Microsoft's Meltdown and Spectre Patch Is Bricking Some AMD PCs (betanews.com)

Mark Wilson writes: As if the Meltdown and Spectre bug affecting millions of processors was not bad enough, the patches designed to mitigate the problems are introducing issues of their own. Perhaps the most well-known effect is a much-publicized performance hit, but some users are reporting that Microsoft's emergency patch is bricking their computers. We've already seen compatibility issues with some antivirus tools, and now some AMD users are reporting that the KB4056892 patch is rendering their computer unusable. A further issue -- error 0x800f0845 -- means that it is not possible to perform a rollback.

Comments

Score yet another for MS quality control.

[QuietLagoon]

Microsoft really seems to be de-emphasizing quality assurance in the Windows product. Makes me feel real good about the forced updates of Windows 10.

Re:Score yet another for MS quality control.

[greenwow]

After firing the vast majority of their QA, why would they expect anything different than a massive drop in quality? They knew this would happen, but decided to do it anyway.

Re:Score yet another for MS quality control.

[TheDarkMaster]

The new guys at Microsoft (the veterans who have created things like Windows NT have now retired), they have not yet understood that you can not make an operating system with the same techniques and procedures they use to create web pages.

Predictable

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the big OEMs use Intel, this just means MS can insure that people who need Windows will continue to stick with Intel, despite all evidence that AMD might be better.

How much did Intel pay M$

[banbeans]

How much did Intel pay M$ to brick AMD systems?
*tightens tin foil hat*

Re:AM2+ cpus are quite old even intel system from

[The Grim Reefer]

I currently have 4 AM2+ systems running at home and while they are old, they are more then capable for what I need them to do. They're all running Windows 7. So I'll have to look into this before allowing them to be updated.

Processors are not like they were in the 80's and 90's. In the 1980's it was seriously expensive to update, so I didn't do so as often as I did in the 1990's. I probably updated my systems every 2 to 3 years back then. But I don't' see the need to do so anymore. Unless you are a serious gamer, or do a lot of video editing/transcoding there's no need. It's been a while since I played any games, but the Phenom 2 1100T with an NVidia 730 had enough power to keep all of the settings pretty high and no issues with frame rate. Why should people be forced to send perfectly usable hardware to a landfill simply because it's not the latest shiny thing on the market?

Not bricking

[samwichse]

The OS has to be reinstalled.

How is that bricking?

Re:Not bricking

[Mashiki]

How is that bricking?

It's not. You get it, I get it, most /. users get it. Average millennial braindead idiot that's pumping out clickbait? Doesn't get it. But it sure sounds shit hot in the media and drives those clicks doesn't it?

It's the same as hacker, cracker, and phreaker. Only us old people know the difference, to younger kids it's all hacker.

The cure is worse than the disease

[GerryGilmore]

I tried - despite down-mods - to warn everyone here that over-reacting to this issue would be a big problem, but nnnnnoooooo. We all had to jump on the Panic Train before it got too crowded. To address a vulnerability that A) requires you to be running malware anyway (specific to Meltdown) and B) is excruciatingly difficult to make work (it took over 20 YEARS to find it!!) and C) is lost in the swarm of thousands of known, easy-to-implement malware, people are ready to brick their systems, suffer XX% performance loss and God knows what next just shows that all sense of perspective has been lost to hype and hysteria. Sad!(TM)

Re:The cure is worse than the disease

[Guyle]

Once a vulnerability is known, if the vulnerability is somehow exploited, and a party is successfully hacked, then the victim becomes liable for whatever resulted from the attack. So yes, now that this is public and those individuals whose moral compasses are pointing south are most likely working to exploit it before patches become widespread, I would feel a sense of urgency about patching my shit. I wouldn't want my company being the first headline of a successful hack and then deal with the aftermath of lawsuits. Whatever probability of likelihood that exists concerning whether a hack will 1) ever happen and 2) what scope of penetration it will allow doesn't matter when it's your ass on the line. That being said, you waving your "I said so!" flag doesn't exactly help anything, either. Has this been overhyped? Probably. Is it still a serious issue? Most definitely. You make it seem like a bug in an update affecting specific systems (and a very small percentage of the market share of desktop PCs, I would add) is a travesty, whereas it's a mistake. Microsoft (like everyone else) makes mistakes. They have a long history of it. They will figure it out and fix it. I would recommend you chill out, have a beer, and let the professionals do their jobs.

Re:AM2+ cpus are quite old even intel system from

[msauve]

"No one at Microsoft intentionally ruined any machines, "

If you think that's true, explain Windows 10.