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EU Officials Raid Intel Offices
Eukariote writes "As part of the ongoing antitrust investigations, EU officials have raided Intel offices as well as offices of a number of IT firms manufacturing or selling computers. This follows the recent ruling by Japan's Fair Trade Commission declaring Intel's exclusionary practices illegal as well as the lawsuit filed by AMD."
A bit overzealous term.
They walked in, asked for documents they had called about. Intel's lawyers were there waiting because they had been notified, and handed over everything they asked for.
So it wasn't a swat team breaking down doors catching barret with has pants down in front of a goat while grove was cramming confidential documents into his mouth.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
AMD's argument wasn't that different code was generated.. but rather that two different code paths were generated (in the same binary); on highly optimized, the other less so. When, at run time, an AMD processor is detected the less optimized path is chosen.
From page 40 of AMD's complaint:
ie. the problem isn't manifest at compile time but rather run time. So your simple test isn't actually testing anything.There was a similar case brought against Pillsbury by Ben & Jerry's which more closely mirrors the case between AMD and Intel. Pillsbury (who own Haagen-Daz) were trying to drive Ben & Jerry's out of the premium ice cream market by refusing to sell products to stores giving freezer space to Ben & Jerry's. Ben & Jerry took Pillsbury to court and eventually won the case, forcing Pillsbury to pay damages and to allow Ben & Jerry's to be sold next to Haagen-Daz.
They're not checking for feature existence, they're checking for manufacturer. If a processor reports that it supports a particular feature, the compiler should use that feature. Their compiler is generating code that does not check feature flags, it checks for the manufacturer.
They (Intel) shouldn't be expected to make a main compiler for AMD's CPU's, no. But that's NOT what AMD's contending. What AMD's contending is that Intel's compiler isn't just optimized for Intel CPUs, it's de-optimized for AMD CPUs- as in, it picks the worst possible instructions for code when it knows that an AMD is being executed against. Technically, it shouldn't care about what CPU so long as the same runs x86 architechture CPU- it should be peak speed, etc. on a P3 or P4 or whatever Intel CPU, but shouldn't be running utterly crippled on other brands of the same architechture. What is happening with the Intel C++ compiler is that they're picking 8-bit instructions and the like in as many cases as they can get away with. This means you're doing memory copies in the form of byte copies instead of word copies, etc. That is a degredation of performance on the order of 20-75% (or more!) for those sets of instructions and I can guarantee that if they're doing 8-bit stuff (And this has been confirmed by alternate sources, by the way...), it explains why it's NOT happy on an AMD64 machine- 8-bit would choke the CPU hard because it eschews the 8-bit modes to accomplish 64-bitness... I've encountered some drivers for Windows XP in some of my porting work that BARFED on my AMD64 machine (the only machine I typically run XP on since it's my reference machine for Linux game porting, etc...)- when it was installed on an Intel machine and an VIA machine, it ran just fine.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Surprising as it may seem to you, AMD isn't really doing all that well in the PC market. Or at least they argue they're not. Given the panorama when I enter any retailer that sells computers, I agree. Not one single AMD machine in sight. Sure, I bought the pieces and assembled myself an athlon 64 machine. But the question is: how many more people would do that? /.ers might, some non-slashdotting hard-core gamers might. But not that many more people. And Intel's market share is still WAY WAY too big for everybody's sake. A much more balanced situation is not only possible (ATi and nVidia seem pretty balanced to me), it'also advisable. At least, the perceived improvements in graphics cards technology, and the clear standards built around them (OpenGL and DirectX, like it or not) make for a much much nicer user experience.
Sure, Microsoft is a pretty powerful monopoly as well. But the question should never be "hey, he's infringing too, why is it that I'm punished and he's not?". Punishment should eventually reach all. But since AMD processors, are fully transparent drop-in replacements for Intel processors, and that makes Intel's supposed monopoly that much more susceptible to attack.
On a related note, when a full-fledged corporate migration to AMD is perfectly feasible without any significative bumps, but vendor limitations prevent it because of Intel's purported pressure, that is a much, much clearer indication of foul play than an already complicated switch from Windows to *BSD or Linux not happening supposedly because of Microsoft's pressure.
