Athlon mobos recalled

Incompatibility problems have hit AMD's latest chip offering, with one motherboard maker pulling its Athlon-ready mobos off the market. The problem affects the Japanese market, where Micro-Star was among the first mobo manufacturers to ship boards for the Athlon - see story. But now it has recalled all its MS-6167 boards, according to reports on the AsiaBizTech news wire. Systems using the MS-6167 mobo are unable to boot up in some instances. This is thought to be due to a lack of compatibility between the Micro-Star board and the AMD chipset. Upgrades to the BIOS and swapped components are being made to get round the problem without having to alter the chipset. According to AsiaBizTech, Japanese system builders received a letter on 21 August, outlining the problems. The letter was co-signed by Micro-Star and AMD. Although AMD has made it clear that its chips and chipsets are not to blame - telling AsiaBizTech that the incompatibility problems were with the components on the boards - the chip maker is splitting the cost of modifying the boards (thought to be around $8 per board) with Micro Star. Modified boards are identified by the shape of the "for the Japanese market" sticker they carry. On the fixed mobos, the sticker is round, whereas on the earlier ones the sticker is star shaped. ®