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Intel Patents Anti-Overclocking Technology
VCAGuy writes "It appears that Intel has pantented a crystal-locking technology to lock processors to the processor's clock speed. The Inquirer has a story about it, and you can read the patent description from the USPTO. Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this..."
I got my system overclocked by 500Mhz now. I think this will deffenetly make me switch to AMD!!
everything released as of yet has been cracked
This will stop AMD from making anti-OC chips, which means I can continue to OC them!
Is it?
I knew I should have patented my anti-anti-oveclocking technology some years ago...
Just another way to ruin the life of the geek. Go Intel, make your chips even less appealing. /me pokes his Athlon XP
no
So lemme get this straight... apple's looking at going to intel, and intel's going to be deploying anti-overclocking tech in their chips... this sucks! The only reason I'd like to run the MacOS on intel hardware is so I can overclock the shit out of it. *sigh*
It's only a matter of time before the overclockers find a way around this. Intel will likely have some kind of undocumented override in place to make it easier, even.
This is the real signature
(Beats those shadows on the cave wall, don't it?)
Why the hell would you take the time and bother to do this?
This reminds me alot like a form of DRM, you buy the chip, but Intel tells you what you can and can't do with it, which type of motherboard you're allowed to use it in maybe? Who the hell knows anymore...
Posting useless rant since 2003.
well, AMD probably wants my business anyway
If anything, AMD should use this as a marketing ploy: "Want to overclock? Use AMD!".
After the chip containing this protection is released and these guys manage to get 'round it.
Before somebody cracks this?
?Who controls the past now, controls the future.
Who controls the present now controls the past.?
i stopped trying to over clock my processor when i blew up a perfectly fine Pentium II 233 when i tried to get it to run at 266.. it worked for a month and then never worked again.. *sniffle* So now unless i have a spare processor lying around i don't risk it.
"Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this..."
They can't. Intel patented it.
I hope this processor will not sell well, as a lot of companies cater to overclockers.
where's all that Karma?
...it's not in their best interests. The people that they get much of their profits from are overclocking enthusiasts, or at least people who consider the ability to overclock to be a plus. AMD most likely won't follow Intel in this, just like it most likely won't hold back 64-bit.
It's just another reminder that AMD+Linux=Good!
Only in slashdot are posts of solidarity modded at -1 Redundant, while posts of antagonism are modded as -1 Flamebait.
Sure, crystals have been used to lock frequencies forever...but processes are what are generally patented, and the process of locking a processor speed with a crystal (versus locking a signal frequency, or whatever)...is it not new? Can someone explain prior art? Or is this just a case of complaining about any old patent that gets approved at all?
While AMD processors might "crack" when you install the heat sink incorrectly, who has cracked the Intel multiplier lock introduced so long ago? Nobody.
this will fall by the wayside, but what logic prompts this kind of thing ??? EVERYONE already knows if you mess with the multiplier and OC hardware you ash the warranty on the spot. Does Intel feel the need to do this for legal protection or is it a precursor to somthing darker... ****sinister chuckle****
AMD has been my CPU of choice for quite sometime, I just really hope they keep up the good work.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Honestly, anyone that overclocks their CPU is someone who buys CPU's individually and not bundled in a computer. Doesn't intel make more of a profit selling individual CPUs? Especially from geeks that are constantly upgrading and overclocking?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
that doesn't look like a valid patent to me. AMD could still implement a similar system using a slightly different technique and should be ok. Besides surely there MUST be prior-art on this shit! :^)
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I don't understand how preventing overclocking helps Intel. Aren't most of their sales to OEM's who wouldn't think about overclocking processors? How does this affect their bottom line? Anyone?
I really really want to underclock my cpus to hardware emulate old machines.
now if i can get a p4 down to 8mhz and in 286 mode
---rhad
Slashdot needs to interview Natalie Portman.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't overclocking good for Intel? When you burn out your chip and then have to buy a new one, isn't that more money for them? What am I missing here?
it just doesn't work.
Ummm... ??
Isnt the Point of a Patent.. is so other companies DONT/CANT copy it?
The More Knowledge you have the Luckier you Get- J.R. Ewing
Now companies and other unscrupulous individuals won't sell overclocked systems at a higher price to people who don't know any better.
Patenting the technology isn't the same as bringing it to the marketplace, and maybe it's intended for some other purpose, like guaranteeing the reference frequency for some time-sensitive circuitry or radio-transmitter chips or something like that.
But if they're trying to tie the hands of hardware hackers, then Intel is shooting themselves in the foot, and AMD has just got a big win on a forfeit.
When all you have is an axe, everything looks like a grindstone.
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Once this patent is registered, any attempt to register a new spurious patent will be impossible.
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then the patent is the resulting process of overheating damaging the crystals and transistors.
Doing the Right Thing should not be preempted by making a buck.
I'm heading to my local patent office to patent my right to not buy Intel processors.
I might be mistaken but it seems like its locked on to the FSB or PCI clock.
That would not prevent people from hacking the multiplier but from upping their FSB.
Overclocking is bad anyways. Destroys your CPU, fries your RAM and makes Baby Jesus Cry.
Sometimes patents arent that bad -> hopefully AMD wont copy this *g*
Before you email me, remember: "There is no god!"
They didn't just restrict overclocking, but underclocking as well.
There are some very good reasons to underclocking processors, especially since they can be run a lot cooler than the equivalent chip rated for that clock speed, this allows passive instead of active cooling, or smaller cases.
I can see what's coming up next, like Lexmark, they implemented a way of controlling the access to the microcode on the chip, so bypassing the "overclock detector" will shortly become a DMCA violation.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
Intel and AMD are options that I considered on the last several machines that I have bought or built for my businesses. If Intel gets around to implementing technology to limit what I can do with the processors I might buy from them, the chances that the Intel option will win when I make purchasing decisions will gradually approach nil.
There is a difference between patenting and implementing technology. Perhaps Intel will do only the former and skip the latter. Somehow, I am not convinced that will be the case.
Throw in the apparent decision on Intel to wait on 64 bit processors, and I am starting to wonder whether Intel really wants my business.
GF.
Lots of petrified grits
for me to stay with AMD...chip is just as good (if not better) for less money....
According to the block diagram, they compare the (divided down) system clock with a 32.768KHz reference crystal. I'm thinking they can't put the ref crystal on the CPU die, and if it's external it can be replaced with a slightly (or grossly) faster one.
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
What you probably didn't know was it was a pentium 133 that was already overclocked by Intel and sold to you :) I've never had much luck with OC'ing intel stuff either, though I've some buddies that swear by it, I prefer AMD's.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Why is Intel so concerned about overclocking anyways? I would think that it would be better for them to set the clock on the proccessor to its full potential in the factory so the user doesnt need to when they get it. I don't see how Intel thinks there losing money because of users overclocking there proccessors, because most users would spend relatively the same amount of money of a proccessor whether or not they can overclock it. I bet that if Intel took all the resourses that they put into Anti-Overclocking and put them into making better cooling methods for overclocked proccessors and then marketing that to the consumers they would make ALOT more money than they every will from restricting the user. People would be more likely to buy a Intel water cooling system for there Intel Proccessor just because of the name. Anyways that is just MHO, as always I may be 96.5% wrong.
This sig was generated by a barrel of trained kittens for SeXy_Red (550409).
So Intel doesn't want you to overclock their processors, and they've even gone to the trouble of devising a method to make it hard/impossible. Furthermore, they've patented the method. So...
- AMD can't use the (exact) same method (unless they licence it).
- therefore we'll all keep overclocking AMDs
- Although they are trying to make it so you can't overclock your own hardware, they are not (yet?) attempting to use the DMCA to prevent you from breaking their methods (if possible) and overclocking anyhow...
- where's the "Your Rights Online" part?
---
I type this every time.
The reason isn't that Intel doesn't want you buying a cheap chip and clocking it up, or cranking their latest and greatest past what it was supposed to do.
What Intel is trying to stop is third-rate PC manufacturers from overclocking a P4/2.53 to 3.04 and _selling it as a 3 GHz computer_ to unsuspecting consumers.
This is and has been a problem for a long time. Overclocked chips fail more often. People who overclock chips themselves know and accept this. But to Joe Blow, his "3 GHz" chip that just fried itself is "unreliable Intel crap!".
That's what they want to stop - damage to their reputation from unscrupulous vendors selling stealth-overclocked chips.
Oh wait, there's no way around that on Intel procs.
