Intel's agreement with the FTC
in [Chips]
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From: Robert Myers on 5 Aug 2010 18:27 On Aug 5, 5:43 pm, Yousuf Khan <bbb...(a)spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote: > On 8/5/2010 12:12 AM, Robert Myers wrote: > > > You left out the part where the federal government is dictating > > details of technology (PCI-X for six years). > > As I said, those were my initial quick reads. But the PCIe issue is > something they did for Nvidia, to give it plenty of time to adjust. Also > it falls into the general idea of Intel now having to provide product > roadmaps to its competitors. This is generally good because Intel has > very recently been playing games with the USB 3.0 specs, first delaying > giving them the specs, and then when it finally gave them the specs, it > decided that it might want to replace it entirely with some kind of > optical link instead. Does nothing but provide instability in the PC > standards. > > > Good news for fanboys. For the industry? For real consumers? What a > > joke. > > Probably really good news for everybody listed above, including you Robert. > I have yet to read that any of Intel's actions caused harm to consumers (from anyone credible). As to Intel playing interconnect games, so what else is new? One of the ironies here is that if Intel *did* keep prices "artificially high," it would have benefited AMD, who has a hard time selling chips at a profit. As to good news for me, I don't see any. A regulatory tax on Intel's business. More obstacles to innovation. Holding on to PCI-X is *not* good news. Fortunately, because of its ruthless business tactics, Intel can just throw money at things, which means we will soon see photons as a bigger part of the mix, and not a moment too soon, in spite of the government (and AMD) interference. Robert.
From: Yousuf Khan on 5 Aug 2010 19:16 On 05/08/2010 6:27 PM, Robert Myers wrote: > On Aug 5, 5:43 pm, Yousuf Khan<bbb...(a)spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote: >> On 8/5/2010 12:12 AM, Robert Myers wrote: >> >>> You left out the part where the federal government is dictating >>> details of technology (PCI-X for six years). >> >> As I said, those were my initial quick reads. But the PCIe issue is >> something they did for Nvidia, to give it plenty of time to adjust. Also >> it falls into the general idea of Intel now having to provide product >> roadmaps to its competitors. This is generally good because Intel has >> very recently been playing games with the USB 3.0 specs, first delaying >> giving them the specs, and then when it finally gave them the specs, it >> decided that it might want to replace it entirely with some kind of >> optical link instead. Does nothing but provide instability in the PC >> standards. >> >>> Good news for fanboys. For the industry? For real consumers? What a >>> joke. >> >> Probably really good news for everybody listed above, including you Robert. >> > > I have yet to read that any of Intel's actions caused harm to > consumers (from anyone credible). 5 anti-trust lawsuits with $2.7 billion dollars in fines and compensation later, serves adequately as a credible witness. > As to Intel playing interconnect games, so what else is new? Yes, so what else is new? Well namely it's now going to stop, that's what's new. > One of the ironies here is that if Intel *did* keep prices > "artificially high," it would have benefited AMD, who has a hard time > selling chips at a profit. The low prices you've seen up until now are nothing compared to what will happen from now on. With more marketshare AMD will now be able to afford the lower prices without going into a loss. That's what will make it different. > As to good news for me, I don't see any. A regulatory tax on Intel's > business. More obstacles to innovation. Holding on to PCI-X is *not* > good news. Oh boo-hoo Robert, why do you care what regulations are put on Intel? And not everything is a tax, get that straight Robert. There are taxes, and then there are regulations, two totally different functions of government. No taxes here. Enough of the civics lessons. And why do you care if PCI-e stays around another few years or not? It was bound to stay anyways. > Fortunately, because of its ruthless business tactics, Intel can just > throw money at things, which means we will soon see photons as a > bigger part of the mix, and not a moment too soon, in spite of the > government (and AMD) interference. > > Robert. If you think Intel was going to be ready with a photonic interface as anything other than a red-herring to throw the PC market place into chaos, then you're ready to buy the Brooklyn bridge. Intel has played these standards games before and it'll play them again if it wasn't put on a leash. Yousuf Khan
