I think the point is that some people will always think the worst of Intel and conversely never speak ill of AMD no matter what they get up to. AMD is no more your 'friend' than Intel is, if AMD was in Intel's position, they would have exploited the market in exactly the same way or they would have been quickly usurped by a company that would. If you are talking about the Salvation Army, you can assign it all the altruistic value in the world, but when it comes to corporations, the bottom line is black, and more specifically staying well within it at all times.

NaturalViolence:

"good for them! Teach that evil Intel a lesson! We should all boycott their products until they stop being evil!".

Intel is a disgusting company. Of course I'll keep badmouthing them. Intel's CEO selling all of his Intel stock he could before these bugs were made public is all you need to know to understand what kind of a corporation it is and what are their values. Without AMD, you'd still be dancing around your 4-core max mainstream CPU in 2025, with hardly any generational performance increase to speak of. No use trying to deny that because history has already proven it. AMD isn't a disgusting company, but its unfortunate decisions in the GPU arena have made me badmouth it as well a few times. Nothing I can do about it. Btw, these recent bugs, neither Meltdown nor Spectre, while annoying, are affecting my image of either company. It's not like they would have designed the CPUs on purpose so that the bug(s) were there. They are just accidents. While it would be amusing to see Intel suffer in the court because of this, it would do nothing good to the technology industry at large. Intel's CEO, however, should be sued as an individual.

user1:

well the linked article on theregister is gone , guess i wont be reading that lol, not sure how they are gonna prove amd did anything wrong, spectre isn't even based on a hw bug, its the consquence of how the effected processors function normally. and amd chose its words very carefully, when speaking about it . hard to say how this will go.

fantaskarsef:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/01/17/amd_investors_sue_over_chip_flaw_silence/ Only article I found, but it does not contain the above quote.

My quote is linked to the comments section of the article itself, which I clearly said my response was from. As for accusations of AMD fanboyisim: I haven't thrown in my two cents into the matter of the Intel case because my feelings are similar to now: These cases should be thrown out on the basis of the shareholders wanting to profit without regards to all else. Spectre affects most modern CPUs, there is no need to single Intel and AMD out for this problem as they only disclosed the exploit after the fixes were ready, which is best practice in all respects. The only exception being the Meltdown fixes has some non-trivial performance impact, and Intel has quite likely known about Meltdown for years, and their handling of the matter is less than commendable, with publishing press releases with a lot of implicative wording to the effect of the "main" bug (Meltdown) on their hardware affecting their competition, even if it factually does not state this. At any rate, any claims that Spectre fixes have a significant impact on performance is amusing and disingenuous, at best. However, the lawsuit claims that they should EVER disclose exploit information about security bugs before fixes are ready should be thrown out (for BOTH Intel and AMD) post-haste, due to the dangerous precedent it will set in the industry; releasing information about exploits before they can be patched unleashes an "arms-race" on how quickly this can be exploited in the wild before people are protected. I hate having to defend my stand on these things but more than anything I hate being accused of being a non-neutral observer to these events. I'd rather not have to respond to this again, please.

David3k:

My quote is linked to the comments section of the article itself, which I clearly said my response was from. As for accusations of AMD fanboyisim: I haven't thrown in my two cents into the matter of the Intel case because my feelings are similar to now: These cases should be thrown out on the basis of the shareholders wanting to profit without regards to all else. Spectre affects most modern CPUs, there is no need to single Intel and AMD out for this problem as they only disclosed the exploit after the fixes were ready, which is best practice in all respects. The only exception being the Meltdown fixes has some non-trivial performance impact, and Intel has quite likely known about Meltdown for years, and their handling of the matter is less than commendable, with publishing press releases with a lot of implicative wording to the effect of the "main" bug (Meltdown) on their hardware affecting their competition, even if it factually does not state this. At any rate, any claims that Spectre fixes have a significant impact on performance is amusing and disingenuous, at best. However, the lawsuit claims that they should EVER disclose exploit information about security bugs before fixes are ready should be thrown out (for BOTH Intel and AMD) post-haste, due to the dangerous precedent it will set in the industry; releasing information about exploits before they can be patched unleashes an "arms-race" on how quickly this can be exploited in the wild before people are protected. I hate having to defend my stand on these things but more than anything I hate being accused of being a non-neutral observer to these events. I'd rather not have to respond to this again, please.

So... where did anybody require you to "defend your stand on these things"? The only thing that was asked is (more or less) if the article's gone, I posted the link to the article. You started defending yourself 😉 By the way, "the fixes were ready", this is greatly exaggerated. Maybe Intel had their microcode fixes ready, but the situation is less than what I personally would call "best practice in all respects".

