Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer
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- Sep 21, 2010
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- 18,790
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]How does it not make sense? The less chip designs you need to make, the less time and effort it takes to make a chip, and the more fab space can be utilized towards a single streamlined process.[/citation]
I'm not saying the consolidation of dies doesn't make sense. I'm saying that if Intel's yields are so good, they should abandon the pretense of their chip lineups and stop fusing off features.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]Sure, if something is damaged, then you slice off a part of it, and then sell it as a cheaper chip. But (for sake of argument) you have demand for 100 i5 chips, but none of the chips are coming out damaged enough to be sold as i5s instead of i7s, then you have to disable part of it deliberately in order to meet demand.[/citation]
The difference between i5 and i7 is that hyperthreading is disabled, which strikes me as more of an artificial limitation, rather than a case of fusing off legitimately non-functional hardware. If Intel is gonna have three die designs, one of which is used for desktop/laptop chips and one of which is used for server/enthusiast chips, and the desktop/laptop chip is a quad-core design, then break the product line up into chips that are fully functional (the majority of them, apparently?) and chips that are not. Bin the fully-functional ones by clockspeed/voltage, and sell them at reasonable-but-higher prices to OEMs and people who build their own systems. Bin the partially-functional chips by core count and clockspeed/voltage, and sell them to OEMs for cheap products. If you need to artificially disable some chips to meet contractual obligations to OEMs, then whatever, fine, do that.
My biggest objection here is the notion of selling functional chips to consumers, limited by the motherboard bios or whatever, and then selling "upgrades" that free up features/cores/clockspeeds that the chip was already perfectly capable of using/reaching. That's just dishonest, disingenuous, distasteful, however you want to describe it. It's not even like the "DLC already on disc" controversy. The physical capability is already on the chip, but it's being held ransom by the manufacturer.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]The other option is that they could lower the price further, and sell more i7 chips, but there are other market and legal issues which prevent that.[/citation]
No, that's exactly what they should do. The artificial product stack is just...dumb.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]Anywho, at the end of the day, I will buy whatever meets my needs of the day at the lowest price point.[/citation]
That's your choice, and I'm not gonna fault you for that. Three out of my last four CPU purchases were Intel, and I sold the AMD laptop to fund the most recent Intel (laptop) purchase. I have a i7-2600K on my desktop, an i5-whatever in my ThinkPad, and an SU-whatever Core 2 Solo Pentium in the laptop that got me through five out of the six semesters that it took me to get my CS degree (sitting mostly useless on my desk, sadly, because a display wire in the hinge started giving out). At the point I purchased them, there was no AMD solution that could compete. T-series ThinkPads only come with Intel chips, the Phenom X6 just wasn't as good as the 2600K, and three and a half years ago, the only real choice for eight hours of battery life in a laptop that was cheap but not a netbook was the SUxxxx series.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]If a BGA chip is capable and cheap, then I will go BGA for that gen.[/citation]
My objection is not really to the BGA situation, if Intel handles it correctly. But in my opinion, if their manufacturing processes really are that good, they need to abandon their ridiculous product differentiation, and if they start selling "upgrades" to software-crippled processors, I'm done with them for good.
I'm not saying the consolidation of dies doesn't make sense. I'm saying that if Intel's yields are so good, they should abandon the pretense of their chip lineups and stop fusing off features.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]Sure, if something is damaged, then you slice off a part of it, and then sell it as a cheaper chip. But (for sake of argument) you have demand for 100 i5 chips, but none of the chips are coming out damaged enough to be sold as i5s instead of i7s, then you have to disable part of it deliberately in order to meet demand.[/citation]
The difference between i5 and i7 is that hyperthreading is disabled, which strikes me as more of an artificial limitation, rather than a case of fusing off legitimately non-functional hardware. If Intel is gonna have three die designs, one of which is used for desktop/laptop chips and one of which is used for server/enthusiast chips, and the desktop/laptop chip is a quad-core design, then break the product line up into chips that are fully functional (the majority of them, apparently?) and chips that are not. Bin the fully-functional ones by clockspeed/voltage, and sell them at reasonable-but-higher prices to OEMs and people who build their own systems. Bin the partially-functional chips by core count and clockspeed/voltage, and sell them to OEMs for cheap products. If you need to artificially disable some chips to meet contractual obligations to OEMs, then whatever, fine, do that.
My biggest objection here is the notion of selling functional chips to consumers, limited by the motherboard bios or whatever, and then selling "upgrades" that free up features/cores/clockspeeds that the chip was already perfectly capable of using/reaching. That's just dishonest, disingenuous, distasteful, however you want to describe it. It's not even like the "DLC already on disc" controversy. The physical capability is already on the chip, but it's being held ransom by the manufacturer.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]The other option is that they could lower the price further, and sell more i7 chips, but there are other market and legal issues which prevent that.[/citation]
No, that's exactly what they should do. The artificial product stack is just...dumb.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]Anywho, at the end of the day, I will buy whatever meets my needs of the day at the lowest price point.[/citation]
That's your choice, and I'm not gonna fault you for that. Three out of my last four CPU purchases were Intel, and I sold the AMD laptop to fund the most recent Intel (laptop) purchase. I have a i7-2600K on my desktop, an i5-whatever in my ThinkPad, and an SU-whatever Core 2 Solo Pentium in the laptop that got me through five out of the six semesters that it took me to get my CS degree (sitting mostly useless on my desk, sadly, because a display wire in the hinge started giving out). At the point I purchased them, there was no AMD solution that could compete. T-series ThinkPads only come with Intel chips, the Phenom X6 just wasn't as good as the 2600K, and three and a half years ago, the only real choice for eight hours of battery life in a laptop that was cheap but not a netbook was the SUxxxx series.
[citation][nom]CaedenV[/nom]If a BGA chip is capable and cheap, then I will go BGA for that gen.[/citation]
My objection is not really to the BGA situation, if Intel handles it correctly. But in my opinion, if their manufacturing processes really are that good, they need to abandon their ridiculous product differentiation, and if they start selling "upgrades" to software-crippled processors, I'm done with them for good.
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