They wouldn't-
Not only does not having anti-overclocking buy them street credibility with the geeks, overclocking kills a lot of processors out there, thus necessitating a re-purchase.
So instead of a single-sale to one person for 3-4 years, AMD can sell 5 chips to the same schmuck in under a year!
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
First of all - patenting doesn't mean it will be put into production. Second of all, it would be truly insane for intel to put this into consumer based CPU's - it would just annoy people without really having a great effect on the bottom line.
When you think about it overclockers are a small segment of the personal PC market (since it requires more than average PC knowledge and usually at least some special hardware to accomplish any meaningful amount of overclocking) Those who overclock regularly usually don't do it so much for the increase in CPU speed so much as for the bragging rights.
This being said, it MIGHT be a worry later on down the line if intel does do the dumb route of completely disallowing overclocking - after all any large corporation has to do their really dumb thing at least once every 5 years or so - but even then it will affect only a small segment of the PC market, and you just know someone will find a workaround for it for the hardcore overclockers within a few days anyways.
It's a fairly simple system. You stick an oscillator of known frequency (32.768 kHz in this case) on the chip, and then use that to count the inputed clock rate.
If you count too many clock pules to each refference pulse, then you can modify behaviour on the basis of that. I's interesting to note that the patent talks about CPU's going as fast as 500 MHz, and talks about 1995 as recent. So all the talk about dodgy resellers was probably topical way back when it was written, when, if I recall, there were a few resellers overclocking chips on the quiet. I think that this is a patent whose time has come and gone.
More worrying, it talks about under-clocking detection, as if it's a symptom of faulty hardware. Well, my recent brush with a failed fan ment I underclocked my CPU, to alow it to function without overheating - I sincearly hope that Intel doesn't intend to prevent that.
Since the discussion will probably wander this way anyway, I thought I'd broach the subject...
;) )
Personally, I can't see where there's too much need for overclocking a CPU any more. Specifically, I think that the other components within a PC (memory, FSB, graphics CPU speed, graphics memory interface) have become as much or more important to overall PC performance as the CPU.
Now I understand the desire to overclock (wanting to save money, the engineering challenge of it all, trying to eke out more performance, pure geekiness) but it just doesn't seem to make sense. Why spend the money on a watercooling system when the next processor step up costs about the same amount of money?
(And yes, I have overclocked before...
Personally, I'd rather undeclock my PC in most cases where I don't need 3 GHz for office apps. In the case where I'm running a 3D game, I'd rather someone come up with a way to add more texturing units to my graphics card than punch up my CPU with a few clock cycles.
Kep in mind that Nvidia's design arguments in creating GPUs were to relegate functions like physics and AI to the CPU, while reserving graphics-related functions for itself. And how many apps (games) have you seen recently where you can say, "Damn, that was some good AI?".
So therefore we aren't restricting what our customers can do with their property but are PROTECTING them from those damn unscrupulous resellers!
Bah. Also
Overclocking, continues the patent, may produce several problems including bit error and data corruptions, and may also affect random number generators".
Yeah, but wouldn't it affect them for the better?
The article claims that they're doing this to prevent unscrupulous resellers etc from claiming a chip is faster than what intel claim. This would only work if you're buying a complete system (or at least a preinstalled chip and motherboard), and that you never look at your chip, or know what to check in the BIOS or motherboard jumpers.
I really wonder how common this sort of thing is. Certainly the biggest occurance of overclocked chips would be the geek end-user that wants to push the last little bit of performance out of their chip, and they know what they're doing and expect instability if they push it too far.
It seems to me that intel are in fact targetting that group of people, and trying to make them purchase faster-tested 'boxed' chips so that intel can make more money off them.
The reality is that if Intel did produce chips with a clock verification circuit, then the gamers / overclockers would just move to AMD (and hope that they never do the same thing).
This is a GOOD thing for AMD overclockers, since if AMD uses such technology, they would have to license it from Intel. Hopefully this fact will reduce the liklihood that AMD would consider using it.
AMD's fastest processor is more expensive than an Intel 3.06GHz HT processor and it doesn't perform as well in most tests.
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"Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this..."
Well, of course they can't. It's patented.
i understand why intel doesnt want people to do it, more specifically OEMS
that remark cpus, they dont care about me clocking the chip up, they care abotu the bad name they get by oems screwing customers.
they should just make a bios flash screen that says
"WARNING this is overclocked blah blah blah, call us and report it if you didnt do it"
It's official, " Intel owns the patent on stupidity "?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Or license?
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
OK, let's just get something out of the way. This is a good patent. It patents a specific method of achieving a technological end. It is directed, nonobvious, and something which would hurt their VALID intellectual property ownings to have given away to their competitors.
This is exactly the point of the patent office--to protect innovative technology. Intel has nothing to be ashamed of for patenting this, dammit.
Now if you don't LIKE the technology they've patented, then don't BUY it! If they put this on future CPUs, don't support them if you don't want. But DON'T WHINGE ABOUT THE PATENT BEING JUNK! It's not.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
What will it be this time? #2 pencil and black sharpie have been done... Isopropyl Alcohol??? White Out! No... I bet it's something abstract like Silly Putty... ;)
Oh well, I've been AMD since the K5 was the cheaper Intel alternative... Vote with your wallets!
Come and see the violence inherent in the system!
The only good thing Intel could announce about this technology is that they're trying to protect the consumers from frying their CPU's while doing something they may not have the expertise to do.
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
Why don't they sell chips without these stupid measures? I rather enjoy overclocking machines (despite the risk) and I would happily buy a retail CPU that lacked this technology, including the FSB multiplier lock. Years ago when they began implementing the multiplier lock I honestly felt that, given time and the ever growing market for cooling gear, they would market an overclockable chip.
Look at the motherboard industry as an example; there was a period a few years ago where Abit was considered the number one board for serious CPU enthusiasts, since their boards contained many features that allowed easy overclocking--thermal probes, small bus speed increments, and so on. While overclockers certainly aren't anywhere near the majority of computer users, I think that they're a significant enough part of the market to warrant "unlocked" CPUs. It certainly helped motherboard manufacturers.
Am I completely wrong here? This news item certainly points me in that direction. Yes, we hate remarking chips. Yes, the patent is probably questionable. But how about moving in the other direction? Either Intel or AMD, damnit, I just want an old-fashioned unlocked CPU/keychain.
"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." -Voltaire
Intel Crystal-Lock Chips
Betcha can't overheat just one.
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Once you run your processor over-spec, you throw reliability, accuracy, and longevity out the door. Not to mention, you end up purchasing a louder fan to cool the processor. Instead of getting that helicopter fan, you could have bought an even faster processor.
Why is this article posted under "your rights online?"
It looks like a pulse counter. How did they get a patent on an application for a widely known and used device?
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
Oh yeah, that's the sound of burning bridges.
From the article: It claims to detect and deter overclocking of a signal for microprocessors which includes a detection circuit and a prevention circuit,
I mean, come on Intel...was this REALLY necessary?
"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned for SEGA. ..."
Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this...
Yah, then Intel could sue them for patent infringement!
Sheesh, you'd think people would learn something here.
Don't steal. The government hates competition.
If I want to spend my hard earned money to purchase a CPU that I wish to overclock and eke out a modest performance increase, then I should be able to OC it without marketing intervention.
If I chose to void my warranty by overclocking my CPU, then that too is my choice. Rather than limiting the speed of the CPU, why not put a one-time flashable register in the CPU that is set when a CPU is run above its intended speed for X amount of time, thus proving that a warranty is void.
By putting a frequency/speed limiter into a CPUs construction, Intel could then make generically speedy CPU and throttle it back and offer a 'value' CPU, and subsequently inflate the cost of less throttled CPUs. Remember back to the 486DX/SX days where they disabled the math co-processor in a 486DX and sold them as 'value' 486SX processors?
I mean really, who are they appealing to here? They wan't to completely alienate the 5% of early adopters and home enthusiasts?
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
This happened to me when I bought from an unscrupulous (read: computer show) retailer.
__________
Love conquers all... except CANCER
Intel: "We have a new product which will make a number of our core products less useful and less valuable to our customers. Just to be sure nobody else siezes on this untapped potential, we've patented the new product."
More power to 'em.
This is like Microsoft patenting a security hole in IIS to prevent Apache from implementing it, too.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
Who cares wether they patent their OC prevention technology? That means only that other CPU vendors cannot use their technolody to prevent OCing.
