Intel's new microcode update forbids benchmark comparisons

[PocketNerd]

And the argument to switch to AMD keeps getting better and better!

[yian88]

Intel bans benchmarks so no one notices performance hit > everyone hears the news and begins benchmarking due to suspicion >  intel cant do shit about since its our right to benchmark and compare products we buy.

[HarryNyquist]

14 minutes ago, Spotty said:

Intel Employee #1: Uh-oh, these test results aren't looking too good, what do we do?
Intel Employee #2: Oh shit... Umm... Let's not allow them to run the tests?
Intel Employee #1: GENIUS!

~Time passes~

Quote

Intel Employee #2: Uh, crap, people read the license.
Intel Employee #1: QUICK, ACTIVATE DAMAGE CONTROL MODE!

 

“We are updating the license now to address this and will have a new version available soon. As an active member of the open source community, we continue to welcome all feedback.”

 

[zheega]

5 hours ago, goodtofufriday said:

Not sure that stands up in court. Consumers have a right to compare products, and current products that recieve changes. 

Consumers yes. But not review sites like Anandtech. They might have to be much more careful.

[CTR640]

Intel [Desperate] Inside. Good job, Intel, you made us much more curious about your sketchy EULA so we now gonna bench like MAD!!

 

AMD is getting more attractive now.

[Mira Yurizaki]

Call me skeptical, but can someone actually verify that "inteleula" was from an actual Intel source and not someone with too much time on their hands? Because the parent site of where the EULA text came from, https://paste.ubuntu.com/, looks like an anonymous version of pastebin where you can pretend to be anyone you want.

[Coaxialgamer]

Come get your microcodes ! Anyone want a microcode ?!

 

https://github.com/platomav/CPUMicrocodes

[vorticalbox]

13 minutes ago, zheega said:

Consumers yes. But not review sites like Anandtech. They might have to be much more careful.

If they brought the cpu then they are consumers.

[DrMacintosh]

I was right! This was AMDs strat all along! 

[Nowak]

Well that was fast. How did anyone approve this in the first place?

[Tiffany123]

Hi here! I am new

[Okjoek]

[alicskysareblue]

how is this patch coming out is it windows updats or driver updates from intel ?

[Mira Yurizaki]

https://paste.ubuntu.com/p/2ZHTFxcNz3/

 

Oh hey look, there's an "amdeula" too!... oh wait.

[TopHatProductions115]

7 hours ago, VegetableStu said:

almost there! you'd need to describe your feelings on the topic in the opening post as well

 

in the meantime I'll quote over what I said in the other thread:

I fell that I may switch to AMD next month...

jk

 

But seriously, this could cause Intel some serious issues with investors if their bottom line gets hit too hard by this. Hopefully, this will get cleared up. I don't think Intel is silly enough to actually pull this - unless they actually wanna shoot themselves in the foot  

[aezakmi]

they already killed about 10% performance in coffee lake with the spectre "fix" and now this?

 

these guys are a joke

[pas008]

13 minutes ago, aezakmi said:

they already killed about 10% performance in coffee lake with the spectre "fix" and now this?

 

these guys are a joke

10% lol

where you getting this?

 

 

[aezakmi]

1 hour ago, pas008 said:

10% lol

where you getting this?

CPU-Z

my old unpatched 8350k topped 470 points on CPU-Z sc bench, unpatched F3 BIOS (factory release)

a friend now has that 8350k and a similar board but with F6 BIOS version, his benchmark is hovering around 400 and 408

the CPU needs to run at 4.3GHz in order to hit 470 points

 

both tests done on freshly installed windows 7, with 8GB @2933 MHz single channel memory and using the iGPU

[descendency]

Might be time to dump any Intel stock you have for now. This looks really bad for them. 

[ScratchCat]

4 hours ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Call me skeptical, but can someone actually verify that "inteleula" was from an actual Intel source and not someone with too much time on their hands? Because the parent site of where the EULA text came from, https://paste.ubuntu.com/, looks like an anonymous version of pastebin where you can pretend to be anyone you want.

