OEM Core 2 Duo at TigerDirect - 12 month warranty?

[Bodine]

Tigerdirect is offering a $50 rebate on a couple of Intel 965 mobos if you also buy a Core 2 Duo, and I just noticed that the rebate requires the OEM version of a C2D. I read that the main differences b/t OEM and retail are 1) whether it includes a fan, and 2) the retail has a 3 year warranty - vs. OEM's one month warranty.

But when I look at TigerDirect's e6600 warranty page it says 12 months parts 12 months labor. Is this a misprint, or do retailers often extend warranties as a competitive advantage or whatever? It may be more than 30 days before I gather all the components and actually start building the system, so I'm hesitant to buy a CPU with a 30-day warranty.

 

[The-Noid]

It has a 12 month warranty. It will also say you need to purchase a heatsink fan at time of purchase though.

 

[Bodine]

Thanks. I'm ok with a better heatsink for less money. Excellent. Thanks again.

 

[Zap]

I don't know about the TD specific warranty terms, but I can provide some "general" terms.

Retail box CPUs have a 3 year warranty from the manufacturer to end users. That means if your CPU dies, you can RMA directly back to AMD/Intel within 3 years of purchase. I've "heard" that they track this using the retail box HSF, so you may want to hang on to that - not 100% sure though.

OEM/tray CPU warranty is 1 year from the manufacturer TO THE COMPANY BUYING DIRECT FROM THEM. This means a company that buys 1000 or 10,000 tray CPUs from AMD/Intel gets a 1 year warranty from AMD/Intel from that time and if the CPU dies in that time, that company can RMA to manufacturer.

What happens when you or I buy an OEM/tray CPU? Most of the time we get a 30 day warranty from the vendor. Why? Well, the OEM/tray CPU market is kind of strange. It involves a lot of middlemen and sometimes is referred to as a "grey market" in that it isn't strictly an "official" distribution channel. However, it is totally legal as long as nothing "fell off the truck." However, you won't be able to RMA direct to manufacturer (in most cases). How this all works is that some company, usually a system builder, will buy a particular CPU in huge quantities so that they can maximize discounts. Let's say they buy a 10,000 quantity C3D E6300. They only need 5,000 of the chips, but buy the higher quantity because they get a lower unit cost. Then, they sell the other 5,000 chips to another, smaller system builder or to a distributor. The original company already got their discount, so they sell maybe at cost to just get rid of them and get their money back. The distributor then sells to the computer store or internet shop, who sells it to you or me. Why the short warranty? Well, the store/shop and the distributor can't RMA directly, but if they don't give any warranty then people may not buy.

Some places offer longer warranties, meaning they may be the original purchaser direct from AMD/Intel.