I mean, when was it in consumers interest to have OC prevention technology in the first place?
And isn't that a little like Sony patenting their copy protection mechanisms?
I must have misunderstood something here...
1 Earth is warming, 2 It's us, 3 it's royally bad, 4 we need to take action NOW
Hopefully they'll just use this to prevent overclocking, not underclocking -- I underclock one of my PCs so its CPU runs cooler and thus requires less noisy cooling. It would be pretty odd of Intel to essentially say, "No, we won't let you pay us more per MHz than our list price, and we will make you run your PC hotter and louder than you need to."
Yeah, it's a bummer for hobby overclockers. But, one area that this is good for is to prevent resellers from selling overclocked machines at a higher price, without telling the buyer it's overclocked. This is a pretty big problem in some areas.
Jason
Underclocking runs cooler, too!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Intel has also patented the procedure: "Putting yourself out of business".
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AMD has followed Intel on every anal-retentive effort so far, if they were to deviate it would be an exception, not the rule.
The single message that they've driven home over the years is to not put your faith in AMD.
If anything, this is a reason to go with a completely different (non x86) CPU, if anything.
/digipak burns his finger :-)
Why should Intel care if people overclock their chips? The only reason I could come up was that they didn't want to hassle with people trying to get returns/refunds on toasted chips due to over-enthusiastic overclocking, which seems pretty far fetched. Personally, if I accidentally blew my processor I'd be too embarassed to try and scam Intel out of a new chip.
Good idea. Perhaps there's prior art, but I don't think the patent itself is an issue (or at least there are much worse patents in the world to gripe over).
As for overclocking, the diagram just shows a signal going out that latches when the chip is overclocked. What a processor DOES with it is an entirely other story. A cool extension would be a pin to a motherboard, and allowing the BIOS to actually give a big "HEY, I'M OVERCLOCKED" message on startup. Those who get reseller-overclocked chips (and it happens!) know they've been shafted. Those who are overclockers know they're cool (well... quite hot actually... nevermind).
At least I'd HOPE they'd put some way around it for those truly interested in overclocking.
with this technology inplace, Intel will be able to prosecute OC'ers under the DMCA, similar to the recent Lexmark case, where Lexmark sued a company for providing mod chips that allowed replacement toners to be used other than the ones made by lexmark. the whole story can be found at http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,57866,00 .html
Perhapse Intel wants to be able to say, "Your systems are safe, using our patented anti-hacker technology." or some such.
It would definately appeal to the PHBs. They have to be jumping at the business market here...
What's this Submit thingy do?
This is so stupid. The added circuitry will only cost the consumers more and inhibit enthusiests. I fail to see the logic here. How many people actually overclock their processors? And does Intel think they'll keep customers who already overclock? I think it's safe to assume that the overclockers would either switch to AMD or simply would not bother with the incremental upgrades.
:)
Of course, it'll be fun to see the neat tricks OC'ers will come up with to get around this technology
>> Is it?
No.
Anonymous Coward, you are the biggest douche in the universe.
Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.
Why would they do this? I don't see the reason in not letting people overclock their processors
It's like selling some kid a bike and telling him he can't peddle faster than 15km/hr
IMHO this is a good thing. If both Intel and AMD cpus are completely overclock-proof this will lead to people having to buy the higher-clocked cpus, which lead to more money being pumped into the two cpu giants. What does that lead to? Eventually a better, more stable technology economy. If you really want to keep overclocking, you could always go to VIA and Transmeta chips. I'm fairly sure that they won't follow suit and keep their cpus clear of anti-overclocking facilities.
><));>
i'm glad they've done this. i'm tired of intel superiority, and i think this will take yet more market share from them (hope so, anyway). don't get me wrong, i don't want intel to go away, i just want amd to get more share, thus more money, thus more r&d.
speaking of which, has anyone seen the barton core athlon xp 3000? outperforms the pentium 4 3.06 by a good margin. (and strangly enough, the athlon xp 2800 outperforms the 3000 on some benchmarks) i can't wait for the 3200's and up.
buh-bye intel.
if it wasn't for that horse, i wouldn't have spent that year in college.....
Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this...
Doesn't this patent mean AMD can't do this? (at least without paying licesnsing fees)
Maybe this isn't so bad after all... unless you really like Intel over AMD chips.
Got Freedom?
Thinking?
I've seen a lot of comments here asking why Intel would do such a thing, why they're trying to prevent overclocking even though it voids the warrantee.
They really aren't concerned so much with enthusiasts... the percentage of people who over clock in the total PC market is very small (they just speak loudly online).
The problem they have is with resellers (ie whitebox shops) taking a slow processor (say a P4 2.0 GHz), overclocking it, and selling it in a system as, say, a P4 2.8 GHz and marking up the price as such. To clarify, these resellers do not tell their customers the system has a P4 2.0 overclocked to 2.8 GHz and that the warrantee is voided, they say it has a P4 2.8 GHz part in it, and pocket the extra cash. So Intel loses money on sales of its higher end parts, and customers aren't getting what they paid for: they end up with an overclocked part that may or may not be completely stable.
He said, "You'll be able to tell your grandchildren that you helped assemble the first NT supercomputer," and I cringed.
i heard a while back that you could appeal to some department of government and provide them with suggestions for exceptions to the DMCA. it would seem to me that this is clearly something that should be exempt because it might just limit scientific advancement. and isn't that what copywrites and patents are for anyway? aren't they
Yes this is what I am implying.
The ol faithful "Get rich of the ignorant, use their money to force them to stay inline after we have a monopoly in place."
Now before the flame, I know Intel dosen't have a monopoly, because of AMD, and maybe Transmeta, they still hold a big ground, and they are the "common name" associated with a processor, and/or computer.
Even if OC'ing is not significant to most people, it's still another step in the "you-pay-our-extreme-prices-and-you-still-don't-o
Posting useless rant since 2003.
What's next an anti octane-booster on gasoline? =) It's my desicion if I want to melt my processor or not ... isn't it?
They want to keep the "homegrown" feel, even though it is just another stealth marketing site run by a large corporation now.
with a method of their own or license of the technology? (Probably the former)
They've been making it harder and harder to overclock since the first athlon was released.
According to the article, they're "stated" purpose is to keep unscrupulous resellers from reselling a lower speed cpu at a higher rating. The problem with this logic is that in today's market, unless you're a in a third world country, it's not that common a problem.
Maybe I can see about 5-6 years ago this having been a problem, but the fact is that CPU prices have dropped so much and been driven down so "far"( anyone remember when a "NEW" CPU from Intel meant that it's initial retail price was over a $1000...it wasn't that long ago, HELLO ! )
So, given that the argument about "remarked" CPU's being such a moot point these days, you can see what Intel's real motivation behind this is. They're going back to the days of crystal-locking ( circa 80286 ). What is that going to effectively do ? Drive prices UP.
Call it for the shameless, monopolistic, BONEHEAD move that it is...and here I was about to switch back to Intel...way to go cheesers.
And no, I'm not an AMD fanboy. I just want the most performance vs price ratio I can find. The tide was starting to turn ( I'm not going to pay $500+ for an AMD 3000+ but I would pay that for a 3.06 with HyperThreading ). But now....I guess I'm going to have to wait for what AMD does next.
Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this...
Thankfully, they can't.
First, I'm not making claims this is uncrackable, but you have no problem making claims that not only is it crackable, but it will be cracked, because you're under the delusion that everything has been cracked.
I'm not going to bother making a huge list of things which haven't been cracked, instead I'll give you one: RSA Encryption
RSA isn't uncrackable. It's not designed to be uncrackable. Instead, it's designed in such a way that cracking it will take a VERY VERY long time with today's technology. (Hundreds or thousands of years, depending on the key size?)
RSA will probably be cracked on some level in the future, but it realistically it won't be cracked in this decade or two or five, which is good close enough for most applications.
Maybe this won't be technically uncrackable, but what will one have to go through to crack it? Cracking Hardware isn't like cracking Software.
"Communism is like having one [local] phone company " - Lenny Bruce
From the patent: "Unscrupulous resellers and/or distributors may purchase less expensive processors that are rated at lower clock frequencies and then remark those processor at higher clock frequencies, a procedure known as over-clocking. "
Phew! I thought that they were onto us price aware hackers at home.
