[ubuntu-uk] Intel evil or not? WAS: Quad core CPU for Ubuntu, is it worth it?

[Kirrus]

Part of this mail is from Philip, which he sent directly to me instead of via the list.

----- "Philip Newborough" <mail at philipnewborough.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > I take it you've not heard of the term `wintel` then?
> >
> > Intel is a massive company, which had a monopoly the same sort of
> size of Microsoft's desktop share. AMD came in, and started forcing
> Intel to shake things up, but till AMD came along, Intel were more
> bothered with the size of their profits than innovation and their
> customers.
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wintel
> >
> > In this monopoly battle, AMD is still very much the underdog to
> intel's behemoth. Does any of this sound familiar? :)
> >
> > In terms of battle, I think AMD are more like Firefox & IE than
> Windows & Linux, but still you get the idea.
> >
> > Intel might be trying now to get into the graphics scene, and making
> sure that their drivers are open, but AMD has historically been kinder
> to the Open Source community, as shown by them buying and then
> starting to open ATI.
> >
> > For some stats and more detailed information:
> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/102607-arguments-intel-amd.html?nwwpkg=50arguments
> (no second page, whatever it says...)
> >
> 
> Someone far more important than me once said, "One man's terrorist is
> another man's freedom fighter." Personally I don't buy into all the
> New World Order/Evil Monopoly theories and tend to use whatever works
> best for me.

Unfortunately, society doesn't work like that always. Intel was not exactly being brilliant at trying to best the new competitor AMD. Remember PIII? I frequently found the PII 450MHz CPU *faster* than PIII 700 MHz chips, in pure usefulness (not speed).
PIII was just a marketing "lets win the MHz war with AMD" exercise, and didn't really advance the usefulness of CPUs.

Personally, I look at the world, and I see quite a lot of greed for money, and quite a lot of lust for power hanging around.

> 
> I find the whole Wintel/Windoze/M$ mindset to be somewhat destructive
> and derogatory. Just my opinion. Besides, I'd hardly call AMD an
> underdog, after all they do describes themselves as, "Advanced Micro
> Devices, Inc. (AMD) is a global semiconductor company with facilities
> worldwide."

Intels current share price: $25.74 
AMD's current share price: $8.1675

As of Q2 this year, AMD was in the red, incurring a loss (buying ATI [$130m chargers], various stock fun).
At the moment, Intels profits are ~£1bn.

Intel are currently paying 12.75 cents per share per year in dividends. AMD are not, as they don't have the cash.

Each CPU chip factory is *INCREDIBLY* expensive to make. Any big competitor to Intel have to be a global semiconductor company, or be extremely specialised. (ARM mobile CPUs)

AMD, as of Q3 this year, have 13.9% of the CPU market share. Intel have 78.7%. 

Saying that, the reason I'm using Ubuntu, is because I find it easier than Windows. I don't really care about binary drivers, and truly-freely-free systems. I want a computer that works. If I can have that whilst supporting the little guy, I will, but I won't stop using something just because it happens to be evil :)

Regards,
Kirrus

(p.s. I quite like Gmail. I prefer Zimbra tho :))





-- 
Blog: http://www.kirrus.co.uk
UK Plone Hosting: http://plone-hosting.co.uk

RPGs:
Captain Senaris Vlenn, CO, USS Sarek
Lt Aieron Peters, XO DS5