News Critical Windows update for Core 2s

/me wonders how this affects we who have turned away from the dark side toward the light of The Great Penguin?

 

XP Pro x64 was the worst Invesment / OS I've ever got. Nothing ever works and its slow as hell.

 

Wasn't XP 64 just designed as a test system? Not formally released

 

The Inq as all the details on what it fixes here. Basically sounds like a hardware issue that can be fixed in software by making sure the exact conditions never arrise. Mac OS X has already been updated as have many BIOSs and Linux is meant to be doing something.

 

Can you post them once your done

 

404's on the patches for me

 

The x64-based versions of Windows Server 2003 and of Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition are based on the Windows Server 2003 code tree. Service and support activities for Windows XP Professional x64 Edition use the Windows Server 2003 tree and do not use the Windows XP client tree.

If you check the filename for the microcode update you'll find it is for both XP x64 and 2003 x64: WindowsServer2003.WindowsXP-KB936357-x64-ENU.exe.

In fact you'll find that SP2 for 2003 is also SP1 for XP x64.

 

QFT. I've had it for six months and do I regret installing it. Harddrive interaction is a pain in the ass, everything takes almost double the time to load/move/copy compared to 32bits (yes I have the latest drivers for everything), and games that doesn't have that nifty 64bit .exe all suffer from random slowdowns for no apparent reason

I gotta reformat someday, but I'm currently out of space to do so

 

http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118296441702631

he has a link to
http://download.intel.com/design/processor/specupdt/31327914.pdf

which has a list of the 105 currently known bugs with the C2D

 

That's unusual. I've been using XP 64-bit for almost two years and I've never had any performance issues at all. My games have only suffered a ~2% performance penalty from having to deal with the WOW64 emulator more intensely.

 

Intel's View

I am from Intel, and I thought I would give you our perspective. Months ago, we addressed a processor issue by providing a BIOS update for our customers that in no way affects system performance. We publicly documented this as an erratum in April. All processors from all companies have errata, and Intel has a well-known errata communication process to inform our customers and the public. Keep in mind the probability of encountering this issue is low. Specification Updates for the affected processors are available at http://developer.intel.com.

All errata are thoroughly investigated for issues and vulnerabilities, should they have any we fix them, usually through a microcode update. We feel we’ve resolved the issue and were open about it with customers and then publicly publishing it, but this is a good venue for ideas on how we could do better or more. I am interested in any constructive comments...

 

Hi Nick

I'd say more information would be nice, other than just a "hey we're releasing a patch, install it!"

 

Well, we have 2 kinds of things we do:

1. We publish details these and tell the big PC manufacturers. The press regularly review our http://developer.intel.com website. The PC makers and motherboard makers have the option to tell their customers directly.
2. If it is a big issue, we tell the press directly - and they in turn make everyone aware.

In this case, since this is an extremely rare issue (only been seen in testing, not in the 'real world'), we published the details in our Specification Updates document and left it up to the PC and motherboard makers to decide how they want to update their customers.

This being said - the Core 2 products are amongst the most solid and reliable - something that is reflected in the posts in this forum.

PS: If you want to update you PC, you can use either the Windows patch, or a BIOS update for your motherboard, either one will do the trick, you do not need to do both. If you use a recent version of Linux, you likely don't need to do anything at all.

 

Hey Nick,

Thanks for stopping by to explain the situation more clearly, I am sure that our readers really appreciate the elaboration (as do we). I will add an update to the story so that the readers are pointed to your posts!

Thanks,
Tim

 

Do I need this for my pentium 3??

 

Thanks mate, definately appreciate the info

 

Nick,

Question: do you use AMD--or would like to? Or are you not at liberty to comment? Thank you for the enlightenment on the matter, though.

Thanks

 

Hehehe! I have a Quad-Core Core 2 Extreme Edition as my gaming rig (mostly BF2 and waiting for the new Civ4 expansion) at home, my wife and I both have Centrino notebooks, I have a Viiv based media centre in the living room and a Pentium-D in the garage (for guests and watching DVD's while working out).

So no, no AMD machines.

 

Hi Nick,

My english is very poor, I have used the google translator to write this post. I hope that it is understood.

When seeing this post I have seen myself in the obligation to register only for tell you that I envy much to you.

I write to you from Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain), here to be able to have that you say we needed to work hard to obtain half of which it is worth all that in my country, and that that we are not a poor country.

I want to you to congratulate by your work and the help that you have offered to us in this post with respect to the subject which we are treating.

I have always bought all the computers with Intel, although AMD launch good and low cost things (sometimes), I have always bought intel thumb, you do not ask to me, I suppose that it is faith.

How much expensive is in your country all that you have? can you send me one of each? surely that is to half of price.

Thanks for the help and to read me…


An envious one from Barcelona.

 

Does this patch show up in windows update?