(This sig intentionally left blank)
Ok, percentage of processors bought with intention of overclocking....I dunno maybe just a guess here.....1%
Percentage of processors bought when the user doesn't care/know about overclocking.....99%
Who the hell cares??? I swear you people need to get your heads out of the clouds and see the whole picture outside your little world.
Also, the invention is implemented in the chipsets, not the CPU.
The usual FUD is misplaced then. If Intel is using this technology, they've been using it for as much as 3.5 years.
"It appears that Intel has pantented...
Uh.... what exactly is "pantented"?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't overclocking good for Intel? When you burn out your chip and then have to buy a new one, isn't that more money for them? What am I missing here?
They are trying to get in good with the environmentalists.
No more overclocking = fewer chips burned out = less need to produce = less waste material
Oh, wait...
I would say AMD goes to some effort to prevent overclocking. Have you ever tried to OC an XP processor? It's pretty fucking difficult for the novice OC'er and pretty much requires the purchase of a kit to do it. And while it's not impossible, it hardly lends credit to the notion that AMD supports the practice.
Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
Why don't they put a lock on Cars as well? What a great idea.
I mean, just how much can Intel possible care about us? Companies didn't care much about us when we refused to change to ie either... so I don't think they'll do anything that costs money just to prevent some maniac overclocking his pc using some weird south-korean cryo technology...
Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even if you take into account Hofstadter's Law
Isn't this kind of like if a car company were to install parts to prevent the use of aftermarket perfomance parts?
Does overclocking actually cause Intel any problems, like people making warranty claims after cooking their chips, or is it just to prevent people for getting performance without paying for it?
OK... so my last post wasn't the best... :(
But seriously, I made that circuit 2 months ago on a project at work in VHDL and I have the CVS logs to prove it. It's pretty standard - have a counter off a known clock to compare the counter off an unknown clock. I was using it to ensure my buddy's code was handing me start pulses at the appropriate rate. Mine even reported the high and low counts along with a true/false "good" signal.
I knew that patent stuff was getting out of hand but this is nuts. I am sure you can pick up any VHDL or Verilog cookbook and find a similar ckt.
I guess I was wrong before... Intel is on crack!
- RR
I should put something clever here. Maybe someday.
Chewing gum.
:-D No need to overclock that.
I like AMD stuff better, myself. My last three systems have all been AMD. I recently got a PII free, tho, so it's been put into service and is okay.
The majority of my work, however, is done on a proc made by IBM.
I want a Power5.
My next computer purchase for a linux box, I plan to get a mid-range chip, then underclock it a few notches as to reduce it's operating temperature and thus extend the reliability of the chip. I don't want to spend a fortune and worry my hair out over whether my CPU is running too hot or not. While I can understand Intel's concern with resellers of their CPUs falsing advertizing faster chips but in reality selling overclocked ones, I hope Intel realizes that it's better to allow consumers to be able to over/underclock the CPU, and instead pursue legal actions against resellers that fake CPU speeds, instead of going for an overpreventative hardware solution.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
Intel answered a few questions that was posted on Explosive Labs' forum.
Q2: Is Intel considering selling their processors unlocked anytime in the near future?
A2: We are always open to new ideas that make sense. This is something that we continue to look at, but we have no plans to do this any time in the near future. Obviously support costs for folks who push the knobs too far is one concern, remarking of parts by criminal elements is another.
They seem pretty open to the idea of overclocking. Perhaps these "criminal elements" are a big problem?
read the rest here
We're sure not many resellers do this kind of thing
Sounds to me like it's a good thing to do then! Why, if you can alienate the gaming market and waste some money at the same time, that's good business strategy, right?
Duct Tape and Plastic!!
a patent doesnt mean that its in their chips!
If it uses a 32kHz crystal (like mentioned in the patents), then these circumvention devices wouldn't be allowed under the DMCA:
38.4 kHz crystal (17% faster)
40 kHz crystal (22% faster)
What copyright you ask? The microcode, of course. That line of thinking is working so far for lexmark. But, we don't really need the DMCA to make crystals illegal. You can also get 34 (+3.7%), 36 (+10%), and 38 (+16%), and 44.1kHz (+35%) crystals easily...
A much better solution for intel would be to have a ring oscillator on the chip and compare the input frequency to that... but that would defeat the whole purpose -- you'd be limited to the actual rating of the chip (because faster chips would have faster ring oscillators), not the rating intel sells the chip at.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
Let's hope AMD doesn't try to copy this...
That's why Intel got a patent. I mean... DUH! This means AMD would have to license the technology from their competitor Intel, if they wanted to cripple their CPUs in the same way.
Why they would want to do that is beside the point. Intel's patent is what prevents AMD from just copying it if they want to.
Edith Keeler Must Die
You first state that raw sales are not the only factor (which I agree with) but then you go on to point out that overclockers cost money to AMD, and that this is a bad thing. What they purchase with that money is more than reputation; they get a lot of free press on enthusiast sites. This can influence the buying decisions of many people that do not overclock, which is a net gain. I think this press more than offsets the cost of a few RMAs.
The patent application already suggests one way of getting around it -- but only if you are willing to let your RTC run too fast. If you increase the RTC frequency to correpsond to your increased CPU frequency, the detection circuit will still see a counter value inbetween the minimum and maximum values. Your RTC runs fast, but now so does your CPU. And it would require changing the crystal for your RTC, so soldering is required.
From the article:
"The detection circuit 144 may utilize a fixed reference clock signal of a known frequency of 32.768 kHz from a real-time clock (RTC) quart crystal to detect possible "over-clocking" of a system (processor) clock signal. The fixed reference clock signal of 32.768 kHz may be assumed to be fixed (i.e., someone over-clocking would not adjust) since no resellers, distributors and/or end users may consider to run this RTC clock at a higher rate (to keep the ratio the same as with the system clock signal that is being over-clocked). For example, if the RTC clock is adjusted by resellers, distributors and/or end users at a higher rate, the time functions in terms of second, minutes, hours, day of week, date of month, month and year will be incorrect, and the RTC battery will drain more quickly."
This patent is filed in 1999!! Anyone remember when Intel released their overclock resistent Pentiums? They took that off the market rather quickly.
Current pentiums are hot; future ones will be volcanic. Overclocking the chip of the near future will lead to a plasma that will destroy the world as we no it. So, be glad Intel is looking out for you! -Iowa
"He who laughs last, didn't get the joke."-Cap
Will this disable the CPU if it is overclocked by even a few MHz, or does it have to be a huge increase? I've been looking for a new motherboard, and I've read reviews of several boards that overclock the CPU slightly right out of the box (as an easy way to boost the board's performance above the competition).
No trees were harmed in posting this message. However, a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced
Especially really stupid words. "inputed" is not a word. Neither is "hitted", another butchery common among gamers.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Overclocking means the CPU runs more risk of failing, which means another CPU will be bought to replace it.
Another CPU yes, but another CPU of another brand. "That machine with an Intel chip died within a month; let's try AMD next time..." Intel doesn't want that reputation on its name.
Will I retire or break 10K?
If you don't like clock locking then don't buy the processor. Intel can do any damn thing they want with their processors. By your logic we should still be moaning about the multiplier lock that Intel has used for many years. Why don't you get an AMD processor instead?
Fuck it! Now I'm a target!
Last time I trick out my ride.
The reason for this might have been to ensure the integrity of the signals within, and maybe meet the FCC specs for radiation; perhaps this is what is being aimed at here?
SIGBUS @ NO-07.308
if changing the clockspeed affects random number generators, it is likely Intel will be using this as a part of their DRM technology.
-gir-
Intel should release their own locked and overclocked cpus at a reduced price and warranty period...
1. When the pin is pulled, Mr. Grenade is no longer your friend.
2. Do not eat iPod shuffle.
Intel didn't get serious into implementing multiplier-locking scheme until irresponsible OEMs sell remarked systems. (300MHz Celeron sold as a 466, for example) I think this anger them a bit.
.sigs are useless; it doesn't protect you from imposters.
My pentium 133MHz is over clocked to 200MHz.
This is actually a GOOD thing. Keep in mind, there's a lot (at least, there used to be... but to some extent, there still is) a good deal of shady dealers out there who'd use overclocking as a way to sell "faster" for "cheaper". Of course, we know who's left holding the bag...
-- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
There is a difference between *forcing* the speed to be a certain speed and *checking* if the speed is wrong.
Read the patent. It was filed in 1999, back when the problem was occurring.
Well, my recent brush with a failed fan ment I underclocked my CPU, to alow it to function without overheating - I sincearly hope that Intel doesn't intend to prevent that.
