GIGABYTE acts on Sandy Bridge retailers

It appears, despite calls to stop, some stores are still selling apparently recalled hardware. But GIGABYTE’s on the case.

This morning, we’d pretty much steeled ourselves for some hardnosed investigative journalism. We’re talking on-the-street, feet-in-doors kinda stuff.

Then GIGABYTE went and ruined it all.

It came to our attention yesterday that one of the small computer retailers at Chinatown’s Capitol Square in Sydney was selling Sandy Bridge motherboards – you know, the ones that were recalled? Specifically, they’d sold a P67A-UD3R, and had told the buyer that since it was a higher end board, it was free of defects.

Which is pretty poor form.

So, knowing that GIGABYTE stressed the important of NOT doing this to all its partners and retailers, we contacted our man in GIGABYTE for a little chat. Then, this morning, these posters showed up in the store in question:

Better late than never, we guess. "We do take this very seriously and have made sure we deal with this as soon as possible," said Dino Strkljevic, our GIGABYTE guy. Though it is curious that the notice only mentions Intel, GIGABYTE and ASUS; the recall affects pretty much ALL Sandy Bridge parts from any manufacturer.

It’s hard to judge just how things like this happen. There’s an old maxim that says you should never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. The store in question could simply have not been contacted by GIGABYTE – there are many small operators in the computer retail sector, and keeping track of them all must be a gargantuan task – and simply not be aware of the recall or chipset issues. However, given the store told the customer that the board was unaffected suggests the staff were well aware of the issue.

Regardless, what this does show is that while it’s always wise to do a lot of research before buying any computer part, that advice is doubly important right now. Whether these faulty parts are still at retail through ignorance or malice is beside the point – that other old adage of caveat emptor comes to mind.

For now, though, our man at GIGABYTE has stressed that all affected boards, including those sold in error, will be eligible for exchange when the new parts are available. What’s more, these parts, in GIGABYTE’s case at least, will even feature different model numbers, to eliminate confusion. As long as replacement stock is available, exchanges should be possible on the spot at place of purchase. "We can easily identify what boards are affected," said Dino.

So remember, if you do have an affected board, hold onto it, and don't be afraid to ask for a replacement.