Intel's 14th & 13th Gen RMA requests are mounting up after several users have started replacing their degraded CPUs with new chips but the blue team is unable to provide a timely solution due to stock availability issues.
In a customer support email by Intel responding to a Core i9-13900K RMA request made by Reddit user, Towel4, it looks like the company might be having trouble allocating enough units for RMA's.
The email states that Intel was successfully able to validate the customer's Core i9-13900K CPU which still falls under warranty considering the company has extended it by 2 additional years. It's stated that due to "Stock Availability Issues", the company doesn't have the actual or same-part replacement available for the Core i9-13900K. Intel also states that a higher but compatible CPU replacement, such as the Core i9-14900K, is also not available at the moment.
A wait time of 4-5 weeks or more is given to the user before the stocks get replenished and Intel asks the user if they are willing to wait 3-4 weeks while they check with their planning team. The company apologizes for the delay but it's pretty much clear that users who have degraded silicon and want a replacement will have to wait a good while, at least a month as per Intel's email, to land a replacement unit.
This sucks for gamers who have degraded silicon and need something fresh that doesn't produces the same issues. I am personally running a degraded Core i9-13900K CPU at the moment which cannot run stable and crashes very often despite the new microcode patches. The solution is only to undervolt and underclock the chip which provides the most stable experiences. Even web browsers such as Chrome crash without the undervolt applied.
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