Intel doesn't plan to block underclocking. The Pentium 4 processor includes a thermal diode that, when the temperature climbs above a safe level, activates a circuit that in effect clocks the CPU down to half speed.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I have seen several 20+ computers in the last year that where overclocked by a local whitebox reseller. Not only does it give Intel a bad reputation but it tarnishes the reputation of all whitebox resellers. The reseller in question has moved on, no doubt continuing to scam unsuspecting people. The authorities were notified, but so far have been unable to locate him.
Old7
Let's get a bunch of left wing protestors ans storm the factory. Well pull the plug on the PID code and the AOC code and make our own line of 2.4 Jigahertz chips and FSCK INTEL!!!
- Visio
- Word
- Eclipse
- Outlook
- Internet Explorer
- Real Player
- Exceed
The few measley MB of disk space you have left after installing all that software will quickly be eaten by your swapfile. The system will groan under the load (using even more cycles and memory to play theWipe away that nostalgic tear, start a compile, and go get a cup of coffee. Lord, the memories!
P.S. I can't do much about 286 mode. Try downloading and installing a lot of device drivers, or running Windows Update a couple times, if you want that kind of system instability.
Patents have NOTHING to do with DMCA. The patent covers a chipset with specific technical features. Unless you are manufacturing a chipset with those features, Intel can do nothing to you. This has absolutely nothing in common with the Lexmark case. Intel CAN'T go after individual OCers with this patent.
Sheesh! They'll be trying to patent the AND gate next.
--- Ban humanity.
Hey, its more business for AMD...
Looking at the diagram with the article, this appears to prevent people underclocking as well.
I have underclocked chips before to reduce power and cooling requirements, so this is annoying.
if (overclock_detected) { insert_no_ops(); }
If you remember correctly the pencil trick AMD has their own ways of preventing overclocking the CPU itself. But nothing prevents you from overclocking the motherboard.
I believe Intel probably has a function in the chip that will take whatever frequency that's given it and just convert it to the rated speed. Sort of a down converter. You can still OC the motherboard for extra performance I suppose.
For some of us old enough to remember, Intel once sold processors without a math coprocessor. The main catch was that there really was a coprocessor in each chip, it was just disabled. The point was to make many of the same chip, but then sell the normal chip for more money than the one with the disabled math coprocessor. More details on this can be found easily.
Now imagine Intel cranking out all the same processor capable of 3 Ghz+, but then using this technique to basically sell you a "lesser" version. It makes sense in a way, but I somehow feel that the customer is being taken advantage if this occurs.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
$rant=on;
// Aw, screw 'em. This is just another reason to
// completely drop all Intel products and go with
// AMD. Who does Intel think they are, anyway?
// *Microsoft?* Thank God there's some competition
// in the processor industry. Imagine if Microsoft
// had installed anti-productivity "enhancements"
// onto MS Office.
// {insert Microsoft-Office-Is-An-Anti-Productivity-Enhanceme nt joke here}
// One can really see the shine on the big brass
// ones that intel is sporting. Hurray for the
// mega-Corporations and their stockholders.
// $Reality_Comes_From_Above=God(Is_Calling_ There_Is_No_Bigger_Love)
$rant=off;
The preceding comment has been reviewed and declared to be compliant with HIPPA Phase II regulations.
AMD has been freq locking thier chips as much as they have been able for a VERY long time. A lot longer than Intel has been (Talking about multiplier locking here as actual freq locking is new).
Of course AMD will "copy" this, they are probably really bummed they didn't think of locking the actualy total freq first! (Well of course they "thought" about it, but I guess hand't found a practical solution yet)
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
Very true, but...
If I crack the OC protection and patent my crack, I can sue OCers for infringing my patent when they crack the OC protection. I'll just have to get in line behind Mr. Ashcroft who'll be prosecuting them for DMCA violation.Given the choice of being in line in front of or behind Mr. Ashcroft, I'd choose "behind".
Definitely "behind".You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
... but don't slam companies for the faults of their stupid customers. Case in point? I own several AMD processors. None are overclocked; none have any problems with either heat or stability at all. Period. Thus, the generic implication that AMD == heat == instability is false.
Admittedly, I did use quality components when mounting the proc - swiftech heatsink and Arctic Silver 3 - but don't blame the company for the fault of stupid/cheap users.
No more glowing Apple logo's. No more clear iBooks. No more lights. :(
That way, AMD will be even less likely to use this stupid technology and gain even more customers amongst the overclockers.
Intel looks like they're heading in the wrong direction. First, they tell us we're not ready for 64. Now we're not allowed to overclock our chips, either.
The russian pulls a bottle of vodka from his jacket, opens it, takes a quick pull then opens the window and throws the bottle out and shuts the window again. The cuban turns to the russian and says, "Why you throw away perfectly good vodka like that?" The russian replies, "in Russia, we have the best vodka in the entire world and more of it than we know what to do with, I can afford to do that, no problem."
The cuban considers what the russian has said then pulls a cigar from a pocket, lights it up, takes a couple puffs, opens the window, throws it out and shuts the window again. The russian is non-plused, but the salesman and the overclocker look amazedly at the cuban. The cuban says, "in Cuba we have the best cigars in all the world and so many of them they just get in the way."
The salesman and overclocker each consider this for a moment. Then the salesman opens the window and bodily throws the overclocker from the trai
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Doesn't overclocking void the warranty? If anything I'd think Intel would be pushing for overclockers to fry more chips so they'll have to buy a replacement.
I only see wasted R&D funds, loss of appeal to a small, but powerful (geeks often decide the systems a commpany will buy) and no benefits...
Yippie!
Why is intel still around? Their chips are over priced and their new chips are over powered for most office applications (a 450 MHz system is more than enough for word processing, web browsing, email, etc.)
-Derick
I hate spelling flames. They always have stupid mistakes. Like this won.
If you think RSA is secure, you obviously don't work for the NSA.
Hardware Asynchronous Logic is a Wonderful Thing.
Pogen Logic: If some members of a group express a certain view, it can be inferred that the entire group holds that view and it is then proper to label that view with the name of the group
XML causes global warming.
Make that small, but powerful market... and yes, I used the preview button. I'm just a moron.
-Derick
I just won't buy Intel processors that can't be overclocked. I'll buy AMD.
I know it won't do any good, but I sent an email off Intel's site to the company letting them know I've been an Intel customer for years (buying over 50 of their processors) but no longer will be due to their decision to block overclocking. I'll just buy from their competitor, AMD.
I don't see why they care anyway... if someone overheats their processor because it was overclocked, they'll just go out and buy a new one.
While it was not used correctly in the original sentence, it IS a word.
Yeah, I know, shameless Karma Whore but what the hell.
If VISTA is the answer, you didn't understand the question
How much money does Intel lose because of overclockers? Very little, I would think.
So why spend so much money to develop and implement something like this? To prevent enthusiests from overclocking there processors just doesn't add up. Maybe this is to fight shady vendors from selling overclocked systems? I remember this was a problem years ago. Is it still an issue?
Gads. Did anyone read the article at the inquirer?
This super-ingenious protection is nothing more than a 32.768khz clock. I'm assuming it's internal to the cpu, since if it wasn't you could beat this thing with a nail file.
During 1 clock cycle, count the system clock. Compare through 2 ripple adders using (probably) 1's or 2's compliment. If clock_count is greater than max_speed_rating, or clock_count is less than min_speed_rating, lock her up.
Could probably be done in VHDL in one screenful. Whooptedoo, Intel.
That being said, way to go! Now nobody else can use this cutting-edge hypersonic mission-critical technology to clock protect. Like for instance...AMD. It'd sure be a shame if it got around that AMD were now and forever overclockable. A real shame. I'm sure that'll hurt their sales a lot. ;)
Weaselmancer
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Your argument against the parent post is correct. However your example is clearly not the same as the technology that the parent refers to.
:-P
I would also put it forward that the parent had no idea what he was talking about though.
When trying to encrypt media in things like DVD's, satelite feeds etc etc etc you need to encrypt the data so that the bad guys can't interrupt it and you need to decrypt it so the legitamate users can read it.
I think this is what the parent post sorta meant. (I don't believe that really)
RSA encryption is not the same thing. If someone gave someone to you encrypted with RSA encryption and also gave you the decryption key it would be cracked. Not the encryption itself but the decryption key can then be compromised. This is the reason that most people today believe it is impossible to safely protect media from copying but still allow it's use.
