Intel Corp (INTC)

[Elmer Phud]

I agree with chipguy that this statement is nonsense.

I'm not so sure. There is anecdotal evidence that AMD suffers from a great deal of process variation. wbmw did a fine analysis a while back showing the wide range of leakage across their entire 65nm product line. Their high published defect density could reflect material intentionally scrapped or at least die killed for either high leakage, slow speed or other parametric reasons. The 65nm process is slower than 90nm. In addition to being near vapor, Barfalona is much slower than expected and no major OEM will touch it. All signs that could be explained by excess process variation and because it is a reoccurring complaint of people who tend to favor AMD, it makes sense that they naturally assume that Intel suffers the same problems. In the past Klaus made other comments indicating process variation was a serious problem in testing parts due to the many speed paths and difficulties covering them all. A wrong assumption but not an unreasonable one. Again, the natural assumption was to assume that Intel suffers the same issues.