I have had failures of PII chips and would buy the OEM version. Several
vendors will offer a one to three year warranty on even OEM CPUs if you buy
the fan and heat sink from them. I have had good luck with a company called
Black Lab. If you have access to the web, I would look at www.pricewatch.com

Usually, if a failure is going to occur, it will hapen soon after the
product is in use well within even the 30 days that you have found. You can
also download break in programs that will burn in your CPU and MB which will
hopefully cause it to fail if they are faulty at an early stage. If your CPU
last a year or two, then goes out, what is the CPU worth anyway? I would
guess that within a year PII 400s will be under $150.



>I'm trying to make a decision as to whether I should purchase a 'retail
>boxed' or 'oem' PII 400 processor. From what I gather, if I purchase the
>oem I'd be giving up the included heatsink/fan, cert. of authenticity and 3
>yr. warranty. I'm inclined to go for the boxed version and have the peace
>of mind of the warranty since the oem's usually carry only 30 days, but the
>price difference is quite significant. Any input or guidance from the list
>members will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.
>
>Tom
>