From: Yousuf Khan on 5 Aug 2010 19:22 On 05/08/2010 10:20 AM, Intel Guy wrote: > The joke is that PCIe was foisted on consumers as a replacement for AGP > primarily to drive redundant video card and motherboard sales when the > reality was that there was a negligible real-world performance increase > with the new bus. Actually, as I remember it, PCI-e was foisted on the consumers to avoid them adopting AMD's Hypertransport as a standard. When AMD developed HT, Intel had no answer to it for nearly 8 years. So it threw the red-herring of a next generation, serial PCI in as the answer. AMD didn't object, as it wasn't really a competitor to HT, and AMD itself could use it. Video cards that could connect directly through HT would've actually been much faster than PCI-e or AGP, since there would a much smaller overhead, but it would've been proprietary to only AMD systems as Intel would've never adopted it, even if it was free. > Do you really want to keep seeing needless forced-obsolescence for your > investment in computing hardware? > > Intel should be forced to support PCIe for 12 years - not 6. At least the version of PCIe available by then. Yousuf Khan
From: Robert Myers on 5 Aug 2010 21:22 On Aug 5, 7:16 pm, Yousuf Khan <bbb...(a)spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote: > On 05/08/2010 6:27 PM, Robert Myers wrote: > > > > > > > On Aug 5, 5:43 pm, Yousuf Khan<bbb...(a)spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote: > >> On 8/5/2010 12:12 AM, Robert Myers wrote: > > >>> You left out the part where the federal government is dictating > >>> details of technology (PCI-X for six years). > > >> As I said, those were my initial quick reads. But the PCIe issue is > >> something they did for Nvidia, to give it plenty of time to adjust. Also > >> it falls into the general idea of Intel now having to provide product > >> roadmaps to its competitors. This is generally good because Intel has > >> very recently been playing games with the USB 3.0 specs, first delaying > >> giving them the specs, and then when it finally gave them the specs, it > >> decided that it might want to replace it entirely with some kind of > >> optical link instead. Does nothing but provide instability in the PC > >> standards. > > >>> Good news for fanboys. For the industry? For real consumers? What a > >>> joke. > > >> Probably really good news for everybody listed above, including you Robert. > > > I have yet to read that any of Intel's actions caused harm to > > consumers (from anyone credible). > > 5 anti-trust lawsuits with $2.7 billion dollars in fines and > compensation later, serves adequately as a credible witness. > Who asked Intel's opinion? Everyone in the business press says that consumers have not been harmed. If the FTC could have made such a charge stick, it would have done so. What do I care what happens if consumers haven't been harmed? > > As to Intel playing interconnect games, so what else is new? > > Yes, so what else is new? Well namely it's now going to stop, that's > what's new. > They won't stop playing interconnect games. > > One of the ironies here is that if Intel *did* keep prices > > "artificially high," it would have benefited AMD, who has a hard time > > selling chips at a profit. > > The low prices you've seen up until now are nothing compared to what > will happen from now on. > > With more marketshare AMD will now be able to afford the lower prices > without going into a loss. That's what will make it different. > Wish I could lay a bet with you about market share. How much do you think AMD's market share will grow? It will double? Then it will start making money? > > As to good news for me, I don't see any. A regulatory tax on Intel's > > business. More obstacles to innovation. Holding on to PCI-X is *not* > > good news. > > Oh boo-hoo Robert, why do you care what regulations are put on Intel? > And not everything is a tax, get that straight Robert. There are taxes, > and then there are regulations, two totally different functions of > government. No taxes here. Enough of the civics lessons. > Everything a business does is paid by the end consumer. You can say it's not a tax, if you like, but the costs come out of your pocket. Well, mine, since you don't buy Intel products. > And why do you care if PCI-e stays around another few years or not? It > was bound to stay anyways. > > > Fortunately, because of its ruthless business tactics, Intel can just > > throw money at things, which means we will soon see photons as a > > bigger part of the mix, and not a moment too soon, in spite of the > > government (and AMD) interference. > > If you think Intel was going to be ready with a photonic interface as > anything other than a red-herring to throw the PC market place into > chaos, then you're ready to buy the Brooklyn bridge. Intel has played > these standards games before and it'll play them again if it wasn't put > on a leash. > I don't know enough details to make a prediction, and I don't think you do, either. What's been coming out of Intel looks pretty real to me. Robert.