The Intel thing is different again as I assume (having not RTFA) that the protection would be embedded on the chip. You would need a pretty steady hand to modify something on a CPU at the scale it is fabricated I would guess.
Also, the protection is not trying to protect someone copying data so encryption technologies are not the trick. It is trying to stop you using more CPU cycles per second. I think this could probably be done in a way that is not accessible (price wise) to the average consumer. Let's face it the only reason overclocking is popular at all is because it is free. If it cost much more money you would just buy faster CPU's on day one.
The overclocking/underclocking deturant they patented is not, by patent, necessarily "on the Chip". That would be a technical break-thru. If they could put the reference clock signal "on The chip" there would be no need for the system to provide it. The CPU could then tell the buss what speed to run at instead of the other aspects of the chipset and motherboard defining the buss speed.
From the Patent:
"a chipset coupled to the processor which comprises a reference clock signal for providing real-time clock, and an over-clock deterrent mechanism for detecting over-clocking of said clock signal based on said reference clock signal, and deterring said over-clocking of said clock signal by either disabling operations of the processor or reducing performance of the processor in response to detection of said over-clocking of said clock signal"
To me it just looks like the introduction of another point of failure.
I think you don't really understand the definition of "obvious" as it applies to patents.
The specific method used is NOT obvious. There are common factors between different possible methods, as you pointed out, such as the need to measure the external clock, and compare it somehow. Specifically how those things are accomplished, and a number of other factors, are what is patented. This is like saying I can invent a new can opener, because any can opener has to cut into the can and then open it. Well, duh. What I'm patenting is how my method uniquely extends upon, or somehow differs from other methods of opening the can. Some might use a large butcher knife hanging from a string, some might use a laser. In either case the method can be patented because they are unique and non-obvious in their specific implementation.
For a really excellent book about the devopment of technology, and indirectly how this relates to patents, read The Evolution of Useful Things by Henry Petroski.
Of course, applying such a circuit to foil attempts at overclocking a microprocessor may be sufficiently narrow in scope and novel in idea that the patent might stand. Sucks to be AMD, I guess (even though I like their CPUs).
You could've hired me.
No, this is a good patent because even though it is obvious it is HARDWARE. So it cannot classify as a bad SOFTWARE patent.
Except..,
It was probably designed by some layout software, and so maybe it is really a software patent...,
except.., oh, I just can't tell the difference between a good patent (good witch of the east) and a bad patent (wicked witch of the west) anymore.
Oh no I just pee'd in my pants.
Ohhhh, Toto!
In other news Timing attack against RSA private keys....
I plan on chewing their asses out for selling me defective parts, and will demand new ones. If the computer can't compile a program without a segmentation error, it's parts are bad or clocked too high.
Anyways, if Intel wants to patent this technology, fine. Just so long as they don't prevent people from underclocking. Helps out Intel and the consumers, who get fucked over when OEM's overclock a CPU and sell it as if it was the real deal.
As for the patent itself, I don't know much about preventing overclocking. I suspect, however, that this is a very obvious "innovation", which shouldn't be patentable in the first place. Furthermore, why should they patent it? It is not a feature that either OEMs or consumers will be wanting.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Intel just needs to add an instruction that returns the "true" clockspeed rating to a register.
Then any software under any OS can read it, even DOS.
And since it's just one piddly instruction, it would be a simple matter to create a "clockspeed check" utility.
A protection system that makes any system on the planet that gets overclocked scream bloody murder isn't necessary. All that is needed is for a reliable way for the user to download a trusted application, fire it up, and see whether their PC is clocked properly or not.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
..if, of course, AMD does not follow suit.
Will they? Problem is, there is not scientific research in the field of how much relaxed your protection is vs. how much this helps adoption of your product. Let me clarify: the relatively easy mod-chip-ability of the Playstation 1 and 2 seem to have contributed to the popularity of these consoles. Sure, a modded Playstation can accept copied game CDs, but in the overall picture it might have paid off for Sony.
Another example: Microsoft products such as the Windows-es and Office. It appears that a relatively easy copy-ability of these products has certainly increased their ubiquitousness, and perhaps as a result of this, generated more profit for Microsoft than it would have otherwise.
Actually, I can imagine that Microsoft perhaps has done some research in this regard, and that they would never publish the results if they did confirm the supposition outlined above.
Sigged!
If you think RSA is secure, you obviously don't work for the NSA.
Did you not read where I explained that RSA isn't uncrackable?
You totally lost my point. I can't anticipate everyway one can lose my point, so I'm putting the burden on you to take the time to comprehend what you read.
When you feel the urge to be pedantic, don't do it!
Why not just code the rated clockrate into the cpu, under the vendor string or such, aswell as printing it onto the surface.. so that if an unscrupulous vendor sells you an overclocked cpu claiming it`s a genuine higher clock model, you can tell... Also have it somehow detect having been overclocked, so people cant clock their cpus to crazy rates, fry them and then claim a warrantee repair. other than that:
Overclocking increases cpu sales and reduces warrantee repairs, overclocking is always done at your own risk, if you fry the cpu its your fault and you can go buy a new one.
A chip being easily clockable often encourages buyers...
The ability to overclock doesnt lower cpu sales, most people who overclock do so to be at the cutting edge of performance, thus they buy the fastest cpu they can, and THEN overclock it even more.
All in all, overclocking should be a win for cpu makers, not something they should encourage.. but they shouldnt try to prevent it either.
Afterall, an overclocked cpu isnt harming anyone... It`s just like adding a turbo to your car.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
The specific method used is NOT obvious.
It should be non obvious if it is the subject matter covering a method claim (i.e a general method claim on cutting open a can would not pass PTO examination).
There are common factors between different possible methods,
Where are those denoted by limitations in claim 1?
"1. A mechanism for detecting and deterring over-clocking of a clock signal for use in a processor, comprising:
a detection circuit adapted to detect over-clocking of a clock signal for use in the processor based on a reference signal; and
a prevention circuit adapted to prevent over-clocking of said clock signal by limiting or reducing performance of the processor in response to detection of said over-clocking of said clock signal."
Seems pretty obvious to me.
as you pointed out, such as the need to measure the external clock, and compare it somehow. Specifically how those things are accomplished,
This is precisely what was asserted as obvious by previous post.
and a number of other factors,
Huh?
are what is patented. This is like saying I can invent a new can opener, because any can opener has to cut into the can and then open it.
Your claims must specify, serve notice, on how your new can opener differs from previous art.
Well, duh. What I'm patenting is how my method uniquely extends upon, or somehow differs from other methods of opening the can.
Again, gotta be in the claims. Nothing non obvous in claim 1.
That is standard patent boiler-plate. Every single patent uses the first claim as an overview of the device or method, then subsequent claims (which you left out) specify the method in which the first claim is accomplished.
A different anti-overclocking device that also uses a method of measuring and comparing the clock speed would reference this patent, then describe how it differs from the specific methods used therein. Hell, the patent in question even references other patents from which claim 1 is derived, such as this one.
Listen, It says Intel has a patent for the technology. Maybe they want to enable it for business desktops for large companies. Maybe they will set up a structure so that you can purchase a chip with or without a lock (costing less for an unlocked chip). You don't know any of this from the fact that they have established a patent. I think the idea itself is good, before everyone freaks out and bashes Intel...wait for them to announce a WAR on overclockers! I doubt it will happen.. Overclockers may be more likely to consume more caffeine then your regular users but I don't think they pose a threat to Intel as a chip maker.
-- Disclaimer: I can't really back up anything I post on
And for that matter, 1999 ? That was 4 years ago, which may have been the cusp of when it was occurring, but I think the newer generations of CPU's, and changed in the market itself, have brushed much of that necessity for this "technical achievement".
What this, when you have a pair of pants and don't let any of your roommates borrow them?
My 1.6a ghz is running at 2.6 ghz. stock fan etc. now that is a overclock! ;)
-Less than previous products. /are/ in use, I will be able to point to the old price as proof, sure.
-By that logic, taking it out of the box turns it -into something you didnt buy.
-This is something which is not currently in use, so I suppose that once they
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
The "reason" for this being pursued was because, en masse, some taiwanese and singapore distribution houses were buying bulk, shaving off the silk screening, re-masking the parts, and then selling the parts by the crate.
The fact that THEY allowed this behavior to occur because of their own distribution practices contributed to it happening. So I don't think their reputation was really as marred as people here keep saying.
