News Intel's CPU instability and crashing issues also impact mainstream 65W and higher 'non-K' models — damage is irreversible, no planned recall

[Admin]

While we thought the crashing bug plaguing Intel CPUs had been solved, the problem has been revealed to be more expansive than initially thought.

Intel's CPU instability and crashing issues also impact mainstream 65W and higher 'non-K' models — damage is irreversible, no planned recall : Read more

 

[jp7189]

I thought it was just a couple of models that Intel was pusing too hard to keep up with AMD. This paints a different picture.

 

[rluker5]

It should be noted that not all crashing is due to high voltage induced degradation. Or else we would not even know what the blue screen of death is.

And not all high voltage is due solely to CPU requests as motherboards choose what voltage to send to the CPU. Any auto OC feature will deny the CPU request and send what the motherboard thinks is best.

 

[abufrejoval]

What's the news on the laptop chips?

After all that's where things would get really ugly...

 

[salgado18]

Intel looks like the bad guy who pushed his machine too hard trying to beat the hero (or win the race, or whatever). "AMD is getting ahead, we need more power!" "But sir..."

(I'm not calling Intel the bad guy, just comparing the anecdote)

 

[punkncat]

This answers the question I had, specifically being was it only the high end K skew, or all. This is super unfortunate for anyone that has Intel 12-14th gen chips (PLEASE SEE POST #20, TY). The other aspect of this is now, how long do we wait to see what happens with 15th gen? A thing like this just being smoothed over for a year and a half + surely isn't going to leave me confident in buying Intel replacement/upgrade for years to come at this point.

I suppose that many of us will have to take a wait and see attitude. If there is some method upon which we can know for fact that it is a 'post-problem' chip it may make them a relevant choice again. Personally sort of ticks me off since I went with a 12th gen chip which are priced quite attractively right now with the future plan to be to update into a 14th gen a couple of years from now.

 

[CelicaGT]

65W base TDP or actual power draw? If the former, why? Is this the cutoff for Thermal Velocity Boost? The claim that mobile chips are not affected seems to support TVB still being the issue since they don't seem to support it. My 13900HX does not list TVB as supported, only Turbo Boost Max 3.0 (Which I disabled. Temps are down and performance is the....same). Perhaps TVB is where the errant algorithm lies? Enquiring minds (and stakeholders) want to know! Considering how much they've bungled this whole mess up they need to issue a clear, concise statement on which chips are affected with batch numbers etc etc. Stick a sock in the mealy mouths of anyone with an MBA and issue a limited recall.

 

[endocine]

This impacts all RL And RLr CPUs, with no "fix" of dubious quality until august, they put a stop sale on existing CPUs, damage is permanent and irreversible, and they aren't doing a recall? Where is the FTC or other similar government agencies stepping in on behalf of the consumer? Really, intel, do you expect anyone to knowingly choose to buy another CPU from you again?

 

[parkerthon]

When Zen 3 was released I went to AMD first time in a very long time. Felt the overall responsiveness of system was “eh”. Then back with 12th gen Intel. The way Intel is handling this debacle though has me questioning why I would buy another CPU from them. It’s not just the fact there are issues with their chips, it’s that they degrade and become unstable over time which can be very hard to isolate. No way do I want to deal with something like that. Combine that with them running hotter as well and I will take stability and reliability over speed any day. Unless AMD has its own moment like this with its next gen, then next four years minimum will likely be all AMD builds for me. Shame, I’d much rather give my money to a US company.

 

[CelicaGT]

When Zen 3 was released I went to AMD first time in a very long time. Felt the overall responsiveness of system was “eh”. Then back with 12th gen Intel. The way Intel is handling this debacle though has me questioning why I would buy another CPU from them. It’s not just the fact there are issues with their chips, it’s that they degrade and become unstable over time which can be very hard to isolate. No way do I want to deal with something like that. Combine that with them running hotter as well and I will take stability and reliability over speed any day. Unless AMD has its own moment like this with its next gen, then next four years minimum will likely be all AMD builds for me. Shame, I’d much rather give my money to a US company.

AMD is based in Santa Clara, California. It is an American multinational corp, just like Intel.

 

[Alvar "Miles" Udell]

What’s troubling is that Intel has not and will not issue a recall for the affected CPUs. It also hasn’t halted processor sales pending the updated microcode rolling out.

That is completely normal. AMD did the same thing with the Ryzen 1000 series, they replaced them if they died or started throwing errors and left them alone if they didn't. Same thing happens to vehicles with potentially catastrophic issues, they fix them if they start showing issues and leave them alone if they don't. Why? You said it yourself.

This doesn’t mean every Raptor Lake or Raptor Lake Refresh CPU will experience crashing issues.

