Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[chipguy]

I'll bet you a number
of OEMs, who've never been thrilled with the Itanium family in the first place, see this as much
more than a "don't care". Rather, something more like a "last straw". Imagine being a sales guy
at a tier 1 OEM trying to sell Itanium-based products to customers. Your task just went from
difficult to nearly impossible.

Catch your breath and try to get a grip on reality. Most server processor families have had bugs
found in the field at one time or another that had to be remedied by a SW workaround or field
replacement. No field of human endeavor is free from error. Not computer design, aircraft
design, or biochemical engineering. Yet we all rely on servers to calculate our paychecks, jets
to fly us across the continent, and the safety of drugs and accuracy of diagnostic tests our
doctors may prescribe. This isn't the first bug to be found in a server processor and it won't
be the last. Any Intel competitor that tries to exploit this is setting itself up for a hard fall when
what goes around comes around. No buyer but a fool would accept an assurance from any
vendor that a bug like this couldn't turn up in *their* hardware. What an OEM or buyer does
expect is that the uP vendor will remedy any problem that turns up as Intel has reportedly
done.