Intel Gets Start of Antitrust Backlash from OEMs

[enigma067]

Intel Gets Start of Antitrust Backlash from OEMs

By Erik Sherman | Jan 4, 2010

A recent announcement that Lenovo would use CPUs from AMD (AMD) in a couple of its ThinkPads rather than chips from Intel (INTC) is the beginning of the price the chip giant could end up paying for its alleged anticompetitive activities: OEM customers shifting their orders.

In two separate statements, Lenovo said that it would use AMD chips in the ThinkPad X1003e ultraportable as well as the 13-inch ThinkPad Edge series, which is aimed at small- to medium-sized businesses. This is the first time that the ThinkPad brand, originally owned by IBM, will have used non-Intel chips:

An ultraportable PC positioned between a notebook and a netbook, the ThinkPad X100e can be equipped with AMD’s Athlon Neo single-core and dual-core, as well as the Turion dual-core processors. The ThinkPad Edge model, the smallest of three offerings in this product family and targeted at small and midsize businesses, may be paired with dual-core AMD Turion and Athlon Neo processors. The 14-inch and 15-inch ThinkPad Edge versions will still be powered by Intel’s Core 2 Duo chips.

Before you say, “But those are the small systems,” remember that the smallest systems, like netbooks, are the ones whose sales are really growing. To put it differently, AMD may not be in the prestige machines, but they’re going into the ones that may get the greater volume sales.

Starting in mid-November, I began noting that the upshot of all the antitrust activity focused on Intel would be customer defections:

PC vendors get completely wary of being sucked into the investigatory void and start shifting a significant portion of their purchasing to AMD. Forget fines and forget legal fees. That’s going to be the real price tag for years of allegedly using money and influence to keep a competitor constrained, and it will be a number with a whole lot of zeros.

I think the Lenovo switch is the first sign of that real price tag. Who knows how large a card it will need to be to record all the potential long-term loss for short-term gain?

Image via stock.xchng user MeHere, site standard license.

http://industry.bnet.com/technology/10004584/intel-gets-start-of-antitrust-backlash-from-oems/

 

[verndewd]

uhhhg the x86 mind fawk
that complicated extension ridden crap needs to die

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Half nodes may help here. Intel not using them, and since half nodes are the leading smallest node currently being used, after HKMG is implemented, these half nodes will catch up and pass Intel.
So power and process will fall to the competition, with money to spare, as TSMC faulters on 40nm node, and possibly more customers head to GF.
Things may just get interesting, as Im not so certain even 22nm will fare so greatly against say 28 half node, it wont have a huge advanatage,
Also, as AMD goes HKMG and drops to 32m, battery life gets to a point of good enough at some point, and itll be close, and certainly for competitive perf and price in mobile, along with much better gfx

 

[jimmysmitty]

uhhhg the x86 mind fawk
that complicated extension ridden crap needs to die

Intel tried. But the masses are ignorant to change in the PC market.

I hear as well that Intel is working on a new 128bit thats non x86.

 

[pausert20]

Half nodes may help here. Intel not using them, and since half nodes are the leading smallest node currently being used, after HKMG is implemented, these half nodes will catch up and pass Intel.
So power and process will fall to the competition, with money to spare, as TSMC faulters on 40nm node, and possibly more customers head to GF.
Things may just get interesting, as Im not so certain even 22nm will fare so greatly against say 28 half node, it wont have a huge advanatage,
Also, as AMD goes HKMG and drops to 32m, battery life gets to a point of good enough at some point, and itll be close, and certainly for competitive perf and price in mobile, along with much better gfx

So, now we have battery life as good enough to go along with processor performance as good enough.

That means we only have GPU performance left to improve. Once that is good enough there won't be any need to improve the manufacturing process except to make everything cheaper for the manufacturer. If you take it to the logical conclusion.

So this means whoever can reach the smallest node first with the largest sized wafer will ultimately win using your logic.

I don't think this will happen anytime soon.

 

[Chad Boga]

I hear as well that Intel is working on a new 128bit thats non x86.

Where did you hear this?

Is this for a CPU product? An extension of Itanium?

 

[Reynod]

Yeah ... will probably be as popular too.

We need 128 bit like a hole in the head.

The programmers are still miles behind the hardware as it is.

 

[Guest]

So, now we have battery life as good enough to go along with processor performance as good enough.

That means we only have GPU performance left to improve. Once that is good enough there won't be any need to improve the manufacturing process except to make everything cheaper for the manufacturer. If you take it to the logical conclusion.

So this means whoever can reach the smallest node first with the largest sized wafer will ultimately win using your logic.

I don't think this will happen anytime soon.