 

[Pierce2623]

When Zen 3 was released I went to AMD first time in a very long time. Felt the overall responsiveness of system was “eh”. Then back with 12th gen Intel. The way Intel is handling this debacle though has me questioning why I would buy another CPU from them. It’s not just the fact there are issues with their chips, it’s that they degrade and become unstable over time which can be very hard to isolate. No way do I want to deal with something like that. Combine that with them running hotter as well and I will take stability and reliability over speed any day. Unless AMD has its own moment like this with its next gen, then next four years minimum will likely be all AMD builds for me. Shame, I’d much rather give my money to a US company.

Zen3 was clearly snappier than anything that came before it. Feeling system responsiveness as “eh” was totally in your head.

 

[great Unknown]

That is completely normal. AMD did the same thing with the Ryzen 1000 series, they replaced them if they died or started throwing errors and left them alone if they didn't. Same thing happens to vehicles with potentially catastrophic issues, they fix them if they start showing issues and leave them alone if they don't. Why? You said it yourself.

Your description of the auto industry is not accurate. If a major issue shows up, they will/must recall all the vehicles potentially affected for repair or replacement. And they certainly won't sell new vehicles with those problems. Doing anything would lead to legal liability, major lawsuits and financial catastrophe.

Boeing tried it; I am not certain if they will recover in the near future.

 

[suryasans]

Intel will blame it to the hand of madness.https://youtu.be/437siTv4ttY?si=GN2JmVb9_SFQel_o

 

[Roland Of Gilead]

It's the gift that keeps on giving! Daaaaaamn

A thing like this just being smoothed over for a year and a half + surely isn't going to leave me confident in buying Intel replacement/upgrade for years to come at this point.

I think this is where Intel have really shot themselves in the foot. The fact that it's not just 1 sku, but many more, will not encourage gamers or enthusiasts to buy their products. They could have nipped this in the bud at the start, instead of hoping that the issue resided in only 1 or 2 sku's. Instead we have had weak fixes, new revelations, and are a month away from a true fix. It all smacks of Intel trying to cover up and get by, all the while doing consumers out of it.

Considering how much they've bungled this whole mess up they need to issue a clear, concise statement on which chips are affected with batch numbers etc etc. Stick a sock in the mealy mouths of anyone with an MBA and issue a limited recall.

Precisely. What a <Mod Edit> show. Not only is it across a bunch of sku's but back 2 gen worth of CPU's to boot! There will be a lot of folks who might go with Intel more often than not, reconsidering their purchases with Intel based machines in the future. Whilst the revenue from these sku's may not be the bread and butter of Intel, surely this will hit their bottom line in this sector either way.

Lets hope Arrow Lake doesn't end up the same way.

 

[suryasans]

The talents who designed a proper PMIC for Intel work for Mediatek. https://www.semimedia.cc/8666.html

 

[pixelpusher220]

That is completely normal. AMD did the same thing with the Ryzen 1000 series, they replaced them if they died or started throwing errors and left them alone if they didn't. Same thing happens to vehicles with potentially catastrophic issues, they fix them if they start showing issues and leave them alone if they don't. Why? You said it yourself.

You know what's also normal? Never buying from such a company again. Seriously, this is "we're so important we don't have to fix our issues" levels of future NOPE.

 

[hotaru251]

Honestly they should be forced to do a recall & send info out to any email that has purchased one of them.

its basically damaged most of 2 generations (in high likeliness to some degree higher than normal) of cpu's & owners may not even know about it.

 

[yc1]

This answers the question I had, specifically being was it only the high end K skew, or all. This is super unfortunate for anyone that has Intel 12-14th gen chips. The other aspect of this is now, how long do we wait to see what happens with 15th gen? A thing like this just being smoothed over for a year and a half + surely isn't going to leave me confident in buying Intel replacement/upgrade for years to come at this point.

I suppose that many of us will have to take a wait and see attitude. If there is some method upon which we can know for fact that it is a 'post-problem' chip it may make them a relevant choice again. Personally sort of ticks me off since I went with a 12th gen chip which are priced quite attractively right now with the future plan to be to update into a 14th gen a couple of years from now.

12 gen Adler lake cpus are not affiliated with the same issues but this makes me very nervous about buying a new cpu from Intel

 

[punkncat]

12 gen Adler lake cpus are not affiliated with the same issues but this makes me very nervous about buying a new cpu from Intel

I do realize that aspect, but since 13 and 14th gen are the same socket/compatible with BIOS update it basically took out the planned upgrade path over the next few years.

 

[bit_user]

not all high voltage is due solely to CPU requests as motherboards choose what voltage to send to the CPU. Any auto OC feature will deny the CPU request and send what the motherboard thinks is best.

