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Microsoft Lifts XP Mode Hardware Requirement
An anonymous reader writes "This week, Microsoft published a patch that allows Windows XP Mode to run on PCs without hardware-assisted virtualization. Which begs the question: Why the bizarro requirement in the first place? Was it an honest attempt to deliver an 'optimal' user experience? Or simply a concession to the company's jilted lover, Intel Corporation — 'a kind of apology for royally screwing up with the whole Windows Vista “too fat to fit” debacle,' as the blog post puts it."
Not only does this not 'beg the question' it's by our good friend Randal C. Kennedy of Devil Mountain Software fame. Come on guys, this is in the frigging Ars Technica.
The problem with Slashdot these days is that has no taste, absolutely no taste.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
On one hand, XP Mode in 7 actually uses Virtual PC, which has been around for a long time - but didn't require hardware virtualization support until the most recent version.
On the other hand, while I can't find that link now, I do recall seeing one of VPC guys explaining that they went hardware-only for the new release simply because it allowed them to cut out a lot of code, which then no longer needs to be supported. In which case it may be that they have realized that it's a bad idea from business perspective, and put that code back in (and brought it up to date) with that patch.
That was my initial thought as well. Yes, well-written software-only virtualization can perform at a similar level, but if they can get it out the door faster with hardware supported virtualization, they may have decided the software-only approach wasn't worth the resources at the time. It's called prioritization; if they put the resources into software-only virtualization, they neglect something else.
$_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
It's very common for Intel to make 6 different CPU chips that are exactly the same, but use a laser to cut a single connection on the chip to make sure it runs at a certain speed. Sure, you can overclock the CPU, but it still has one of its throttles turned down. These chips are then sold for 10-50% less, depending on which connection is cut.
It costs them exactly the same amount to design and manufacture a 2.4 GHz model as a 3.0 GHz model. In fact, it ultimately costs more to gimp these chips, because they have to pay an engineer to design this mechanism, and buy/maintain the machine that does the gimping. Although, this does mean that I can get a gimped chip for slightly less than the cost to produce it by having someone else pay for the overpriced ungimped version. Still, I think I would rather pay $200 for a 3.0 GHz model, and not have the option of a slower model, than to pay $180 for a 2.4 GHz model while enthusiasts pay $900 for the 3.0 GHz model.
Not only are you right that this has been done for a long time, but it's also become common practice.
These days a lot of that happens to keep yields higher. They take chips where one part doesn't meet their standards and disable then, then sell it for a discount. Reduce, reuse, recycle or something. Where do you think AMD tri-cores came from?
-]Phreak Out[-
If the editors paid a tenth as much attention to the story as the commentators did, I'll be pissed that they're giving this bozo even more traffic as a reward for passing bullshit off as fact.
Since they don't, I'll instead just have to remain pissed that the editors don't pay a tenth as much attention as the commentators do.
Hint for Slashdotters: anything posted by the Exo Performance Network is pure bullshit. Don't believe a syllable without independent verification.
Comment of the year
Nobody ever turned [the speedup button] off, so why have the button in the first place?
Nowadays, CPU speed settings are most useful for battery-powered computers to let the user trade off performance against battery life.