4 ms·

a common problem back then was chips getting remarked as higher clock bin parts.

by moonbug 6y ago

whoopdedo 6y ago
I felt at the time that when Intel said "counterfeit" they really meant "clones".
- M277 6y ago
  Yes, this was what immediately came to my mind as well. For an interesting, albeit slightly unrelated read, see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chip_art https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chip_art >"Prior to 1984, these doodles also served a practical purpose. If a competitor produced a similar chip, and examination showed it contained the same doodles, then this was strong evidence that the design was copied (a copyright violation) and not independently derived."
- rasz 6y ago
  What Intel meant at the time was "someone is selling our chips relabeled to a higher SKU and pocketing our cut". This happened in 1996 with criminal gang remarking 120 to 150, 133 to 166, etc, pocketing extra ~$30-50 per CPU. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsKjX6UGYUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsKjX6UGYUQ Intel was so pissed someone else was making money on binning they locked multiplier on later 133/166/200, all Pentium MMX and later models ending easy overclocking. https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/pentium-200mhz-multiplier-unlocked.800270/ https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/pentium-200mhz-multipli...
  - paranoidrobot 6y ago
    > later models ending easy overclocking. Except the classic case of the Celeron 300a which let you go from 300Mhz to 450Mhz with a simple change of a motherboard FSB clock setting. I was nervous when I ordered the parts - but stunned that it was so easy for me to do, and left me with a machine that was effectively faster than anything Intel was officially selling at the time.
    - rasz 6y ago
      FSB (and later BCLK) overclocking is what we got left with for a while until Intel killed that too with Sandy Bridge just after introducing special upscale K series CPUs generation earlier with Nehalem. All in an effort to sell gimped parts while charging extra for the whole deal.

a common problem back then was chips getting remarked as higher clock bin parts.

whoopdedo 6y ago

I felt at the time that when Intel said "counterfeit" they really meant "clones".

M277 6y ago
Yes, this was what immediately came to my mind as well. For an interesting, albeit slightly unrelated read, see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chip_art https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chip_art >"Prior to 1984, these doodles also served a practical purpose. If a competitor produced a similar chip, and examination showed it contained the same doodles, then this was strong evidence that the design was copied (a copyright violation) and not independently derived."
rasz 6y ago
What Intel meant at the time was "someone is selling our chips relabeled to a higher SKU and pocketing our cut". This happened in 1996 with criminal gang remarking 120 to 150, 133 to 166, etc, pocketing extra ~$30-50 per CPU. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsKjX6UGYUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsKjX6UGYUQ Intel was so pissed someone else was making money on binning they locked multiplier on later 133/166/200, all Pentium MMX and later models ending easy overclocking. https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/pentium-200mhz-multiplier-unlocked.800270/ https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/pentium-200mhz-multipli...
- paranoidrobot 6y ago
  > later models ending easy overclocking. Except the classic case of the Celeron 300a which let you go from 300Mhz to 450Mhz with a simple change of a motherboard FSB clock setting. I was nervous when I ordered the parts - but stunned that it was so easy for me to do, and left me with a machine that was effectively faster than anything Intel was officially selling at the time.
  - rasz 6y ago
    FSB (and later BCLK) overclocking is what we got left with for a while until Intel killed that too with Sandy Bridge just after introducing special upscale K series CPUs generation earlier with Nehalem. All in an effort to sell gimped parts while charging extra for the whole deal.