From: Yousuf Khan on 6 Aug 2010 01:45
On 05/08/2010 9:22 PM, Robert Myers wrote: > On Aug 5, 7:16 pm, Yousuf Khan<bbb...(a)spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote: >> On 05/08/2010 6:27 PM, Robert Myers wrote: >>> I have yet to read that any of Intel's actions caused harm to >>> consumers (from anyone credible). >> >> 5 anti-trust lawsuits with $2.7 billion dollars in fines and >> compensation later, serves adequately as a credible witness. >> > Who asked Intel's opinion? Everyone in the business press says that > consumers have not been harmed. If the FTC could have made such a > charge stick, it would have done so. What do I care what happens if > consumers haven't been harmed? Who asked Intel's opinion? Probably all of the judges and lawyers in those various court cases it lost, I would guess. Some of those lawyers belonged to Intel, so at the very least they should have. :) > Everyone in the business press says that consumers have not been harmed. Ah, if only the business press were the ones judging Intel, then you would've been completely right. But since they weren't, so you're completely wrong. I mean who could be more impartial than writers whose salaries depend entirely on advertising revenue from big advertisers, like Intel? > If the FTC could have made such a charge stick, it would have done so. Have you actually read the PDF? That's pretty much all that the FTC keeps saying, it's within pretty much every section start. Pretty much every section has something about "Benefit to Customer or End User", which means it's talking about "harm to consumers". Put down your pink sunglasses, the company you love so much has been found guilty of everything that it has been accused of for so many years. >>> As to Intel playing interconnect games, so what else is new? >> >> Yes, so what else is new? Well namely it's now going to stop, that's >> what's new. >> > They won't stop playing interconnect games. There's a piece of paper with an agreement with the FTC that says they will. Well, actually there's several pieces of paper, they also had an agreement with AMD a few months back on which this FTC agreement is modelled on which also says similar things. >>> One of the ironies here is that if Intel *did* keep prices >>> "artificially high," it would have benefited AMD, who has a hard time >>> selling chips at a profit. >> >> The low prices you've seen up until now are nothing compared to what >> will happen from now on. >> >> With more marketshare AMD will now be able to afford the lower prices >> without going into a loss. That's what will make it different. >> > Wish I could lay a bet with you about market share. How much do you > think AMD's market share will grow? It will double? Then it will > start making money? According to Intel's previous agreement with AMD, Intel will allow AMD upto 35% before it starts the games again, er, I mean before Intel deems its agreement with AMD to have been fulfilled. >>> As to good news for me, I don't see any. A regulatory tax on Intel's >>> business. More obstacles to innovation. Holding on to PCI-X is *not* >>> good news. >> >> Oh boo-hoo Robert, why do you care what regulations are put on Intel? >> And not everything is a tax, get that straight Robert. There are taxes, >> and then there are regulations, two totally different functions of >> government. No taxes here. Enough of the civics lessons. >> > Everything a business does is paid by the end consumer. You can say > it's not a tax, if you like, but the costs come out of your pocket. > Well, mine, since you don't buy Intel products. If that's your screwed up definition of a tax, then we've just been given a tax break. >>> Fortunately, because of its ruthless business tactics, Intel can just >>> throw money at things, which means we will soon see photons as a >>> bigger part of the mix, and not a moment too soon, in spite of the >>> government (and AMD) interference. >> >> If you think Intel was going to be ready with a photonic interface as >> anything other than a red-herring to throw the PC market place into >> chaos, then you're ready to buy the Brooklyn bridge. Intel has played >> these standards games before and it'll play them again if it wasn't put >> on a leash. >> > I don't know enough details to make a prediction, and I don't think > you do, either. What's been coming out of Intel looks pretty real to > me. They'll be real alright, but probably in another decade or so. Intel is showing off science projects hoping people will wait for them to become real products and ignore actual current solutions. Remember the wireless laptop recharging system that Intel showed off in an IDF a couple of years back? That's otherwise known as a Tesla coil, and looks like it's something that came out of a steampunk design from the 19th century. Intel is just entertaining people, not really providing real solutions to anything. Yousuf Khan |