Intel Inflates CPU Prices says AMD. We Investigate

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Its unfortunate you dont find 3 rulings against Intel as a for sure thing, but grudgingly sorta acknowledge theyre there.
You mention an older article that speaks on the system builders, but you neglected to mention your other previous article, where it shows Intel purposely inflating the price of Atom, which to me is pertinent to your own article. Smacks of fanboyism, while you try to come off as neutral.

The ruling speaks on past crimes Intel's done, not current, and yet you defend the 1000$ cpu pricing. Intel doesnt get it here, as someone mentioned before, if AMDs top cpu's were IPC/feature matching, those 1000$ cpus would be much less. Blinded by Intels actions here?

How much more Advertising, which would put more money into TH's pockets would be available if Intel hadnt broken the law, and AMD would have that ability also, but hey, you wrote the article
 
Just because Intel isn't really inflating now ( other than the very high end tier ) doesn't mean they don't and that it isn't business as usual for them. Given the chance they would have us pay over a grand for a 1 GHZ single core CPU, in this sense they are just like Microsoft.
 
I find the results of the "whether or not they personally felt that CPU prices were too high" poll interesting. Are people STUPID?! They think overall they are good value?! I think the low end is very good value. Sub-one hundred dollars gets you a chip that was the very high-end only a couple of years ago and is still more than capable today, but the high-end is a complete ripoff. Apart from the Core i7s (which are ridiculously high-priced) you only have to look at differing CPUs within the same range. E8400 AU$240 E8500 AU$270. $30 for Intel to clock it a little higher? That's $30 of pure profit.
 
So based on this article I guess Intel is paying Tom's "MDF's" to have more pro Intel articles? This article was a bunch of crap and I'm now removing Tom's Hardware from my feed because this is ridiculous. You basically defended Intel when they were found guilty in a court of law with solid evidence...

Also, last time I checked the QOTD concerning CPU prices, a good amount of people pointed out that the i7 Extreme was the only overpriced CPU yet no mention of that? Bias BS
 
I don't know what to make of these statements and articles, but i do know this: I work with and sell computers for a living, and i have not sold a SINGLE Intel based computer since before the days of the Pentium 4, and all Pentium 4 based computers have in one way or another ended up back in my lap, either fried, or simply dumped in order to get rid of them. No, im not an AMD fan-boy, i work with some Intel based computers, i appreciate their performance and the overall quality of their drivers, chipsets and durability (some motherboard-manufacturers excluded) And still, i haven't had a single person go "Hello, i want an Intel processor, nothing else" it's usually "I want something reasonable to work with" or "i want something i can play games on... But i don't want to spend a lot of money". It's always a matter of price, and in my country, AMD based platforms are the best at price/performance, not counting rebates, since they're usually bound to some unreasonable prerequisite. Point is, i for one cannot see this demand for intel based computers... At all. But then again, i don't work for a high profile/large quantity computer maker, that may get some sort of boon, or rebates for choosing Intel.
 
"Despite AMD's response, it's interesting to note that a very well-known motherboard manufacturer indicated that it sells more Intel-based motherboards simply because of customer demand for better performing parts."

Interesting to read what the sales numbers were back in 1999 (enter Athlon) and then in 2003 (enter 64-bit Opteron) when AMD was the clear performance leader. Somehow, Intel continued to gain market-share during this time with their inferior products. All that money went to Intel instead of AMD, but AMD earned it. That cuts out R&D and increases the advantage of Intel. It's unfair, unethical, and has cost the consumer a better price point. This cannot be disputed intelligently, except through coercive smear and spin - much like your article. Intel does not innovate, they copy, re-engineer, spin it as their own "new innovation", and then sell it for a premium. Oh, and cut out the other options to avoid competition, thus keeping their cost/price ratio in-check. We all lose when companies like Intel and Microsoft are allowed to reign unchecked.
 
"Coincidentally, the monumental $1.4 billion fine landing on Intel's lap, matches the quarterly loss of $1.4 billion that AMD reported back in January of this year."

"If the EU's findings are indeed true, in that Intel did illegally coerce partners and vendors to actively avoid AMD technology"


Wow, this article looks like it has been writen by Intel´s CEO!!! I never think that this kind of article can be published in a site like Tom´s Hardware.