The root of the problem is: knowing your hardware has a security flaw and you chose to release to consumers anyway. Both AMD and Intel did release hardware after knowing about the security issues but the key difference for me is that AMD didn't lie about performance wile Intel did. I don't see lawsuits resolve anything, they just want free money. Instead they should force each company to update their microcode up to 10 years back.

Not surprised. Next thing you know, there will be a lawsuit against ARM as well. Greedy and/or opportunistic investors wanting their handouts (ah, handout culture, LOL). Of course as an AMD shareholder I might be able to get some money, but I don't like taking part in frivolous lawsuits. No handouts for me.

Pretty stupid. I don't think either Intel or AMD should've been sued for this. It was an accident, and so far, there is no evidence that anybody exploited these security flaws. Just ridiculous how people will sue over something that's hardly an actual problem. I also don't understand why AMD hasn't been used sooner, and, why IBM, ARM, and ARM's partners haven't been sued.

BangTail:

AMD is no more your 'friend' than Intel is, if AMD was in Intel's position, they would have exploited the market in exactly the same way or they would have been quickly usurped by a company that would.

Eh.... I wouldn't go that far. AMD obviously is out there to make money and they've pulled a lot of crap that threatened their customer loyalty, but the only reason they're still in business is because they aren't so obviously greedy as Intel (where a lot of people supported them mainly on principle) and they've rarely been anywhere near as shady in their business practices as Intel has. Intel for a while was synonymous with being anticompetitive; even in AMD's best of days, they've never had the leverage to be like that.

schmidtbag:

Pretty stupid. I don't think either Intel or AMD should've been sued for this. It was an accident, and so far, there is no evidence that anybody exploited these security flaws. Just ridiculous how people will sue over something that's hardly an actual problem. I also don't understand why AMD hasn't been used sooner, and, why IBM, ARM, and ARM's partners haven't been sued.

Who cares about stuff like that??? In the US where anyone can sue everyone for everything, it´s just business. Here is the same, people are suing not because is the right thing to do but because they think they can make some easy money...

H83:

Who cares about stuff like that??? In the US where anyone can sue everyone for everything, it´s just business. Here is the same, people are suing not because is the right thing to do but because they think they can make some easy money...

You're right, but it still annoys me. And like I said, why are IBM and ARM (or rather, SoftBank) off the hook? Greed doesn't stop at the major players. I'm sure Oracle could be sued too.

I'm assuming that IBM, ARM etc... investors have not taken an issue with how they have handled things. Unless I'm reading it wrong, AMD are not being sued because a security flaw, but because the investors feel AMD were selective with information that could/did lead to them losing money.

Redemption80:

I'm assuming that IBM, ARM etc... investors have not taken an issue with how they have handled things. Unless I'm reading it wrong, AMD are not being sued because a security flaw, but because the investors feel AMD were selective with information that could/did lead to them losing money.

I haven't heard anything from ARM, IBM, or Oracle - it's almost as though they're intentionally staying out of the spotlight and nobody seems to care about pointing them out, despite that they're probably going to spill more money from being sued. AMD was trying to lay low while also still trying to figure out exactly how much they were affected, because AMD didn't seem to know how much these bugs affected them, so it's understandable how they may have been a bit misleading. But to my understanding, they came out with official and definitive statements of how they were affected before they got sued and they still took some precautions to protect users, so if being selective with information was the issue, that's kind of a moot point now.

schmidtbag:

I haven't heard anything from ARM, IBM, or Oracle - it's almost as though they're intentionally staying out of the spotlight and nobody seems to care about pointing them out, despite that they're probably going to spill more money from being sued. AMD was trying to lay low while also still trying to figure out exactly how much they were affected, because AMD didn't seem to know how much these bugs affected them, so it's understandable how they may have been a bit misleading. But to my understanding, they came out with official and definitive statements of how they were affected before they got sued and they still took some precautions to protect users, so if being selective with information was the issue, that's kind of a moot point now.

Obviously the AMD investors have an issue with them knowing since June, and so far the IBM, ARM, Orcale etc...investors do not.

fantaskarsef:

By the way, "the fixes were ready", this is greatly exaggerated. Maybe Intel had their microcode fixes ready, but the situation is less than what I personally would call "best practice in all respects".

