1.13GHz Pentium3 Processors Unstable? Answer:Yes

brennan73 writes "Last week, Tom's Hardware wrote a very critical review of the Pentium3 1.13GHz, specifically mentioning serious stability issues. Today, HardOCP wrote an article of their own backing Tom up and describing their own experiences; they even got Anand in on it. Probably the most interesting thing to me is that none of the tested sample CPUs was able to run Tom's Linux kernel compilation test. After Rambus, this is the last thing Intel needs. Are they shooting themselves in the foot AGAIN?". Update by: HeUnique : Tom has updated the story, so I recommend to read the update.Update: 08/28 06:44 PM by H :Check out the latest burst from ZDNet - it appears that Intel will be recalling the Pentium3 1.13 Ghz. Thanks Evan.

Comments

Running scared

[BrK]

It seems that Intel thinks the only thing we care about is raw speed. Trying to one-up AMD is simply going to get them into a hole in terms of public perception. I'm surprised that a company as big and diverse as Intel would stake their reputation on a speed pissing-contest.

M$ marketting tactics?

[jabber01]

I know, I know, there's enough M$ bashing here as it is, but... They (M$) did start this trend that Intel (and numerous .coms) seems to have picked up.

They announce a product before it's completely designed. They "release" an unstable, unworkable version 1.0 of something, just to get their name out on a press-release. All to divert attention from a competitors product and get some cash flowing in to fund the development of version 2.0 (or 3.1) which is the actual product.

The competitor releases their offering later, but it's of higher quality. Still, the vapour has already dulled people's minds to the competitor's efforts and value.

Techies know better, but how many home-users and managers do? We have to make it clear to the business decision makers and the casual users, that this is not about Intel being technologically superior or better able to deliver on schedule than AMD or Transmeta or anyone else - it's marketting and it needs to be stated as such.

Not that I think Transmeta is a God-send, but let's let numbers and solid products do the talking. A 1.3Ghz CPU from Intel, even though it's been demoed, is still vapour-ware, until it's solid and readily available.

The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196

Go AMD

[grahamsz]

Yeah there are quite a few UK magazines and websites citing similar problems and even DOAs with the 1.13ghz chips.

That isn't to mention the severe shortage of the actual chips. UK Mags dont even get their own chip, they have it for a few days and then instructions on who to post it to next.

I have a sneaking suspicion that this is just an overclocked 1ghz chip, and they've picked the best few to ship at 1.13 in a desperate attempt to one-up AMD.

However AMD today announced real tangible availability of their 1.1ghz ath's and Compaq, Big Blue, HP, Gateway and Fujitsu Siemens are amonst the big names about to ship this in systems.

Looks damn good for AMD

Intel Racing Off of a Cliff?

[Luminous]

It seems Intel is pushing itself to disaster. I could rant on about issues of quality control and being far better to create something that is stable and useful to sell to the public than something that just gives you bragging rights.

This actually makes me nervous about all the Gig chips being built. What kind of testing is really going on with these chips and is it adequate enough or are the manufacturers so eager to get another press release out in order to get a boost to their stock they are failing to realize their design is flawed?

Intel has been suffering some serious blows, both in the technical world and in the business world and cannot afford another setback, especially since these new gig plus chips are supposed to be selling for the holiday season (as gamers are one of the first to eat up such advancements).

If I had any advice for Intel, it would be to retrench and spew out tons of 700+ chips at low prices to build up marketshare while focusing on turning the Gig plus chips into something worthwhile. This is just an off the cuff suggestion as IANA-MBA.

INTEL: In related news...

[mwalker]

In related news, Intel Corportaion recently purchased "Tom's Hardware Guide" and "HardOCP" for a record 1 billion dollars. Intel's spokesperson had these comments early this morning:
"We really like their [Tom's Hardware] input, and we wanted everyone in Newfoundland to be able to recieve the bounty of his wisdom. That's why we've purchased Tom's organization, and we're strategically relocating Tom to Newfoundland, where he will perform a streaming audio broadcast to everyone within earshot in his new deep, dark, hole in the ground."

Further updates as events warrant. Rambus Corporation (Nas: RAMBUS) had no comment, but their stock spiked 30 points on the news.

AMD and Intel Rushing things?

[dreamchaser]

Disclaimer: I have AMD and Intel CPU's at home. I'm agnostic when it comes to processors, give me speed and stability and I don't care who it is from!

Check out the review of the 1.1 ghz Athlon at
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardware/reviews/cp u/thunderbird_1-1ghz/

Good marks, great performance. However, look at this blurb from the review about the high return rates of high speed Athlons:

"We haven't had any more AMD CPUs fry on us, but we did talk to a mail order house that said some disturbing things. They told us that they have had approximately a 10% return rate on AMD Athlon Thunderbird CPUs. That is a painfully high failure rate. They said that some distributors place bar codes on the underside of the Athlon Thunderbird CPUs and that these barcoded CPUs often come back with their barcodes burnt. Their Duron failure rate, however, has fallen to normal and acceptable levels."

Could it be that both Intel and AMD are too busy racing each other to take proper care in the Quality Control arena?

Maybe they were just duds?

[icqqm]

I'm sure that the Intel 1.13GHz chip works fine and it's just that there was a strange coincidence and three duds were sent out to be tested.

Also, it's a software problem

</FUD>

Updated info

[Anonymous Coward]

the above links on Tom's Hardware were published a month ago. For an article published today on thje AMD 1.1 Ghz, go here

I wonder...

[Tridus]

I wonder if the problem with Intel right now is simply that they're trying too hard.

Maybe they're trying to stay ahead of AMD, and thats causing them to do things more quickly then they should, resulting in mistakes. It probably can't be good for morale over there to see that seemingly out of nowhere AMD has come in and almost taken over the high end single cpu market.

So the guys at Intel simply want to be better then AMD, but they don't have time to do what that would actually require (some pretty major architechture changes), and so we end up with stuff like this P3, since they have to release *something*.

I bet if management were to walk down there and say "ok, we're not going to release anything new for the next few months, I want you guys to take as much time as you need to redesign things so we're on top again", they could probably do it.

Of course, they aren't being given a mandate like that.

AMD has them on the run

[Greyfox]

AMD's ascendance to technical superiority couldn't have happened at a worse time for Intel. They were focussing all their energy on getting IA64 working and AMD came out of nowhere and blindsided them with a faster and less expensive chip. In a panic over losing their bragging rights, Intel started cranking up their current chips past what they could tolerate and AMD's been merrily keeping them in that panic mode by cranking up their chips right along with Intel. And AMD's chips seem to be able to handle the speed increases better.

I think AMD will keep Intel in their current tizzy right up until they deliver their death stroke in the form of sledgehammer. Intel will again be taken completely by surprise as they were focussing on gaining their bragging rights back in the 32 bit world, which will be inconsequential in just a few years. I don't expect they'll last much longer after AMD catches them flat footed in the 64 bit arena.

Of course, Intel's been doing a lot of stuff right with Itanium. They've been making sure that a lot of OSes will run on the chips before the chips are even out the door, and they're making sure heavily optimizing compilers are available for the chips. AMD could still screw it up and become the technological almost-ran in the 64 bit arena. And Intel still has a lot of influence in the motherboard/chipset manufacturers. It doesn't matter how technologically great your chip is if there isn't a motherboard you can put it in (Witness the continuing lack of Athlon SMP motherboards.)