Besides, it's not a matter of "They're doing well", it's a matter of "they'd arguably be doing much better if Intel didn't repeatedly screw them over in illegal ways"
I think there are plenty of industries where companies charge more for a competing version of a product. Dining (Outback vs. Morton's), software development (Accenture vs. Infosys), automobiles (BMW vs. Ford), you get the point.
Neither Outback nor Morton's have 90% of the restaurant market. Neither Accenture nor Infosys have 90% of the development market. Neither BMW nor Ford have 90% of the auto market. Intel do have 90% of the desktop processor market. That's why it's different.
And Ford are not building roads that detect whether the car driving on them is a BMW and cause it to burn more gas if it is. Accenture are not writing programs that delete any Infosys software they find installed. Morton's are not putting chemicals in their food that cause food poisoning in any customers who have eaten at Outback in the last month. Intel are bullying OEMs into selling only Intel products, and tricking software companies into releasing programs that, entirely unbeknownst to the software company, contain what is essentially a trojan that causes them to run suboptimally on AMD processors. That's why it's different.
If it was just a case of Intel's pricing policy, nobody would have any complaints. The problem is that Intel are engaged in illegal anticompetitive practices that are shielding their high prices from the free market, while denying AMD any benefit from whatever pricing policy they adopt. That is not good for anyone, least of all you and me. That's why it's illegal, and that's why Intel and AMD users alike will benefit from lower prices all round if Intel are made to stop.
Does that make any more sense now? I don't expect my arguments to change your mind, but I hope you will at least concede now that the other points of view are not as irrational as you appear to have been thinking.
Microsoft's influence in high places allowed them to avoid punishment, despite being found guilty in the DOJ case.
That same influence is now being targetted _against_ Intel.
As you point out, AMD is doing quite well these days. They are close buddies with Microsoft, they have their own CPU designs which are competitive with Intel's, and AMD CPUs have been selected by various large buyers, such as Sun.
So for AMD to fight Intel in court right now is a risky move that makes little sense. AMD could end up pulling a SCO.
And the analogy to SCO runs deeper, because, in both cases, you find Microsoft pulling the strings.
While it makes little sense for AMD to fight Intel right now, it makes perfect sense for Microsoft to push AMD (and the government) to do it.
That's because Intel has become a threat to Microsoft. Not only has Intel been supporting Linux, but Intel is taking their hardware in directions that Microsoft is incapable of following (such as the Itanium, which depends on compiler optimizations to perform well). If this trend continues, then Linux is going to be running on some very powerful and popular PCs that won't run Windows.
AMD, on the other hand, has been catering to Microsoft's inabilities, and optimizing their CPUs just for Windows. AMD is counting on Microsoft to help them increase marketshare.
This situation has been building for some time now. For example, there was this quote from the DOJ Findings of Fact:
> In February 1997, one of Intel's competitors, called AMD, solicited support from Microsoft for its "3DX" technology, which provided sophisticated multimedia support for games. Microsoft's Allchin asked Gates whether Microsoft should support 3DX, despite the fact that Intel would oppose it. Gates responded: "If Intel has a real problem with us supporting this then they will have to stop supporting Java Multimedia the way they are. I would gladly give up supporting this if they would back off from their work on JAVA which is terrible for Intel."
Plus, just a little after that is another quote that shows how Microsoft uses its friends to attack its enemies (just like SCO):
> Near the end of March, Allchin sent another message to Gates and Maritz. In it he wrote, "I am positive that we must do a direct attack on Sun (and probably Oracle).... Between ourselves and our partners, we can certainly hurt their (certainly Sun's) revenue base.... We need to get Intel to help us. Today, they are not."
So there you have it. History tells us that this court case is most likely just another anti-competitive move by Microsoft.
By the way, did you ever notice how the regulatory bodies used to scrutinize every partnership and purchase AOL made, yet those same regulators never lifted a finger as Microsoft bought up more and more Internet companies?
And don't let anyone try to tell you that the government is getting involved to help consumers, or the industry. After all, those same government officials have allowed the world's most expensive denial-of-service attack to continue to this day. I am speaking, of course, of Microsoft's pollution of the Java market with incompatible Java clients. To this day, companies still can't trust the compatibility of Internet Java clients enough to build the interactive e-commerce sites that they were planning to build five years ago. This DOS attack by Microsoft has been costing the U.S. economy $billions per year.
So, no, it's not about protecting consumers or industry. This is about Microsoft using its influence in government to try to remove any threats to its monopoly. In other words, just follow the money.