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I'm amazed on how Intel's stock price still keeps going UP, despite all these problems... just WOW.

ceejayoz 9y ago
Spectre affects AMD, too, so there's no competitor to run to... and CERT was saying at one point that only new processors would fully fix it. They're looking at everyone needing to buy a bunch of replacement products, aren't they?
- Valmar 9y ago
  Spectre v2 affects AMD less drastically than it does with Intel, because of the architectural differences between Zen and Intel's processors.
adtac 9y ago
The recent jump is because they released a good earnings report. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/26/intc-intel-stock-jumps-to-highest-levels-in-17-years.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/26/intc-intel-stock-jumps-to-hi...
collinmanderson 9y ago
I have a feeling there's going to be a lot of demand for future Intel hardware that's immune to spectre and meltdown. I think it might cause _more_ sales of Intel chips in the future, not fewer.
- xigency 9y ago
  Regardless of sales, I would think damage to their image would be a concern. Maybe it's not a concern to investors because their "PR nightmare" turned out to be softball for them, and it's been hard to pin anything on Intel when they keep pointing fingers in all directions. I think it's our responsibility as technology literate folks and decision makers to explicitly highlight their failures so that mistakes and poor handling like this are not normalized.
  - phaser 9y ago
    It would be a concern if real competition was allowed in the x86_64 CPU space. Monopolistic patents, in this case, create the opposite incentives
ggregoire 9y ago
Do you know someone who is going to stop buying Intel's CPUs?
- speedie 9y ago
  Well , Linus already said perhaps linux should look at the arm folk . Should that happen , well guess what ? From my very small knowledge , 90+% of internet infrastructure runs on linux .
  - monkmartinez 9y ago
    Then ARM "folk" will find the equivalent of Spectre and Meltdown... then the cycle repeats, ad infinitum.
    - andreiw 9y ago
      ARM already did. https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update The Meltdown/Spectre class of attacks affect certain CPUs. Spectre is a microarchitectural attack on any CPU that does speculation and uses data caches, regardless of architecture. Arguably, it has been handling Meltdown and Spectre in a much much more humble and transparent way. See https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update/compiler-support-for-mitigations https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update/compiler-s... for work they are doing with the compiler communities to address the Variant 1 both on current and future chips.
- tyfon 9y ago
  I know in my company this has indeed resulted in a full stop in buying Intel and going AMD instead. There is also an active "project" to replace the Intel servers. I work in a bank and they are terrified of the possibility of user processes reading privileged memory. Not necessarily out of actual fear but out of the insane amount of paperwork this will require to satisfy the auditors that it is still safe. Anecdotally, but you asked for "someone" and here is someone :)
  - 9y ago
NelsonMinar 9y ago
What, are you going to stop buying Intel processors?
- ImaCake 9y ago
  I will, but I am just a guy who builds his own computer every few years.
speedie 9y ago
I tend to think it's because the folk who trade with stock very well know that these "issues" are actually features. I can also bet that that "grilling" they get from US government is not about the mess the chip flaws are doing , it's about why the "flaws" were publicly announced.
- fineng123 9y ago
  I think we're just in a bull market so people ignore bad news

Spectre affects AMD, too, so there's no competitor to run to... and CERT was saying at one point that only new processors would fully fix it. They're looking at everyone needing to buy a bunch of replacement products, aren't they?

Valmar 9y ago
Spectre v2 affects AMD less drastically than it does with Intel, because of the architectural differences between Zen and Intel's processors.

adtac 9y ago

The recent jump is because they released a good earnings report. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/26/intc-intel-stock-jumps-to-highest-levels-in-17-years.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/26/intc-intel-stock-jumps-to-hi...

collinmanderson 9y ago

I have a feeling there's going to be a lot of demand for future Intel hardware that's immune to spectre and meltdown. I think it might cause _more_ sales of Intel chips in the future, not fewer.

xigency 9y ago
Regardless of sales, I would think damage to their image would be a concern. Maybe it's not a concern to investors because their "PR nightmare" turned out to be softball for them, and it's been hard to pin anything on Intel when they keep pointing fingers in all directions. I think it's our responsibility as technology literate folks and decision makers to explicitly highlight their failures so that mistakes and poor handling like this are not normalized.
- phaser 9y ago
  It would be a concern if real competition was allowed in the x86_64 CPU space. Monopolistic patents, in this case, create the opposite incentives

ggregoire 9y ago

Do you know someone who is going to stop buying Intel's CPUs?

speedie 9y ago
Well , Linus already said perhaps linux should look at the arm folk . Should that happen , well guess what ? From my very small knowledge , 90+% of internet infrastructure runs on linux .
- monkmartinez 9y ago
  Then ARM "folk" will find the equivalent of Spectre and Meltdown... then the cycle repeats, ad infinitum.
  - andreiw 9y ago
    ARM already did. https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update The Meltdown/Spectre class of attacks affect certain CPUs. Spectre is a microarchitectural attack on any CPU that does speculation and uses data caches, regardless of architecture. Arguably, it has been handling Meltdown and Spectre in a much much more humble and transparent way. See https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update/compiler-support-for-mitigations https://developer.arm.com/support/security-update/compiler-s... for work they are doing with the compiler communities to address the Variant 1 both on current and future chips.
tyfon 9y ago
I know in my company this has indeed resulted in a full stop in buying Intel and going AMD instead. There is also an active "project" to replace the Intel servers. I work in a bank and they are terrified of the possibility of user processes reading privileged memory. Not necessarily out of actual fear but out of the insane amount of paperwork this will require to satisfy the auditors that it is still safe. Anecdotally, but you asked for "someone" and here is someone :)
- 9y ago

NelsonMinar 9y ago

What, are you going to stop buying Intel processors?

ImaCake 9y ago
I will, but I am just a guy who builds his own computer every few years.

speedie 9y ago

I tend to think it's because the folk who trade with stock very well know that these "issues" are actually features. I can also bet that that "grilling" they get from US government is not about the mess the chip flaws are doing , it's about why the "flaws" were publicly announced.

fineng123 9y ago
I think we're just in a bull market so people ignore bad news