboards.

The two largest motherboard makers , ASUS and Gigabyte, have posted instruction for how the returns will be handled and the good thing is that both companies, back by Intel, will exchange or replace all current Sandy Bridge customers. More information on each company and how they will handle the returns can be found below.

• ASUS return information
• Gigabyte return information

Overall the returns will be handled by retailers and distributors, the exact flow of things remains to be seen.

Not all SATA ports on Intel's Sandy Bridge motherboards are affected. Only the 4 ports that connects to Intel's own SATA 3,0 Gbps controller. This means that consumers should only use SATA port 0 or port 1 (or other ports from discrete controllers) and if you have enough ports to go around you can sit tight until the replacements arrive in April/May.