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Microsoft Pauses Rollout of Spectre and Meltdown Patches To AMD Systems (betanews.com)

Posted by msmash on from the hold-on dept.

Microsoft is suspending patches to guard against Meltdown and Spectre security threats for computers running AMD chipsets after complaints by AMD customers that the software updates froze their machines. From a report: The company is blaming AMD's failure to comply with "the documentation previously provided to Microsoft to develop the Windows operating system mitigations to protect against the chipset vulnerabilities known as Spectre and Meltdown." There's no word on when the patches will be fixed, but Microsoft says that it is working with AMD to address the problem.

15 of 100 comments (clear)

  1. Maybe they should test on real hardware by HalAtWork · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It seems like MS could have some sort of lab with various configurations of relatively recent hardware where they can test updates they deem ready for production.

    --
    Twinstiq, game news
    1. Re:Maybe they should test on real hardware by thegarbz · · Score: 4, Funny

      It seems like MS could have some sort of lab with various configurations of relatively recent hardware where they can test updates they deem ready for production.

      They did. Today. Their beta testers found a bug and the rollout stopped. Just because their lab is the size of a planet doesn't change the fact that they are testing their high quality software releases.

  2. Why Meldown? by 110010001000 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The only commercially available chips susceptible to Meltdown are Intel chips. Why is a Meltdown patch being pused to AMD systems? They aren't affected.

    1. Re:Why Meldown? by Scarred+Intellect · · Score: 2

      The only commercially available chips susceptible to Meltdown are Intel chips. Why is a Meltdown patch being pused to AMD systems? They aren't affected.

      Incompetence.

    2. Re: Why Meldown? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      On the Linux side, didn't Intel supply much of the Meltdown mitigation, pushing it on all CPUs? And then AMD had to add a patch to exempt their processors?

      Wouldn't be surprised if Intel did a lot of the behind-the-scenes work for Microsoft here, and they just sort of accepted it without sufficient testing.

    3. Re:Why Meldown? by 110010001000 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I don't get it. Do you think AMD and Intel Windows builds are 100% equivalent? Adorable!

    4. Re:Why Meldown? by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      Why would an AMD system need to suffer the 30% slowdown, when it is Intel that messed up their architecture? That seems odd.

    5. Re:Why Meldown? by TeknoHog · · Score: 4, Informative

      In the latest Linux releases, the Meltdown fix has a runtime detection of AMD CPUs, in which case the fix is not activated. I'm sure MS could do something similar if they wanted.

      --
      Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
    6. Re:Why Meldown? by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Because its not called "Wintel" for nothing? Remember this is the same company that royally fucked their own flagship OS just to allow good buddy Intel to sell a bunch of garbage 945 chipsets with the "Vista Capable" fiasco, I seriously would not be surprised if Intel picked up the phone and said "You damned well better fuck AMD with this patch as much as we are getting fucked".

      Never let it be said that old Hairy don't give credit where credit is due and in this case the Linux guys have it better as no less than Torvalds himself said that Linux shouldn't treat all CPUs (meaning ARM and AMD) as crap so I seriously doubt Linux users with AMD have a thing to worry about when it comes to the meltdown patches, it'll be us Windows users that will be going to forums and looking for .bat files or reg keys that will kill the meltdown patch on our AMD systems.

      Oh and on a personal note as someone who stuck with AMD FX while everyone was singing the praises of Intel (and still quite happy with my FX-8320e as even my games run buttery smooth at an average of 90 FPS+ while recording gameplay footage) I would be lying if I said it didn't give me a bit of a smile to see Intel getting bit right in the backside after their years of cripple compilers and bribing OEMs, the only thing that could make it more delicious would be if it turns out that Intel chips get a performance hit equal to what the cripple compiler did to AMD systems. Man would that not be some delectable irony?

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      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    7. Re:Why Meldown? by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

      From my understanding, it's not even incompetence that brought this about in the first place. Lack of foresight more than anything else. No one imagined trying an exploit like these until recently. Unless they have, but have been
      keeping it quiet, much like the Allies kept the cracking of Enigma quiet...

      People did more than imagine. They wrote research papers on this very topic over a decade ago about the very thing the spectre ghost is holding in its hand.

      https://eprint.iacr.org/2006/2...

    8. Re:Why Meldown? by Antique+Geekmeister · · Score: 2

      > No one imagined trying an exploit like these until recently.

      I'm afraid that this is not true. I'm following an intriguing discussion of similar side-channel attacks on Multics systems on GE hardware in roughly 1970. It's not a new problem. I've been trying to explain repeatedly to some colleagues while reviewing these attacks that doing "speculative compilation" is very appealing at first glance, but the work involved in doing it is not free. Security risks and maintenance of the resources are critical and related costs of such optimization.

    9. Re:Why Meldown? by jwhyche · · Score: 2

      So the question you should ask yourself, is why you chose Microsoft.

      Because all the games and most of the software I want to run is Windows only. An none of the games have linux counterparts.

      Any other questions?

      --
      I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.
  3. AMD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So, the problem is that AMD failed to comply with the documentation for the Intel bug? Perhaps "failed to comply" is just MS-speak for "failed to implement the bug"...

    1. Re:AMD? by Entrope · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, it's really not clear. Maybe that is the implication that Microsoft wants people to draw, but they don't directly say who provided the documentation in question.

  4. Collusion investigation of wintel in 3...2.......? by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

    Amazing the company that does it right and is not vulnerable to "Meltdown" in the first place is being actively punished for that fact.