That's because you don't understand how this works. Intel and AMD work with vendors and anybody involved to roll out the microcode and software fixes, but they only really need to hold off public disclosure of the exploit until they have working mitigations, the timeline for OS vendors to roll out patches is less their responsibility as long as they have developed a working understanding with the OS makers' on how the software fix is supposed to work. Microcode updates, however, are fed directly through via an OS update channel patch software or a motherboard manufacturer firmware update. As long as they have already cooked up the fix with their partners, they're free to publicly disclose the exploit details. It's not their fault if, for example, MS falls behind a day or so on actually producing a patch that doesn't brick systems. Anyone can see these suits vs Intel and AMD are just cash-grubbing, at least in the case of exploit disclosure timelines. There IS a case, however, for the performance impact of Meltdown, but that is neither here nor there. All that aside, this discussion is tiresome if the only argument is "this is exactly the same thing Intel did", which isn't the case. EDIT: It just occurred to me that you misunderstood what "best practice" meant. I was referring to not disclosing exploit details to the public OR shareholders without having the fixes ready and in the hands of OS/motherboard vendors, rollout of the fixes aren't their responsibility outside of pressuring/helping the partners to rollout faster.

what does it matter consumer will not get any compensation for this. if all cpu makers were made to refund half the price of cpu or even 50$ or made to replace said cpu,s they would all go bankrupts

Robert E. Kahn and Vint Cerf < are the guys that need to be sued. After that, sue whoever invented/made a microprocessor in the first place, and all the way down the rabbit hole, as long as you have living people and companies to sue. Don't forget the companies that make keyboards!

SSD_PRO:

This. And some of this, from both sides. Since Ryzen release AMD worship has been out in full market force. Sometimes Intel has their people out. I have no idea why users want to treat tech companies like sports team hysteria. AMD did try and deny they were affected by variant 1 and 2 (Spectre). In a year we will likely find out they are vulnerable to variant 3 (Meltdown). For days AMD and the fans said only variant one because AMD used the term "near zero" to describe vulnerability to variant 2. "Near zero" is not "zero". All of this are near zero risk scenarios; that was just misleading semantics. What I don't get is this: why are tech companies always so vulnerable to lawsuits for exploitable flaws? The end user must also take steps to invite that exploit - this stuff doesn't happen logging online to check your bank statement or write a word doc.

It amazes me how many people have made decisions and posted misguided information without knowing ANYTHING about these problems. First, Meltdown. Intel's speculative execution starts no matter what conditions exists. If it finds that it's working on a page violation, it doesn't kill the process until AFTER some executed commands. Hence, it can perform commands fed by a malicious program and retrieve valid memory contents.. AMD kills the page fault BEFORE and instructions are done. Thus, no memory disclosed. 10 years won't help meltdown work. Spectre 2 is almost the same. With Intel, the code can get the branch predictors to start jumping around to different threads and hyperthreads, by caching the memory locations in a lookup table. Really, really oversimplified, but that's it. AMD doesn't have a the same problem, so It doesn't implement all of the microcode changes intel does. AMD doesn't use a lookup table to be altered. they use the full memory locations straight from the branch predictors. Hence the don't need the table, which can be exploited. The branch can only be trained by the host system actual branch address. The optional AGESA only introduces two of the three branch commands, as the third is not necessary. Also, the statement still stands, spectre 2 HAS NOT BEEN DEMONSTRATED ON AN AMD SYSTEM. ( I am aware of one success using and AMD Pro cpu in linux, with two commands set to disable 2 cpu features, not a normal test on a standard system). It's all about the hardware, and AMD is indeed less exposed on Spectre 2 as well as Meltdown. There position actually hasn't changed. Still near zero risk. But, releasing two commands into the microcode to keep branches in their lanes, and to clear branches, makes them complete liars??? Feels like the Gigabyte X399 forum last week. 29 posts, with 10 of them from Intel mb owners demanding Gigabyte give them a new bios. The were not getting too far in a threadripper forum. The rest were demanding an AGESA update from Gigabyte, when AMD had not released it. They wern't getting anywhere either, but boy did they threaten and rant.

Give person a reason to be mad about something, and it surely deliver. People lose more nerves on this exploit than they should. It's not politics, move on.

SRB:

It amazes me how many people have made decisions and posted misguided information without knowing ANYTHING about these problems. First, Meltdown. Intel's speculative execution starts no matter what conditions exists. If it finds that it's working on a page violation, it doesn't kill the process until AFTER some executed commands. Hence, it can perform commands fed by a malicious program and retrieve valid memory contents.. AMD kills the page fault BEFORE and instructions are done. Thus, no memory disclosed. 10 years won't help meltdown work. Spectre 2 is almost the same. With Intel, the code can get the branch predictors to start jumping around to different threads and hyperthreads, by caching the memory locations in a lookup table. Really, really oversimplified, but that's it. AMD doesn't have a the same problem, so It doesn't implement all of the microcode changes intel does. AMD doesn't use a lookup table to be altered. they use the full memory locations straight from the branch predictors. Hence the don't need the table, which can be exploited. The branch can only be trained by the host system actual branch address. The optional AGESA only introduces two of the three branch commands, as the third is not necessary. Also, the statement still stands, spectre 2 HAS NOT BEEN DEMONSTRATED ON AN AMD SYSTEM. ( I am aware of one success using and AMD Pro cpu in linux, with two commands set to disable 2 cpu features, not a normal test on a standard system). It's all about the hardware, and AMD is indeed less exposed on Spectre 2 as well as Meltdown. There position actually hasn't changed. Still near zero risk. But, releasing two commands into the microcode to keep branches in their lanes, and to clear branches, makes them complete liars??? Feels like the Gigabyte X399 forum last week. 29 posts, with 10 of them from Intel mb owners demanding Gigabyte give them a new bios. The were not getting too far in a threadripper forum. The rest were demanding an AGESA update from Gigabyte, when AMD had not released it. They wern't getting anywhere either, but boy did they threaten and rant.