Even if it wasn't anonymous Intel would not post their EULA on a pastebin type site, why would they? They have their own website and C+P EULAs are what you expect from that random dude on GitHub rather than industry giant Intel.

 

The best explanation would the this is partly leaked and the leaker would just want a place that others can access.

[Mira Yurizaki]

10 hours ago, ScratchCat said:

The best explanation would the this is partly leaked and the leaker would just want a place that others can access.

Since Intel acknowledged it (https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/08/23/intel_microcode_license/), I will concede that whatever was posted to the pastebin was real. However, the fact that it was on an anonymous pastebin platform and people were eating it up like it was truth upsets me.

 

Because what's stopping someone from making a malformed EULA and posting it there as something official looking?

Edited August 24, 2018 by M.Yurizaki

[Sober2ndThought]

12 hours ago, Brooksie359 said:

My mother is a lawyer and she has talked about how UELA have little to no power. She says that alot of companies have EULAs that have part that would never hold up in court. At the end of the day this would be super illegal and wouldn't even make it to a court case. They would just throw out the case tbh. 

That's not what I learned in law school. I remember my first day they told us EULA are enforceable. 

Now I am not a contract lawyer and have not studied contract law for years, an actual contract lawyer can get into the nitty gritty. Plus most my education was in the common law in Canada, so what I say is mostly true for Canada and not true world wide.

 

The only type of EULAs which might not be enforceable are Shrink Wrap Contracts. In the U.S. the law is split, one court decisions ProCD, Inc. v. Zeidenberg, 86 F. 3d. 1447 (7th Cir. 1996) held that they are enforceable, while another Klocek v. Gateway, Inc 104 F. Supp. 2d. 1332 held they are not. It will depend on which state you live in. That is unless the UCC is updated to resolves the issue once and for all and the state legislatures all adopt the new UCC . 

 

All other EULAs are enforceable. In the U.S. they are called Click-Through License Agreements. EULAs are considered a form of a Standard Form Contract, and the Under the Article 2 of the UCC (in the U.S.) and under the Common Law (commonwealth countries) EULAs are enforceable as such. But because they are Standard Form Contracts, they are subject to several limitation which are not typically found in typical bilateral contracts. 

 

Generally, to be enforceable, a person must enter into the contract with the intent to be bound by the contract. With a typical bilateral contract which is negotiated and hammered out, all aspects of it are enforceable unless a limited number of exceptions apply. The assumption is both parties are equal in power, they probably discussed every clause in the contract, and they agreed to bound by every single term in the contract and agreed to every clause in the contract. So the contract is enforceable. There are a handful of limitations such as mistake (mutual and unilateral), duress or undue influence, unconscionability, misrepresentation or fraud, impossibility or impracticability, and frustration of purpose.

 

Standard Form Contract there is an unequal bargaining power, they are typically a take or leave it deal, they are imposed on us, and there usually is not enough time to understand the implications of each clause of the contract. For these reasons Standard Form Contracts have limited enforceability. 

 

The general rule is that anything in a Standard Form Contract are enforceable on the whole against the party which drafted it.  But on the other party (the party assenting to the EULA), the terms are only enforceable so long as those terms are normally expected to be found in such a contract. Any term that is unusual or particularly onerous, must be pointed out with particularly to be enforceable (i.e. bolded, in red, with the right to sign on the side, etc.) otherwise it will be unenforceable. Tilden Rent-A-Car Co. v. Clendenning (1978), 83 DLR (3d) 400,

 

For example, in your cell phone contract the clause about long distance calling being subject to a higher rate is generally enforceable because as consumers we expect this to be part of the terms of the contract. But a clause stating that you must pay your long-distance bill in pennies at a particular location would not be enforceable because that is considered unusual and onerous clause (pennies are heavy).  So unless it was pointed out to you with particularity and you assented it is not enforceable. 

 

With, EULAs since all we do is click agree and we have no right to negotiate the terms, they are considered Standard Form Contracts and are enforceable as such. In this case, the question will turn on whether the clause about publishing benchmarks is either particularly onerous or an unusual contract terms and whether Intel pointed it out with particularity. 