The manufacturing process improves because it means more money in the end. It will only stop improving when the cost to improve it outweighs the reasonable likelyhood of recouping the money spent on development.

Much more likely is a completely new style of tech obsoletes current methods, for example circuit stamping would basically revolutionise the whole industry, if not the whole planet.

 

[Reynod]

Well the ethics department at Intel have been rubber stamping for .... or sorry ... I misread your post.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

LOL, I saw the stocks of rubber stamping had gone up, thanks for the tip

 

[fazers_on_stun]

IIRC when upgrading to a new node or process, much of the fab equipment is rendered useless and either gets put out to pasture making non-leading-edge products like chipsets, or sold to some company that makes non-leading-edge products like chipsets. In fact I have heard that often the entire infrastructure gets upgraded - new wiring, plumbing, and air filtration. So there is quite a lot of capital equipment that cannot get reused. I'd imagine GF bought Chartered mainly for its customer base rather than fab capabilities.

Faser, I do have some insight on the cost of outfitting a new fab from my friend that works at Intel.

The building shell costs peanuts compared to the actual Fab Tools that get installed. The part of the new Wiring, Plumbing and Air Filtration does cost a lot to any of us but in the big scheme of things when either building a new fab or upgrading one those cost are minuscule.

D1C just finished being updated to 32nm. They are now the current leading manufacturer of 32nm chips at Intel. D1D is also building 32nm chips but they are now working hard at bringing up 22nm for the next round and also doing experimental work at the next node.

I understand New Mexico is next to get changed over to 32nm at Intel's megafab 11x. Not sure who else is going to be tranformed next. Might be Israel, Ireland or Arizona.

Thanks for the info. It matches up with what some of the other Intel employees who post over on Roborat's blog say about the fabs. D1D has been the developmental fab for some time now, so I'm not surprised to hear they are working on 22nm.

IIRC Intel says it'll have 4 fabs cranking out 32nm by this summer, and should reach crossover a bit later. I just wish they'd announce a 32nm quad-core, since the i980 is too expensive. Really, the i930 should be 32nm, not 45nm, and priced the same as the i920. And yes I'm greedy!

 

[B-Unit]

I dont remember where the article was, but a big part of why Intel is able to lead the way in process tech is that every one of their fabs is identical, down to the paint on the floors. All they have to do is perfect and tweak a process in one place, and the lessons learned transfer exactly to all other fabs.

 

[archibael]

Copy Exactly is indeed a major part of our manufacturing philosophy. Sometimes it seems a bit overdone (when it gets down to paint, etc.) but it's hard to argue with the success. Bringing up a new factory is FAST.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Seems itd be great for modularity as well, for people transfers etc

 

[amdfangirl]

Besides, doesn't ARM want the ARM arch to be no. 1?

 

[verndewd]

Besides, doesn't ARM want the ARM arch to be no. 1?

ARM is no1 for now but things like i3 can possibly threaten ARM especially when the tech goes below 32nm. Pretty reasonable idea to team up with GF . Once Intel gets a power threshold that can work on cell phones ARM is just a piece of tech history. On the surface they(ARM) say Intel doesnt have what it takes to compete and then they sign up with the partially AMD owned GF, And I think thats with foresight of survival over the next 4 years plus.

jimmy smitty said
Intel tried. But the masses are ignorant to change in the PC market.

I hear as well that Intel is working on a new 128bit thats non x86.

screw intels 128

I think we have learned that a proprietary design impedes the market, the next basic programming mArch should be an industry standard open source that intel cannot prohibit competitors with.

 

[pausert20]

The manufacturing process improves because it means more money in the end. It will only stop improving when the cost to improve it outweighs the reasonable likelyhood of recouping the money spent on development.

Much more likely is a completely new style of tech obsoletes current methods, for example circuit stamping would basically revolutionise the whole industry, if not the whole planet.

I can agree that a new technology can supplant what we currently have now. IBM seems to be working tirelessly on trying to develop Nanotubes as transistors. I think before we get that we will get FinFET technology and that will carry us to Nanotubes or some type of molecular circuitry.

 

[pausert20]

Copy Exactly is indeed a major part of our manufacturing philosophy. Sometimes it seems a bit overdone (when it gets down to paint, etc.) but it's hard to argue with the success. Bringing up a new factory is FAST.

They bring in hundreds of people from the fabs that are going to do a new process node and train on one that is already up and running. But even when they copy exact there is variations so when they start ramping up they keep tweaking it in for the best yields.

 

[Chad Boga]

ARM is no1 for now but things like i3 can possibly threaten ARM especially when the tech goes below 32nm.

