In addition to offering compensation to motherboard players for its defective chipsets, Intel plans to increase its marketing subsidy budget hoping to comfort its motherboard partners as well as boost consumer demand for PCs in the second quarter, according to sources from motherboard makers.

The sources pointed out that since 6 series chipset-based motherboards only accounted for less than 10% of most players' shipments, they were not affected much in terms of cost; however, consumer demand in February and March are expected to be significantly impacted, causing shipments to drop 10-15% sequentially.

To comfort its downstream partners, Intel plans to increase its budget in the second quarter of 2011 to subsidize motherboard players' marketing activities.

Motherboard makers have already started shipping fixed 6 series motherboards with entry-level H61 chipset-based motherboards to also appear in March.

Motherboard with fixed 6 series chipset (B3)
Photo: Monica Chen, Digitimes, February 2011