Intel has a pretty good three year warranty program setup that comes with ever Intel processor you buy. Meaning if your processor fails naturally during your first three years of using it Intel will replace it. That’s more than enough for the average user since Intel processors are pretty stable. But some Intel processors can be overclocked and if you overclock you always run into the risk of damaging your processor, and Intel doesn’t cover that in their standard warranty.
If you are an overclocker and you want to still be protected by Intel in case anything goes wrong it looks like you know have an option. It’s called the Intel Performance Tuning Protection Plan and it’s this plan you can purchase from Intel that extends your Intel warranty to cover overclocking. You will be given one free replacement if you damage your Intel processor.
Right now Intel is just trying this out over the next six months and then they’ll decide if they want to keep it or get rid of it. And there are some limitations like you can’t get a replacement processor within the first thirty days after you purchase the protection plan. The cost of the new protection plan depends on the processor you have and they range from $20 for the Intel Core i5-2500K all the way up to $35 for the Intel Core i7-3960X. All Intel Sandy Bridge and Sandy Bridge-E processors that can be overclocked are in the list as well.
For the most part I don’t see myself or most people benefiting from this kind of protection plan. My Intel processor has been running just fine overclocked to 4.5GHz running 24/7 for the past year. But those who are really into overclocking and are testing out the processors to see how fast Intel processors can go would like this plan. People trying to break records or really test the limits of the Intel processors with aftermarket coolers would be interested in this new protection plan.
What are your thoughts on this?
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