:lol: How is a CPU that hasn't been designed with power saving as the overwhelming design characteristic, going to compete with ARM?

Intel is setting up Atom to take on ARM, not i3.

 

[jimmysmitty]

ARM is no1 for now but things like i3 can possibly threaten ARM especially when the tech goes below 32nm. Pretty reasonable idea to team up with GF . Once Intel gets a power threshold that can work on cell phones ARM is just a piece of tech history. On the surface they(ARM) say Intel doesnt have what it takes to compete and then they sign up with the partially AMD owned GF, And I think thats with foresight of survival over the next 4 years plus.

jimmy smitty said
Intel tried. But the masses are ignorant to change in the PC market.

I hear as well that Intel is working on a new 128bit thats non x86.

screw intels 128

I think we have learned that a proprietary design impedes the market, the next basic programming mArch should be an industry standard open source that intel cannot prohibit competitors with.

Problem is that everything in the world normally runs on a patent based system. So even if some random company creates the next step they will patent it and become the next Intel.

I think for ARM though is that they are afraid of Intel and what they can do. But I wouldn't mind another competator besides Samsung in the cell market. Most of the Android phones run a Samsung CPU but its barely enough to multitask.

I can agree that a new technology can supplant what we currently have now. IBM seems to be working tirelessly on trying to develop Nanotubes as transistors. I think before we get that we will get FinFET technology and that will carry us to Nanotubes or some type of molecular circuitry.

I think before that we will see fiber based setups. I know Intel claimed to have found a way to embed fiber into silicon so maybe that will come soon. Light speed CPUs woot.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

Intel tried. But the masses are ignorant to change in the PC market.

I hear as well that Intel is working on a new 128bit thats non x86.

Hmm, interesting - you have a link?

IMO, Intel is big enough to successfully promote an x86 alternative, if they (1) include an x86 core on the new chip to handle legacy code natively (as opposed to emulation which is what they did with Itanium, IIRC), and (2) subsidize the transition at least initially, by either porting apps to the new CPU or paying the devs to do so. Of course, the latter would probably land them in hot water with the FTC unless Intel continued development (for a time anyway) on x86.

Apple pretty much did the same when they dumped the PowerPC CPU in favor of Intel. Except for the backwards-compatibilty part that is..

 

[Chad Boga]

Hmm, interesting - you have a link?

IMO, Intel is big enough to successfully promote an x86 alternative, if they (1) include an x86 core on the new chip to handle legacy code natively (as opposed to emulation which is what they did with Itanium, IIRC),

Itanium started with an x86 core on it, but it was a dog and they got much better results when they switched to emulation.

and (2) subsidize the transition at least initially, by either porting apps to the new CPU or paying the devs to do so. Of course, the latter would probably land them in hot water with the FTC unless Intel continued development (for a time anyway) on x86.

Apple pretty much did the same when they dumped the PowerPC CPU in favor of Intel. Except for the backwards-compatibilty part that is..

Even though I think it is unlikely, Itanium could still end up as the dominant CPU architecture in 15 years time, but other than that happening, Intel will be with x86 forever and a day.

The only ISA that might end up taking over from x86 is ARM, but again, I also think that is an unlikely scenario.

 

[amdfangirl]

x86 will dominate unless we have a revolution.

 

[verndewd]

:lol: How is a CPU that hasn't been designed with power saving as the overwhelming design characteristic, going to compete with ARM?

Intel is setting up Atom to take on ARM, not i3.

ok let me make it simple for the geico cavemen.

i3 intros an soc design that can eventually (theoretically) evolve into something that would basically decimate ARM. Sorry I didnt first say put on your future looking caps and see where things LIKE i3 could go. mmkay?

 

[Chad Boga]

ok let me make it simple for the geico cavemen.

i3 intros an soc design that can eventually (theoretically) evolve into something that would basically decimate ARM. Sorry I didnt first say put on your future looking caps and see where things LIKE i3 could go. mmkay?

Look into Atom soc's and realise how silly you have been.

 

[jimmysmitty]

x86 will dominate unless we have a revolution.

Unless we go full 64bit (Windows 8 and hoping it gets rid of 32bit) where IA64 actually would probably dominate since tis a naitive 64bit CPU. Plus current Itaniums have 2 Billions transitors. Thats more people than in China.....

ok let me make it simple for the geico cavemen.

i3 intros an soc design that can eventually (theoretically) evolve into something that would basically decimate ARM. Sorry I didnt first say put on your future looking caps and see where things LIKE i3 could go. mmkay?

i3 wont though thats the problem. Atom is specifically designed to go from what it is to a SoC to take on ARM and create the Netbook market.