But I have a geek subject that I have to get off my chest. My beef today is with Intel. Yes, Intel the blue guys doing the music, dum dum dum, Intel inside, holds 70% of the processor market.... you know ... Intel Intel at the beginning of the month released its new processor called the "Duo" for the dual core version and the "solo" for the single core version.
** geek talk might want to skip this paragraph **
This is Intel's first processor using the new 65nm technology which finally enabled them to get their Watts back down to a normal level. Until now AMD had just been killing them at this point, among others, I'll get to that later. However at the same time they also went to a new chip design at the same time they went to a new fab. process. Now I have heard it stated many times by Intel, AMD, and several other company engineers that doing either of those at separate times can be sketchy but going to a new fab. process and to a new chip design at the same time can be down right suicidal. This is already showing when these chip hit the market, in the first 20 days the chips were released over 30 flaws have surfaced, some minor but some pretty major. Toms hardware last week posted a flaw where if you plug in a USB 2.0 device into a laptop running a DUO processor it will cut the battery life by up to 80%. This could be a Microsoft issue or Intel.. neither is saying. The fact is that not only did Intel and Microsoft know about this months ago but they still released the product and told no one.
** geek talk finished **
Most of you know that I am an AMD fan... but with this how can you not be. AMD has consistently put out a faster processor that used less power and had fewer flaws. That is all.
Posted by Korvon at February 1, 2006 04:56 PMIntel is always going to dominate the market, they may slip now and then but "Intel Inside" is burned into the consciousness of some many non-geeks that most people will buy a machine with an Intel chip over one with an AMD chip.
Just like Linux and Mac users (okay maybe not Mac users as much as a few years ago), people who prefer AMD are going to be in the minority because the average user has no idea that AMD is superior in performance and price.
Unlike most things, I am not 'branded' either way, I will buy the one that is the best performer and if the price is right, even better.
As for why they would double the trouble, why not do both at the same time? I mean if you know you are going to have problems either way, best rip the band aid off quickly than draw it out over two product releases.
Posted by: ArchAngel at February 1, 2006 09:02 PMthe answer your looking for here is simple.
why do hardware manufacturers, software companies, and game producer flood the market with inferior, buggy, glitchy products?
greed.
they calculate how much money they can spend on a product and how much they will make when its released. And once that hits a certain mark they put out the product wether its ready or not.
but archangel is right, as long as the mass market of ignorant computer users remains in the dark nothing will change. They'll just call tech support, whine, moan, and B*%&! till their sent a new model that actually works. Companies make money off the initial sale and the tech support calls. So people buy the crap product, call tech support, then the company puts that money into fixing its crap product to the point where it only annoys us geeks.
Greed sucks. so try not to get sucked in. :P
Posted by: Phobos at February 2, 2006 09:36 AMyeah I totally agree, you go....AMD forever........yeah I don't know what I'm talking about but I will take your advice and not get intel and no it is not just because dave would rant every time he had to work on my computer (well maybe a little) but because you all have convinced a non geek so a little good was done here today. :)
Posted by: amy (the sister) at February 4, 2006 11:47 PMthe 20+ flaws "errata" in a shipping processor is actually normal, every one released in the last few years will have a similar sized list.
AMD in most of their processors actually had a higher wattage (in the desktop line at least, I hadn't compared the laptop processors recently)
I haven't read about any USB 2 power problems on the MacBook Pro's yet... of course they aren't shipping yet, so it was only people using them at a conference that might have noticed so far.
overall as far as speed, the Intel Core Duo is decent for performance, in some of the comparisons I've seen, it's comparing to the AMD 3800+ X2 (also dual core, but for a desktop)
really I'm just happy that there are finally dual core processors made for laptops =)
Posted by: Brian at February 6, 2006 06:14 AMa couple of pages covering AMD processor errata
(they don't make this public like Intel does, at least according to the following article)
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2006Jan/bch20060127034450.htm
AMD64 for example was up to 136, but in more recent revisions of the processor, they have brought this number down to 67
What it comes down to is... by the time the processor is in a shipping product, the BIOS, or OS has already been updated to work around the errata... if it affects anything
(not all errata are "bad things", some are just things that didn't work out the way they expected)
(note: in the comments on the story people mention that they've seen it in all forms of chips)
ooo, ooo, funny article on the whole thing =)
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=29321
Posted by: Brian at February 6, 2006 06:31 AMIf you just look at the processors alone the AMD has a higher wattage. However since AMD has the memory controler built right into the processor so in order to get an accurate comparison you have to look at more than just the processor. On a like system one with amd one with intel the wattage is quite a bit less. This has been documented is various places since many corperations are going with AMD processors since they have a better price/watt ratio.
Posted by: Korvon at February 6, 2006 05:17 PM