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Intel's Anti-Overclocking Technology Simplified

Posted by michael on from the why-johnny-can't-speed dept.

John Thorensen writes "Found a fantastic article on Intel's recent Anti-Overclocking patent at Fastsilicon.com. Worth the read, as it also explains some of the technical and ethical issues of overclocking. Good to see that some tech journalists can still write material understandable by an average person."

9 of 319 comments (clear)

  1. Overclocking a violation of the DMCA by Honest+Man · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Beware - soon we will find people who sell overclocking devices going to jail for violating DMCA.

    (yes, I forgot my password here.. again lol)
    -Honestman

    1. Re:Overclocking a violation of the DMCA by j3110 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because modifying hardware you purchased is stealing. You should buy the better model.

      Tune your car to get better mileage, go to jail for not buying a car with better gas mileage.

      Seriously though, it's going to happen.

      --
      Karma Clown
  2. Ethical issues? by Gothmolly · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What ethical issues are there relating to overclocking? Overclocking a chip, and selling it at a higher speed is already called "fraud". There's nothing ethical or unethical about overclocking. Is redlining your car's engine unethical? Stupid maybe, but that's about it...

    --
    I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
    1. Re:Ethical issues? by The_K4 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actyually, having had expeirence with this, it's not "fraud".....and I can explain why. This dealer advertised and sold a machine of a specific speed, they didn't sell a system DESGINED for that speed. I know someone who got taken by buying some overclocked machines, when this small buisness owner attempted to sue the computer dealer, the judge threw it out, sayign there was no fraud. If he had said it was a system DESIGNED for that speed it would have been fraud.

  3. How about overclocking detection? by elwinc · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Maybe the fairest thing for Intel to do is find some way to dectect and record if a chip is ever overclocked. The basic problem with overclocking is those unscrupulous folks who drive a chip to it's death, then try and take it in for a refund. If the chip could detect and record warranty-voiding settings, then overclockers wouldn't be able to void the warranty.

    Personally, I'd like to be able to underclock better so it would be easier to built a really quiet PC. Although there are a few articles about it, silent PCs are an underserved area of the market.

    --
    --- Often in error; never in doubt!
  4. Re:Not so fast by HamNRye · · Score: 5, Funny

    It says fast silicon, not fast ethernet....

    What good is a smart bomb and a dumb president??

  5. join us next week on slashdot when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ..we discuss the ethical implications of using your teabags twice instead of once, and we explore the high-tech solutions to this problem, and the clear connection to terrorism.

  6. The article is wrong by Hannibal_Ars · · Score: 5, Informative

    I don't think that the author of this article actually understands the patent in question. Specifically, the reference signal is absolutely not generated on the CPU die, as the author claims. Intel's new scheme is still dependent on the chipset's cooperation.

    Anyway, I won't go into anymore detail here, because I explain the patent and its implications for overclocking in the following Ars news post:

    http://arstechnica.com/archive/news/1048630320.h tm l

    --
    Senior CPU Editor | Ars Technica | http://arstechnica.com/
  7. Too Much Effort, could satisfy everyone: by rkent · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ... An over-clock deterrent mechanism of a chipset which comprises an over-clock detection circuit for detecting over-clocking of a system ... and an over-clock prevention (thwarting) circuit.

    Okay, to implement this, they're including a reference clock on the chip, which means that processors of different (marketed) speeds will have to be made with a different process (which has maybe been true for a long time, but I was lead to believe that, eg in the pIII days, the wafers that failed 1Ghz just got sold as 833MHz, etc).

    So instead of doing all these calculations to decide if you're "speeding," and then doing even *more* calculations to penalize you, why don't they just expose this reference clock speed in a special interrupt call? And maybe even the relation to the operating speed (eg, "you are overclocked by 10%")? Then, they could release an app that would tell you how fast your computer was SUPPOSED to be, and how fast it IS.

    Then, OC'ers could have their cake, and no one else could be taken advantage of by unscrupulous OEMs who overclock to bump up their margins. I concede the point that "most average people will never check anyway," but just having the information *available* should protect Intel from liability, which seems to be the essential idea. Plus, the threat of having the practice exposed at any time should stop at least some of the overclock-resellers.