Hey, do you think if they really lost THAT much money, that they'd be able to put on some of the advertising that they do on TV ? When was the last time you say an AMD Commercial on during the SuperBowl...do the math.
I've talked with companies like TI(Texas Instruments) about their similar reactions to user/programmer exploitation of their technology and hardware.
They fought it as much as Intel and maybe AMD seem to be fighting it, but eventually learned to embrace it after the people just overcame all of the obstacles and programming limitations they tried to force on the system.
Years later, they are utilizing this influence and interest by the user to promote products that are very popular amongst both end users and license/site users such as teachers and schools. It's become an invaluable teaming of these two rivals.
Why cannot they simply see that consumer interaction is not bad but healthy. Not like these users are going to try and take over their business, they just want to find new uses.
It'd be kind of hard for AMD to copy Intel now that Intel owns the patent to this technology. Wouldn't that be patent infringement?
X86, AMD has to pay intel for that, do they not?
And for the record...if I paid for a CPU, it's mine, not theirs, I can cook it, fry it, ice it, do whatever I want to with it. If I know that it will void my right to any claims against them, then they should shut up and not bitch that I'm "hurting their poor baby cpu".
Geez ! Most overclockers probably take better care of their CPU's ( Water Coolers, Peltier rigs, AIR CONDITIONING COILS ), than your average Joe SixPack that has their box sitting. They spend more money in PROTECTING their investment.
So don't go off farting that overclocking is going to hurt their intellectual property. At least come up with a VALID argument, before you pronounce something obviously as inane and flagrantly Anti-Consumer as this patent.
why would they care if us hardcore geeks were to overclock a system every now and then? we don't represent the masses they target with their products and it voids the warranty anyway... how do they lose when i overclock? unless they are worried about sellers of overclocked machines..
mix_master_mike
vafrous
Read the subject. Can we all now say "greed"?
-Slashdot Junky
.
Landfill Mining Co.
Managing the (Un)natural Resources of Tomorrow
Know thy customer....
The guys that are doing this overclocking are also the ones buying the fastest chips Intel makes so they can overclock them.
Good, you made there choice just so much easier to decide to avoid intel...
It's a no brainer now. Must be taking tips from Microsoft. Piss your customers off and see how long you remain profitable 101.
Restricting underclocking (if it happens) would most likely be done to push the mobile editions of their various processors.
No "quick and dirty" FSB-based underclocking of a desktop CPU in a notebook - Nope, gotta buy the expensive mobile version and use SpeedStep.
I wouldn't mind this so much, since desktop CPUs should never have been allowed in notebooks in the first place, but the alternative (SpeedStep) utterly sucks. Transmeta does clock/voltage ramping much better than Intel does. (SpeedStep only has "full tilt" and "slow", while Transmeta CPUs have everything in between.)
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
I think this is a questionable technology to invest money in. Why spend however many hundreds of thousands of dollars this must have cost to alienate a very small but dedicated chunk of your userbase?
I doubt overclocking causes a substantial loss of profits through people doing it in lieu of an upgrade. The very few people I know that overclock processors regularly do it on old boxes that they use as playthings. They always have a very up-to-date computer that they aren't overclocking, they just take their old ones and see what they can do with them. These people wouldn't have gone out to buy a new processor for these old boxes if they couldn't overclock, they'd have just used them as-is. So by preventing them from overclocking, you're just making them more likely to buy a competitor's chip for their new boxes. I doubt sales would show any significant decrease from these hobbyists buying other chips but why turn away even one sale without financial benefit elsewhere?
Certainly manufacturers aren't regularly overclocking processors. It was Kryotech's main business when they started and they don't even sell an overclocked PC anymore.
The only reason I could possibly see for this would be to prevent accidental overclocking and I can't imagine that being a significant problem. Very few novices go out and roll their own PC's. Certainly not enough that there's a widespread problem with people damaging their hardware.
Don't get me wrong, I don't bother to overclock my machines so I don't mind them putting this into their chips. I just don't understand what would make this technology worth investing in.
RSA doesn't need to be cracked for most applicatios, since the real-world deployments be cracked instead. From the inside out, here's a few: timing attacks, bad PRNGs, a bad timestamper that lets people submit arbitraty messages be signed, people talking on an STU-III before going secure, any number of Outlook or IE bugs that let arbitrary code be run, a user who got tricked into running BO, bad physical security, espionage, or just plain bribery.
Similarly, maybe Intel's device gets its reference timeclock from the chipset, or a crystal external to the chip. So what if that lead is cut? What if it's replaced with a slower crystal? There's bound to be implementation issues (if this is ever implemented).
The core technology may be secure, but that doesn't mean the system is secure. Read Crypto-Gram; Bruce talks about attacks against systems all the time, rarely discussing attacks against the ciphers.
Except the word wasn't "imputed" it was meant to be "inputted" but came out as "inputed", neither of which are very desirable.
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
There is no way for software to query the nominal clock speed of the chip. A real 1.4GHz chip and a 1.2GHz chip running at 1.4GHz look exactly the same to the OS. Remember, CPUs of all different speeds roll off the same assembly line - it's only after testing that MHz ratings are assigned.
(I suppose the manufacturer could perform some kind of irreversable alteration to the chip when the clock speed is assigned, but AFAIK nobody does that yet)
Apple have new systems out soon that support *unknowen* CPUs
~~
AMD are pushing 64Bit
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Intel are holding back on 64bit and have now patented hardware to limit overclocking.
~~
Its all a bit to complicated for the average joe geek aint it!
But what im thinking is: Intel have HyperThreading, and over clocking a HT chip can lead to very big increases (ie like 2% speed per every 1% overclock) on there part, its a good move to patent this technology, we already have tech sites overclocking to 4.440ghz and thats with out the liquid nitrogen.
and all you AMD fan boys please remember, your CPUS DID come with ANTI overclocking countermeasures. You have to visibly void your warrenty to overclock, current intels have no such mecanisms, only a locked mulitplyer....
Si
Keep in mind that a patent is only good when it is ENFORCEABLE. Does this mean they will go after consumers? Probably not. This just keeps other chip makers from implementing an "anti-overclocking system" similar to the one they have disclosed in their patent. So unless you manufacture/design circuits, you have nothing to worry about (except it'll probably be more difficult to overclock Intel chips). Someone on this thread discussed the possibility that it might be because the vendors are selling overclocked Intel chips meaning when they fail, it makes Intel look bad. I think that's probably one of the main reasons they have patented this. Keep other chip manufacturers from implementing an anti-overclocking system thus making their chips more un-reliable therefore Intel builds it's reputation as "stable" processors.
I don't claim to be right, it's just my $0.02.
S P A Z
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Cracking hardware is easy. You just get a hammer and... wait... you meant cracking the overclock protection, nevermind.
Centralization breaks the internet.
So they are patenting melting?
Table-ized A.I.
if countA - countB > threasHold then overClockedWarn()
Hmm... if I buy Intel I can't overclock, if I buy AMD I can... guess what I gonna buy?
girl
I'd expect from someone who'd patent a straw with a one-way valve in it to prevent little kids from blowing bubbles in their milk - or a way to make Oreo cookies stick together so you can't twist them open....
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
Had tbirds between 1000 mhz and 1200 mhz in various flavors and several XP's my buddies and I have installed in the past... not ONE has even pretended to crack yet... even with nasty heatsinks like the Global Win FOP38i and WBK series. and those had horrible clips. However using a drill and a silver chain and keychain I've made me one HICE keychain piece and a pendant out of several old chips. -DaedalusHKX
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
>>GUI: Path to enlightenment or straight-jacket?
Neither. A gui is just another way to get work done.
My mistake, I thought what you describe here was already being done.
There is a project to crack the RSA encryption key on Xbox right now, using distributed computing. its @ operationprojectx.com. they've tried about 1.5 trillion keys so far.
Legalize Everything. www.infoshop.org
Get a clue before you post.
AMD already has their own technology to prevent overclocking -- it's called "letting out the magic blue smoke".
Ooh, I LOVE being called an ass-clown. It usually means I've iether pissed someone off, or they've missed my point entirely. Sometimes both.
I didn't say that overclocking would hurt their IP. I said that when they came up with a specific manner for stopping overclocking, then not patenting it would hurt their IP.