[Ryujin2003]

Intel backtracked: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/08/23/intel_microcode_license/

Quote

Intel has backtracked on the license for its latest microcode update that mitigates security vulnerabilities in its processors – after the previous wording outlawed public benchmarking of the chips.

 

[Kamina]

Is that a challenge, Intel?

[Brooksie359]

6 hours ago, Sober2ndThought said:

That's not what I learned in law school. I remember my first day they told us EULA are enforceable. 

Now I am not a contract lawyer and have not studied contract law for years, an actual contract lawyer can get into the nitty gritty. Plus most my education was in the common law in Canada, so what I say is mostly true for Canada and not true world wide.

 

The only type of EULAs which might not be enforceable are Shrink Wrap Contracts. In the U.S. the law is split, one court decisions ProCD, Inc. v. Zeidenberg, 86 F. 3d. 1447 (7th Cir. 1996) held that they are enforceable, while another Klocek v. Gateway, Inc 104 F. Supp. 2d. 1332 held they are not. It will depend on which state you live in. That is unless the UCC is updated to resolves the issue once and for all and the state legislatures all adopt the new UCC . 

 

All other EULAs are enforceable. In the U.S. they are called Click-Through License Agreements. EULAs are considered a form of a Standard Form Contract, and the Under the Article 2 of the UCC (in the U.S.) and under the Common Law (commonwealth countries) EULAs are enforceable as such. But because they are Standard Form Contracts, they are subject to several limitation which are not typically found in typical bilateral contracts. 

 

Generally, to be enforceable, a person must enter into the contract with the intent to be bound by the contract. With a typical bilateral contract which is negotiated and hammered out, all aspects of it are enforceable unless a limited number of exceptions apply. The assumption is both parties are equal in power, they probably discussed every clause in the contract, and they agreed to bound by every single term in the contract and agreed to every clause in the contract. So the contract is enforceable. There are a handful of limitations such as mistake (mutual and unilateral), duress or undue influence, unconscionability, misrepresentation or fraud, impossibility or impracticability, and frustration of purpose.

 

Standard Form Contract there is an unequal bargaining power, they are typically a take or leave it deal, they are imposed on us, and there usually is not enough time to understand the implications of each clause of the contract. For these reasons Standard Form Contracts have limited enforceability. 

 

The general rule is that anything in a Standard Form Contract are enforceable on the whole against the party which drafted it.  But on the other party (the party assenting to the EULA), the terms are only enforceable so long as those terms are normally expected to be found in such a contract. Any term that is unusual or particularly onerous, must be pointed out with particularly to be enforceable (i.e. bolded, in red, with the right to sign on the side, etc.) otherwise it will be unenforceable. Tilden Rent-A-Car Co. v. Clendenning (1978), 83 DLR (3d) 400,

 

For example, in your cell phone contract the clause about long distance calling being subject to a higher rate is generally enforceable because as consumers we expect this to be part of the terms of the contract. But a clause stating that you must pay your long-distance bill in pennies at a particular location would not be enforceable because that is considered unusual and onerous clause (pennies are heavy).  So unless it was pointed out to you with particularity and you assented it is not enforceable. 

 

With, EULAs since all we do is click agree and we have no right to negotiate the terms, they are considered Standard Form Contracts and are enforceable as such. In this case, the question will turn on whether the clause about publishing benchmarks is either particularly onerous or an unusual contract terms and whether Intel pointed it out with particularity. 

My mother is a contract lawyer and she reviews contracts for a living. She was saying they have little to no power because they have such stringent limitations on them. Yeah they can get you for obvious stuff like misuse of education grade software for commercial use but not for doing benchmarks. People think they are the same as legally binding documents when they aren't. If they have anything out if the ordinary they are not enforceable. If they conflict with any laws such as consumer protection laws they aren't enforceable. There are so many ways for a EULA to be considered unenforceable that they have little power. This case would be cut and dry. Intel would lose in a second because of consumer protection laws.