Even though the motherboard ultimately decides what voltage to provide the CPU, isn't that just a master voltage, with the voltage of individual cores derived by the CPU internally stepping it down?

I'm having a little trouble finding much info on FIVR, but this quote directly supports the idea that each core can run at a different voltage:

"Note that while each of the CPU cores now has its own PLL (and its own V/F curve), for processors without FIVR and where the cores share a single VccIA or VccCore voltage rail, only one voltage is applied across all cores.

Alder Lake and Raptor Lake inherit the overclocking feature from Rocket Lake and offers ratio limits for each of the P-cores and each cluster of 4 E-cores."

Source: https://skatterbencher.com/intel-per-core-ratio-limit/
​

Then, the question is whether FIVR is stepping down the voltage it thinks it's getting or the voltage it actually gets.

 

[CmdrShepard]

This impacts all RL And RLr CPUs, with no "fix" of dubious quality until august, they put a stop sale on existing CPUs, damage is permanent and irreversible, and they aren't doing a recall? Where is the FTC or other similar government agencies stepping in on behalf of the consumer? Really, intel, do you expect anyone to knowingly choose to buy another CPU from you again?

But please, think of the government's Chip Act! We must sell chips!

/s

Joking aside, what they did here is asinine and a proof they have been promoted into "too big to fail" category by those government subsidies, just like Boeing and other defense contractors.

Just think about it:

1. Not stopping sales
2. No recall of things already in the stores and warehouses
3. No information on serial number range / manufacturing date range and exact list of models affected.
4. No detection tool for affected CPUs
5. No information on mobile parts
6. No warranty extension
7. No proper fix
8. No way to tell if your CPU already got damaged

I hope they get taken to the cleaners via a class action lawsuit, and if FTC doesn't do anything, then maybe WTO or EC will do something about it.

Also, with all these failures, and considering corporations are people, perhaps it's time to introduce corporate death penalty for the most egregious crap those megacorps keep pulling on us day after day without recourse.

 

[bit_user]

I do realize that aspect, but since 13 and 14th gen are the same socket/compatible with BIOS update it basically took out the planned upgrade path over the next few years.

FWIW, there's the potential of Bartlett Lake. New leaks emerged about it, a couple weeks ago. The i9 and i7 will be available in 12P + 0E and 10P + 0E configurations. The rest of the model lineup looks like yet more Raptor Lake (B0) rebadges.

https://www.techpowerup.com/324571/intel-planning-p-core-only-bartlett-lga1700-processor-for-2025
​

I think the biggest remaining questions are what the lithography and microarchitecture of those P-core only models will be. I assume still Raptor Cove on Intel 7+. Also, what might the emergence of such models say about the gaming potential of Arrow Lake?

 

[punkncat]

FWIW, there's the potential of Bartlett Lake. New leaks emerged about it, a couple weeks ago. The i9 and i7 will be available in 12P + 0E and 10P + 0E configurations. The rest of the model lineup looks like yet more Raptor Lake (B0) rebadges.

​

https://www.techpowerup.com/324571/intel-planning-p-core-only-bartlett-lga1700-processor-for-2025​

​

I think the biggest remaining questions are what the lithography and microarchitecture of those P-core only models will be. I assume still Raptor Cove on Intel 7. Also, what might the emergence of such models say about the gaming potential of Arrow Lake?

As above, I would guess the thing here would be to wait around a bit and see if they also share the deficiencies.

 

[bit_user]

Just think about it:

1. Not stopping sales
2. No recall of things already in the stores and warehouses
3. No information on serial number range / manufacturing date range and exact list of models affected.
4. No detection tool for affected CPUs
5. No information on mobile parts
6. No warranty extension
7. No proper fix
8. No way to tell if your CPU already got damaged

You're overthinking this. Intel is only on the hook for the warranty period and we're told they believe they have a fix in the works that will fulfill that obligation for most customers. So:

1. Why stop sales? Most of these CPUs take a while to fail. Customers who buy new ones and apply the microcode update shortly thereafter will (theoretically) still get a CPU that lasts at least through the warranty period.
2. Same reason as above. No compelling reason to stop sales, if the microcode fix works well enough.
3. Because it probably affects all that are currently in circulation?
4. Not sure it's detectable via software.
5. Yes, good question. They clearly need to fill us in on more details.
6. Yes, this would be a good move by them and I think it's really owed. This is something that could still happen, but perhaps they're currently focused on how to keep the chip from sinking. Once they've stabilized the crisis, perhaps they'll turn attention to secondary matters, like customers whose chips haven't yet started failing.
7. Probably, but are you certain?
8. Assume it did. The question is how much it's degraded and I'm not sure that's something you can determine via software.

Some good points.
; )