Let me repeat it again! WHATEVER YOU THINK OF INTEL FOR IMPLEMENTING THIS IDEA, WHAT THEY ARE PATENTING IS A VALID TECHNICAL TECHNIQUE, WORTHY OF A PATENT. What you want to do with your CPU has nothing WHATSOEVER to do with the validity of the patent.
Anti-consumer patent? I wouldn't agree, but it doesn't matter--they're entitled to come up with patents as anti-consumer as they want, as long as they're valid from a patent office perspective.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
WHY would they do this? why are they against overclocking? isn't it the overclockers problem if they kill the chip?
>RSA isn't uncrackable. It's not designed to be uncrackable.
Neither is a One Time Pad. Unless you're dumb enough to give the customer the pad... which is what so very many companies do. All the time.
How do you think most digital TV gets cracked? If it's worth it, it will be cracked. Hell, for the last big crack at TV they electron microscoped and reverse-engineered the actual smartcard (which contains a key).
With people willing to go to those extremes, anything that's supposed to be a neat little encypted package will get cracked if it's valuable enough.
That is, unless you don't let the customer have the key in any form whatsoever. In which case the item is totally useless, so why bother?
Encryption is only secure if the intended recipient can be completely trusted. Otherwise kiss goodbye to anything of "value".
>Maybe this won't be technically uncrackable, but what will one have to go through to crack it? Cracking Hardware isn't like cracking Software.
Considering the amount of effort scammers put into remarking chips back in the day, it will happen. Imagine selling a P4 1.7 Ghz as a P4 2.2 Ghz and having it fully authenticated as "the real thing". Rake in $$$ hand over fist.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
Lets hope AMD does adopt this technology IBM has patented, then maybe we can see the end of kiddies blowing up thier CPUs to get more "'hurtz" outa their l33t boxes.
I wonder how many RMAs those companies have to deal with because some fool burned his/her CPU out trying to overclock, instead of spending a very small amount of money to upgrade to a better processor?
"i got my 1GHz athlon to overclock to 1.33GHz!#" big deal, the cost difference is like $20, and you get the added stability of equipment that was meant to run at those speeds.
I think AMD will be wise to follow this. This patent gives Intel an advantage of having a higher profit margin if it decide to do this since no more over clocking. To keep up and protect the profit margin, AMD may have to find some ways to do the same thing.
On the other hand, it's a somewhat narrow patent - it doesn't prevent their competition from making chips that Go Slower, or Go Faster, or using other techniques to Not Go Faster. So it's not a total non-loss :-) Now, as far as how obvious it is or how overbroad the claims are, I'm not a chip designer, so I'll shut up now....
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
So now some people will do hardware hacks on their PC's again. On a better note though here is a silly question: I take it that this "protection Circuit" will be out side of said CPU right? If that's the case can't you just rig up a way to ground the signal being produced and inject you own constant frequency? I mean this whole thing is dependant of a return freq, so if you give it what it wants there should not be a problem, except with the thermal protection also used to "deter" the overclocking.
This SIG pulled due to lack of funding. (This damn war is costing too much!)
So its possible for me to choose a random key that decrypts your pr0n locker first try. But I'm not even going to try because that would use up all my luck in next weeks lottery.
You have just violated my patent on making funny posts to /.
I can understand Intel's desire for this technology. I was working at the Folsom campus when one of my co-workers in the IVL (part of EUCD at the time) decided to see what would happen if he overclocked some spare processors we had around. (They would pass out chips like candy to some of us "Here, see what you can do with these") At the time however remember that the "fast" chips were the 66 Mhz 486 DX2 and 66 Mhz Pentium. The verdict, (which found its way into a memo, then a report...) "Speed Kills". Basicly at that time Overclocking was officially considered "A Bad Thing". I bet this technology has its origins, somewhere to that memo circa '94 or so. If there was going to be any clock multipling going on, they wanted it to happen ON CHIP. It was around this time that we got our first prototype for the 100MHZ (25x4) DX4.
There are two kinds of fool. One says, This is old, and therefore good. And one says, This is new, and therefore better.
I don't think Intel is locking chips to please the big business gods, I mean after all, the only PC resellers that were selling overclocked PCs were small mom-n-pop shops, and how many big businesses *really* go down to the local mom-n-pop store to buy a few hundred PCs? No, that doesn't make sense. Could they use this as a selling point? .. Eh, maybe, but how many people out there even know what "overclocking" is, and if they did know would they even worry about it? I'd say no to that too, I don't think people are calling Dell to be reassured their new PC isn't going to be overclocked.
That only leads to one conclusion (that I can see): they must be doing this to stop that 0.1% of the public that overclocks their PC.
Businesses don't buy PCs from companies that might try to sell overclocked PCs, and the vast majority of the PC buying public don't even know what overclocking is so they're not concerned about it, so stopping overclockers seems to be the only reason they're doing this.
Well that just takes the fun out of building PCs doesn't it? Hell I might have to go back to AMD and their POS chips that crack.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Theres a little difference between a 1600+ (1.4ghz) and something like an XP 3000+ at 2.16ghz when it comes to producing heat. If I was going to shell out for an XP 3000+ I'd want something better than an $8 hsf on it. I have P4 1.8ghz (nw-a) cpu's that idle at 32C and peaks at around 36-38C on a hot day. (about 38C day) with the standard intel hsf. not meaning to start an intel vs amd fanboy war, my point is like others have said, as the cpu's get smaller (0.09 micron anyone?) the heat issue will become critically important.
//dD
My new EPIA 533Mhz shitbox scores 94.6 in "BYTE UNIX Benchmarks (Version 4.1.0)" while my Celeron 333Mhz dinosaur scores 100.2. Kernel compiles are even slower.
"Compares well" = "I'm using hardware decoding so the CPU is mostly idle."
A beowulf cluster of these would be sucktacular.
Opportunity knocks. Karma hunts you down.
you DO realize it is slashdot right?
Just replace de 32Khz reference Xtal with another faster, or even a external clock.
scotch logic: A statement about groupthink is obviously intended to be applied to every single member of that group.
> RSA will probably be cracked on some level in the future, but it realistically it won't be cracked in this decade or two or five, which is good close enough for most applications.
You are missing the possibility of someone discovering some mathematical property, theorem, or whatever that makes it possible to attack RSA, triple DES or whatever in a completely different manner. This possibility always exists, always, and it is the reason why encryption standards have to be revised quite often.
> Cracking Hardware isn't like cracking Software.
Yes it is. And very often it is a lot easier. I've often thought about it, and I think that the reason has to do with the fact that there are a lot less good electronics engineers than there are software engineers. Nowadays "everybody" has a PC at home, but not many of us have a complete electronic development lab (oscilloscope, logic analyzer, power supplies, PCB manufacturing..) I get the impression that software security has evolved quite a lot more because of lots more people trying to crack it.
pogen logic:groupthink != groupthink
XML causes global warming.
At this point, a gentle reminder is in order...
(besides the fact that IANAL)
Intel and HP do not own the IP for the IPF/Itanium/IA64 architecture and implementation. They instead set up a holding company for the IP, that licenses it back to them.
This way, IP on IPF does not come under any existing cross-licensing agreements.
In plain English, IPF is *the most proprietary* CPU architecture out there. If IPF indeed "wins" the CPU wars and competition withers, Intel and HP will have extraordinary power to write their revenue plans.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Although you need better cooling then you did before (almost all processors require better cooling anyway) you don't need super cooling to get awesome overclocks nowadays. Infact you can manage with air cooling that doesn't kill your ears.
Your celeron overclocked well because the 300a model was basically a higher end core then the p2's at that mhz with part of the cache disabled.
The sweet spot for that celeron like modern processors is when manufacturers give a lower label to higher end cores.
Here are some current sweetspots:
Athlon XP 2100- the new tbred core in these easily clocks to 400 mhz better then the original palomino cores. With some good cooling you can overclock to 2.4 ghz which is the equivalent of a athlon 3000+. With new nf2 motherboards you can also overclock your fsb signifincantly
Athlon XP 1700- These are the best values, they clock just under the 2100's but a 2.1 ghz processor for $50 bucks is just way to tempting. The 2.1 ghz is like a 2600+.
Intel Sub 2 ghz a models like the 1.8a- These are the northwood cores sold under 2 ghz. These babies have the capability to go over 50% higher. I've seen some get to 3 ghz with stock cooling.
Note that these are just typical overclocking results, some will fare better and some may get a lemon of a processor that just doesn't do well. In most cases you will be fine though.
Hmmm... Pie...