Defending Intel, who is "the bad" in this story, and accusing AMD and the EU of been lying and thieves.

Is demostrated that Intel act in illegal form, and you deffend it? Awesome!!

 
dissapointing article. Sounds like the author was payed by intel to write this article. Where is tomshardware objectivity?
 
[citation][nom]raulrapadura[/nom] I never think that this kind of article can be published in a site like Tom´s Hardware [/citation]

An article like this would have never been published on the Tom's we used to know. Enter BestofMedia...
 
"In the first quarter of 2009, AMD spent a total of $287 million to market (PDF) its products. During the same period, Intel spent $1.2 billion (PDF). Intel also spent $1.31 billion on R&D, while AMD spent only $446 million."

Intel has established itself as an upper-tier, slightly higher priced option. The numbers speak for themselves - Intel comes out with better products because of its "ARCHITECTURE" which is a direct result of R&D. That's what makes Intel better. The new Core i7's (940, 965 EE) DESTROY AMD. Are those prices inflated? I agree with you Tuan - what Arbitrary "Metric" does one use in a court-of-law to establish that? You mine as well complain that Lexus uses an "inflated price scheme" in comparison to Honda, while we all know that Lexus is the luxury edition of Toyota - who is almost IDENTICALLY priced to Honda. Like Quick-Path-Interconnect technology with the Core i7's, you (the consumer) are Paying more for a MUCH better product.

"AMD: So, if the evidence the committee found is that ... and our ASPs over the past 10 years on the average have been lower than Intel's, then by default Intel's actions limited customer and consumer access to higher value options from AMD."

He said this just after he complained that this whole ordeal was not about PRICING !!! What an idiot.

As for the "Coercing" done by Intel? My only response would be - Hey, if they were MDF's, that is all completely contractual, and NOT "DIRECTLY" affecting the competition, but rather, "Indirectly" affecting the competition. You're right Tuan, it's anti-competitive ... but HEY, if the consumer wants the BEST CPU for their system,

Quality always comes at a Price.
 
Why does the interviewer focusses on current hardware when the lawsuit is one that started back in the year 2001 and the investigations for that lawsuit took quite some years from 2002-2007? This make no sence as you need to compare prices at that time. And at that time, the Pentium 4's where much more expensive and didn't perform aswell as the AMD athlon. However, the AMD CPU's barely made it into OEM's PC's because of obvious bribes by Intel. It is proven in the lawsuit, check the evidence(facts!). Don't you find it suspicous when AMD's marketshare drops from 25% (2002) to 9% (2004) in 2 years with a superior product in price and performance(athlon XP/64)?
 
Do you want Intel to drop their prices? Stop buying their products and see what will happen. Man I do sure hope that AMD will not go under and will push Intel to the edge. I don't "care" for any given company - I just care about the value of their products - and right now AMD=value, whereas Intel=rip-off. Ciao!
 
[citation][nom]kode[/nom]Why does the interviewer focusses on current hardware when the lawsuit is one that started back in the year 2001 and the investigations for that lawsuit took quite some years from 2002-2007?[/citation]

because the quote by McCoy was talking about prices being inflated today, in current times.
 
[citation][nom]Justs0meGuy[/nom] ...Intel has been proven wrong and who do you think you are questioning the verdicts of several legal authorities?[/citation]

Who questions legal Authorities? Oh, I don't know, maybe any citizen of a free country. If it were not for questioning we (if you live in the US) would still be ruled by Britain, without the Magna Carta, and there would be no free enterprise to develop the computer technology we are using now. And all of these posts would be illegal. So we, questioning this decision, are people who want to make sure that Intel is the dishonest one and not the EU.
 
Why does the interviewer focusses on current hardware when the lawsuit is one that started back in the year 2001 and the investigations for that lawsuit took quite some years from 2002-2007? This make no sence as you need to compare prices at that time. And at that time, the Pentium 4's where much more expensive and didn't perform aswell as the AMD athlon. However, the AMD CPU's barely made it into OEM's PC's because of obvious bribes by Intel. It is proven in the lawsuit, check the evidence(facts!). Don't you find it suspicous when AMD's marketshare drops from 25% (2002) to 9% (2004) in 2 years with a superior product in price and performance(athlon XP/64)?
 
svenolsen:"because the quote by McCoy was talking about prices being inflated today, in current times."

