AMD Files Anti-Trust Against Intel

[bapenguin]

AMD (http://www.amd.com/us-en/Weblets/0,,7832_12670_12684,00.html?redir=CORBF02) has filed an Anti-Trust suit against Intel for unfair trade and monopolistic practices.

From Yahoo (http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=581&e=2&u=/nm/20050628/tc_nm/advancedmicro_suit_dc):In its statement, AMD said it identified 38 companies that have been victims of coercion by Intel. It said the companies include large-scale computer makers, mall system builders, wholesale distributors and retailers.

Some highlights:*Then-Compaq CEO Michael Capellas said in 2000 that because of the volume of business given to AMD, Intel withheld delivery of critical server chips. Saying "he had a gun to his head," he told AMD he had to stop buying.

*According to Gateway executives, their company has paid a high price for even its limited AMD dealings. They claim that Intel has "beaten them into 'guacamole'" in retaliation.

Interesting...most likely...Intel is screwed. It's been long assumed these kind of things were going on. Good news for the PC market as processor prices could be driven down.

[Varsity]

This does sound good!

[crashedout]

I really hope they can prove it I would like to see a $400 Dell with an A64.

[Montgomery_Python]

Love my AMD chips. Hot but fast!

[screwtape]

Anybody know what AMD's market share is? I think Intel is getting scared of the little guy.

[Bone]

Everything I've heard from friends at Dell suggests the same- that when Dell considered AMD chips, Intel threatened their Pentium chip supply in return.

[bapenguin]

Anybody know what AMD's market share is? I think Intel is getting scared of the little guy.

It shows it in the AMD PDF on the first link...I think it was like 16% currently....21% was the highest they got.

[Taco]

I'd imagine AMD has spent years building a case before they moved on it. So I'd like to think they are going to win this.

Usually I'm very pessimistic about this kind of thing.

[Wadmaasi]

Guacamole? Awesome.

[XxSATANxX]

AMD is a smart company. It's a good day to be a shareholder!!

GO AMD!!!!

[Pie4Foo]

Having owned AMD shares for 3 years, I can assure you it never seems to be a good day to be a shareholder. :=\

[crashedout]

Well maybe with the press from this suit and if they win you may get some upward movement on the stock. WE all know they make better chips, its about time Joe Sixpack figured it out too. I am not looking for them to dominate the market but 30-40% is fair.

[Heretic Machine]

I hope the judicial system actually works this time.

[Roc Ingersol]

Love my AMD chips. Hot but fast!
Almost all of their newer chips (while still faster) run dramatically cooler than their Intel counterparts.

[Taco]

Yep, "heat" has replaced "unstable" as the most spread yet untrue statement.

[MasterEvilAce]

AMD for life.

and in a semi-related topic...
ATI for life.

[SaintArnold]

AMD is a smart company. It's a good day to be a shareholder!!

GO AMD!!!!

Haha, it's never a good day to own AMD. Flat for 20+ years. (http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=my&s=AMD&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=intc)

[Taco]

Maybe tomorrow will be a good day to sell ;)?

[net7runner]

Lets look at the past few years:
- AMD is the first company to successfully implement 64-bit architecture. Intel caves and copies them.
- Intel runs into the "heat wall" and is unable to produce a 4 GHz Pentium 4 as promised.
- AMD implements Cool N' Quiet technology, making its chips run even cooler than before (which are now practically frigid compared to Pentiums)
- AMD64 procs start trash Intel chips in most benchmarks (especially games). In response, Intel comes out with nifty 600 series processors with double the L2 cache...and 0 the performance increase.
- Both companies implement dual-core technology. However, Intel's chip is basically two cores taped together on one die with a nasty switching bottleneck inbetween, while AMD's is an elegant, integrated approach with separate FSB's for each core.

Right now, I'd say all Intel has is its market share, so I'm not surprised that they're throwing it around as much as they can. Oh, I forgot--they have HyperThreading too. Wooo.

[KarmaGhost]

Yeah, HyperThreading = slows your games down, actually.

I've been an AMD fan ever since I bought my first chip 3 years ago. I'm looking forward to getting my next one this summer.

[SaintArnold]

Don't get me wrong, I think AMD is doing a great job. I just wouldn't buy the stock. However, I will admit that there might be hope for it now that the Jerry Sanders era is over.

[Mysterio]

I work for a company who's a supplier to Intel, so I deal with Intel on a daily basis. Mark my words: AMD will win this suit.

[mister_slim]

This will be long and messy. I wonder how it will affect Apple's switch?

[Kagger]

I run an athalon 900 mhz (ya thats right)

I personally have never paid for a processor (first machine was my families old modified, 2nd was a birthday present (old gateway...I had to pay for the monitor). Those were both pentium 2 cards.

However, when I finally get the cash to upgrade (10 dollars a week isn't much you know)...I'll get AMD most likley

[TrackZero]

Almost all of their newer chips (while still faster) run dramatically cooler than their Intel counterparts.

Yeah, I'd have to agree with that. My P4 2.8 "prescott" core was BLAZING. The fan would always run at full speed and the CPU temp was still up at 65 degrees just idling in WindowsXP. Eventually after playing enough games with the temp at 75-80, the CPU outright died. I then got a P4 3.0 "prescott" core (because I wasn't going to get a new/motherboard RAM), which a year later, they seemed to have fixed that problem (and they got a quieter fan). Though it still runs 10 degrees hotter than my friends athlon 64 at any given time.

Next time I do a complete upgrade, I'm switching to AMD (even though their K6-2 300Mhz was a piece of shit which also had overheating problems).

[ElectricMonk]

everybody always roots for the little guy, but only right now has it really been a clear choice to use amd if you were going to upgrade immediately.

i have always had stability and incompatibility issues with amd. it never seems to be the chips though, always shitty motherboards. incompatibilities with video cards and especially usb devices. I don't think there was a single motherboard avaliable around the athlon 1 ghz days that worked with over 60% of periphials. and perhaps there still isn't.

i will take a slower pc that works 100% over a faster pc that locks up and i have to reboot every time i use my scanner any day of the week.

i won't be upgrading for another year at least though so i hope that amd can iron out some more of these issues.

oh and if intel did this then yeah they should be punished.

[bobbler]

Nvidia's nForce chipset for AMD are some of the best ever made (nforce4 is as stable as it gets). Ever since Via and others stopped being top dog for AMD's chipset, stability issues sort of disappeared. These weren't really AMD issues to begin with, they were chipset issues (which, since they didn't make chipsets they couldn't really control).

With that said. I hope AMD wins this suit -- I don't think anyone, at this point, disagrees with the charges they have made (besides maybe Intel). Intel is rather notorious for forcing their size and power upon suppliers (as far as I've heard, at least). Anyone else wonder why Dell (and others) just doesn't support AMD? It isn't because people don't want them... A company like Dell isn't going to not support a product that sells well unless they have reason not to (such as Intel cutting some major deals to be sole supplier, etc). There is no way Dell would just cut AMD out because they don't like AMD's products (which by all accounts are superior in most ways now days) -- anything to increase profit will be done.

Intel's tactics are going to come back to bite them in the ass this time, hopefully.

I hope both stick around for a long time -- I hope AMD gains another 30+% market share (over time) so the competition is a bit more even.

[Taco]

Nvidia single handily solved AMD's stability problems. Good job by whoever got Nvidia to put so much effort into their AMD boards. The newly generated competition even got the VIA's chipsets shit together, their newer ones are nice and worth considering. I still went Nforce with my last board though.