Actually whole bios microcode update is optional.AMD still stands at "there is near zero risk" statement. Bios update that they will release is for the as they said "paranoid", the ones that are not satisfied with near zero risk but want little closer to zero risk.As such they are recommending that bios update is completely optional,not recommended .

David3k:

That's because you don't understand how this works. Intel and AMD work with vendors and anybody involved to roll out the microcode and software fixes, but they only really need to hold off public disclosure of the exploit until they have working mitigations, the timeline for OS vendors to roll out patches is less their responsibility as long as they have developed a working understanding with the OS makers' on how the software fix is supposed to work. Microcode updates, however, are fed directly through via an OS update channel patch software or a motherboard manufacturer firmware update. As long as they have already cooked up the fix with their partners, they're free to publicly disclose the exploit details. It's not their fault if, for example, MS falls behind a day or so on actually producing a patch that doesn't brick systems. Anyone can see these suits vs Intel and AMD are just cash-grubbing, at least in the case of exploit disclosure timelines. There IS a case, however, for the performance impact of Meltdown, but that is neither here nor there. All that aside, this discussion is tiresome if the only argument is "this is exactly the same thing Intel did", which isn't the case. EDIT: It just occurred to me that you misunderstood what "best practice" meant. I was referring to not disclosing exploit details to the public OR shareholders without having the fixes ready and in the hands of OS/motherboard vendors, rollout of the fixes aren't their responsibility outside of pressuring/helping the partners to rollout faster.

Best practice would have been to offer a solution for people, us consumers, that offers a set of patches that closes all security holes and fixes the issues. "Best practice" in this case means, best case for the company, not the consumer. They did what they had to do (and were ready with their aimed at time to release the microcode fixes), but they had half a year and the mainboard vendors did not do or get anything. All they have to do is compile BIOS files and offer them on their homepages. As Intel knew about that half a year already, as well as some others say that AMD did as well, it's actually quite a shame that a bug that could be potentially destructive and performance degrading to virtually every known and used (Intel) machine does not get treated with zero day patches. Yes, the two of us seem to see different things as "best practice". What's the reason they did not talk to any of the mainboard manufacturers or Microsoft for half a year to let them know that they have issues and they need to fix and test things, as well as implement them? Is there no way they could have put in some extra hours and delivered the microcode updates to the vendors a week before disclosure so that we could have a chance to not even be in the situation to be vulvernable after disclosure? Oddly convenient that their CEO could sell some of their shares at their higher price before it drops in conjunction with Meltdown / Spectre vulnerabilities. Oh yes, "best practice". Best practice in my opinion would be, if my product is faulty (which the CPUs are), it should be the companies responsibility to do what they can to offer a sollution as fast as they can. And I personally did not see that happening here with 6 months of virtually doing nothing besides trying to get around lawsuits (I guess they were trying to work around Meltdown performance decreases to not have so many people sue them in the company's best interest. Interestingly google accomplished to work around the performance decrease two weeks after disclosure for their workstation and servers, and we guys neither get updated BIOSs or flawless OS patches.) Oh and by the way, I do understand what you are trying to say, but thanks for your patronizing matter to talk to people. I guess you are generally successful with such a way of talking to others. Welcome to the fabulous ignore list of fantaskarsef, where people like you seem to be well taken care of. Free lodging, reduced rates on drinks and food. Because that's "best practice" to handle downtalking people like you who think a different opinion means that people are stupid and don't understand.

Glottiz:

This AMD worshiping on computer hardware websites needs to stop, it's getting out of hand. "AMD is the best, they can do no wrong, they are so consumer friendly, they care about the little guy" I see this nonsense constantly. AMD isn't your buddy, it's not a person. It's just a giant corporation like any other, they couldn't care less about you, so why do you care so much about a faceless corporation? If they are getting sued chances are high it's not without reason.

I think you are exaggerating people liking that AMD supports open source, has developed new more powerful rendering API's and not kept them proprietary, and offers better value than what Intel's greed has given us to "people are claiming blah blah blah". If you want to you can enjoy the 40% reduction in Intel CPU's, and if you're real lucky AMD can get back in the GPU race so you won't have to spend $3000 for a top of the line video card. If cheering for that to happen is somehow worship to you all I can say is you are severely lacking in vision.