It's not today, in the article it says: "In a recent press filing, AMD's executive VP of legal affairs, Tom McCoy, said that Intel's CPUs were sold with inflated pricing. "

were sold is in the past, otherwise it would be are sold
 
[citation][nom]bullshit[/nom]svenolsen:"because the quote by McCoy was talking about prices being inflated today, in current times."It's not today, in the article it says: "In a recent press filing, AMD's executive VP of legal affairs, Tom McCoy, said that Intel's CPUs were sold with inflated pricing. "were sold is in the past, otherwise it would be are sold[/citation]

"Today" as in recent times. Doesn't matter, you're wrong anyway, since McCoy made this statement THIS year, and the filing was for periods prior to 2007, which is saying AMD still believes Intel's pricing is inflated today.
 
One of our best partners at the time, was Hewlett-Packard. While we had our own marketing budget, HP made sure that we would receive a lot of money every month to spend on marketing if we sold more HP products. This was wholly legal. They're called marketing development funds, or MDFs. Many large companies offer this, and while it may differ in name from company to company, the intent is the same.

Consequently, we ended up pushing more HP products than say, IBM products. HP wasn't paying us money to avoid using other vendors' products, but with a lot of cash sitting there for us to use, it made sense to try to accumulate that money instead of dipping into our own pockets. MDFs are not the same as rebates. With rebates, we received lower prices for certain products if we sold enough of other products. If we sold over 1000 HP multi-function printers (MFPs) for example, we would receive rebates on HP server products.
Click to expand...

Mr. Tuan Nguyen, If you really believe that practice you describe is in your words "wholly legal", why you are withholding the name of your ex-employer. I am sure that their customers would like to get the real explanation why they have stuck with HP crap. Because my real experience is that companies are giving those rebates and marketing money for staff that is define as crap or really over-priced. Where the hell you think all those money are coming from?! I will tell you - from the pockets of the customers, cheated by you.
 
Atom costs are inflated, thus, all netbooks are as well. 1000$ cpus are inflated. Any P4 EE price was inflated way beyond its ability.

Intel dropped 2 of its 3 i7 cpus, why? Their prices were too high. They just dont get it, thinking this WAS yesterday, and not todays economy.
 
Did they inflate prices? In my view, indirectly yes. Since they caused AMD to lose as much money as they did due to anti-competitive business strategies. AMDs loss forced them to hike their prices to stay afloat, while Intel just went along for the ride.
 
Hey...

My mother paid $3000 for her first computer, and all she did with it was pay taxes.

Now $3000 is considered an extremist build...

Anti-competitive or not, the consumer still has benefited.

Most importantly, both companies are dropping a lot of cash into R&D still.

Products are getting both better and cheaper, so what the hell are you complaining about?
 
First of all analysis has to be a bit more refined than what this article presents. You can't compare marketing raw numbers from two companies whose Net Sales and Gross Margins are entirely different. Marketing spending is based on a percentage of last years sales. So use metrics like Marketing as a percentage of Gross Margin % or Net Sales. Second of all, if illegal practices brought down the total revenue that another company would have been due, obviously they are going to have less money to spend on R&D, marketing and the like and therefore they have to cut their margins to compete. Let's introduce car manufacturer's as an analogy. Let's compare some lower priced car manufacturer versus the likes of Toyota. Whose costs of goods sold per unit sold is going to be lower? Toyota hands down because of a thing called Economies of Scale. So who is going to have room for higher profit margins, and thus more money for marketing and potential illegal market blocking? Toyota. Now add to the equation that is other car manufacturer and Toyota are the only two players in the game. Who is going to get the shaft a lot because of spending power and economies of scale? The little guy. We need a level playing field for competition to work to the consumers advantage, where companies can compete based on their merits and not on their market muscle. Your example with HP is a poor one because it leaves out so many relevant details. Thankfully the outcome of these court proceedings didn't rest on your great analytical and decision making skills...
 
mmurphy1, your wasting your time here, any comment w/ better than a grade school understanding of economics is going to be modded down, this article is pure garbage.
 
I think AMD's price/performance target is smart because for consumers, getting the most bang for your buck makes the most sense. If your hardware is going to be out-of-date next week, why not pay less?
 
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