Intel Letting Customers Upgrade Underpowered Chips

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It looks as though Intel is hauling out that $50 upgrade service again for its low-end processors.

In order to take advantage of the upgrade, which essentially turns on performance features that haven't been enabled in the processor, customers must download the company's Windows application. In addition, they need to buy an upgrade code, which is inputted online to activate the update. From there, they need only to wait for the upgrade to complete, reboot their computers, and they're all set.
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I'd like to be able to turn on the extra 2mb cache and hyperthreading of my 2500k if I ever wanted. I might be the only one not opposed to this idea.
 
So the supreme court rulled that jail breaking is legit, right?
So would jailbreaking a processor be considered illegal?
 
DLC for processors.

Bravo Intel sell your cheapest processor for cheap and have retailers make a low % profit and rake in the pure profits of DLC.
 
I still haven't figured out if this annoys me or if I have mad respect for Intel pulling it off...:confused:

I am so very tempted to buy one of these chips just to see if I can break the encryption on it and unlock it personally.
 
cant wait for GOTY edition. get all DLCs for my intel processors for cheap!
 
vengence said:
Wait... so now you can really download more ram? Well... almost.
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It's pretty sad we've gotten to the point it's so cheap for them to manufacture that they can just put things in there that you haven't even bought - yet they still want to charge the prices they do. I guess that's how you make nearly 30 billion in profit a year though.
 
How about letting my upgrade my Q6600 for 50 bucks, it's under powered as hell nowadays! :p
 
Wow, they actually trying this crap again? I wonder if Intel will ever tell us how many of these BS unlocks they actually extorted, er sold to end-users.
 
WTF how about just charging $25 more to start with and having everything enabled by default. also dude someone will almost certainly figure out how to do these "upgrades" for free.
 
is this a one time thing (run the upgrade and it's permanently upgraded),
or does the program have to run on each boot up?
 
I'm sure someone can make a jailbreak program for this and just give it out for free. It's legal no?
 
ripken204 said:
is this a one time thing (run the upgrade and it's permanently upgraded),
or does the program have to run on each boot up?
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Not sure.

This link appears to be for B45 and B55 express chipsets, but if it works the same way, it looks like all the application does is flash a new firmware to the chip somehow. (CPU's have Firmware now, or is this in the chipset?)

If that is the case, it would seem that its a one time flash.
 
Zarathustra[H];1037633567 said:
Not sure.

This link appears to be for B45 and B55 express chipsets, but if it works the same way, it looks like all the application does is flash a new firmware to the chip somehow. (CPU's have Firmware now, or is this in the chipset?)

If that is the case, it would seem that its a one time flash.
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It says that the way the G622 gets increased performance through this upgrade is through increased clock frequency....

So essentially this is an Intel sanctioned overclock (that you have to pay for).

So much for the concept that unlocked Sandy Bridge CPU's can't be overclocked. If Intel can do it, someone else will certainly figure out how...
 
Zarathustra[H];1037633604 said:
It says that the way the G622 gets increased performance through this upgrade is through increased clock frequency....

So essentially this is an Intel sanctioned overclock (that you have to pay for).

So much for the concept that unlocked Sandy Bridge CPU's can't be overclocked. If Intel can do it, someone else will certainly figure out how...
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Intel isn't sanctioning overclocking, they're just selling you underclcoked CPUs so they can rip you off more to "unlock" their standard performance.
 
Ok, how long until someone cracks the app/DLC for a keygen. I'm guessing not very long.
 
I'd be more interested in seeing someone crack the software to allow a multiplier unlock on the i3 Cpus...that way we can have 5.0 Ghz Overclocks on those little-guys, with that and an Radeon 6950 1GB unlocked to a 6970, you can have a hell of a budget gaming machine....The SandyBridge i3's are very quick as they are, a high overclock should see it overshadow even the old i5 760 and even rub shoulders with the i7 950 in many application.
 
I take great offense to this, because years ago the community would do the same thing. Unlock graphic cards pipes, unlock cores in CPUs, and etc. I loved unlocking my Radeon 9500 into a 9700 Pro via a softmod, or bios flash. The same thing with Geforce 6800's and some AMD CPUs.

Now they're purposely crippling their CPUs when they are sold, and expect people to pay for what they bought? Anyone with half a brain can expect to pay more for getting the same thing. Actually, not the same thing. Cause what happens when you change the motherboard? Your probably screwed.

I would praise the pirates or hacking community if they could offer a free alternative to this unholy practice of Intels.
 
I want to know how the change happens. CPU firmware? It has to make some permanent change to the CPU. What if you you bought this update, then replaced the motherboard? I would hope that the changes would remain...
 
AMD does the same thing, they just don't charge for it. Or at least they haven't figured out how to charge for it.
 
Omegas said:
AMD does the same thing, they just don't charge for it. Or at least they haven't figured out how to charge for it.
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AMD has always been comitted to price. I don't think they'll charge for something like that. In fact they like to have enthusiasts tinkering with their stuff.
 
Intel as well as AMD have always had CPU features disabled to sell units at lower price points. All Intel is doing now is allowing you to re-enable those features. The phrase "You get what you pay for" has never been more true.

I don't see this being hacked anytime soon. People have been working for years to break open Intel's microcode to enable features (e.g. hyper-threading, multipliers, cache), but have only managed to do so on accident while never figuring out how they did it.
 
Track Drew said:
I want to know how the change happens. CPU firmware? It has to make some permanent change to the CPU. What if you you bought this update, then replaced the motherboard? I would hope that the changes would remain...
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Doesn't look like it's persistent. The software Intel uses probably changes certain CPU configuration registers during OS boot, but they'll return to their default state after a reboot.

If I replace my motherboard with a new one, will the upgrade still be installed?
No, for initial hardware failure, return to the place of purchase. You will need to request them to "Re-Activate" your Upgrade Card Pin#. This will allow you to re-use the existing upgrade card you previous purchased. Be sure to have your Serial # (SN#) ready when you call Gateway. Example of what to find: SN#: 123CA12345678912D12345 (example only).
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Omegas said:
AMD does the same thing, they just don't charge for it. Or at least they haven't figured out how to charge for it.
Click to expand...
Actually they don't. Normally they're fused off or have a lesser grade than expected. So it's at the customer's risk to unlock them. Like the X3 processors that were actually quadcores, they were rated X3 because they were deemed defective at X4 rating. And the thing is, AMD didn't charge for it, you just wouldn't be covered by warranty.
 
AMD should be happy about this because Intel is essentially making their CPUs crappier than they need to be. I wonder if this will continue when Bulldozer rolls around?
 
bpmurrGT said:
What's next a "Season Pass" for discounted CPU DLC?
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What I can see happening is that they move to a subscription model where they offer only one processor model with a very basic feature set and then allow upgrades to it for yearly fees
.
For example:
$50 will get you a base processor running at 1.6GHz with only a single core, 1MB of cache, and a single channel memory controller.

Then you can choose the following upgrade packages:
Code: 
$5 per year
2.0GHz
single-core
2MB cache

$10 per year
2.4GHz dual-core
4MB cache 
dual-channel memory controller

$25 per year
3.0GHz dual-cores
4MB cache
dual-channel memory controller
Hyper-threading

$50 per year
2.4GHz quad-core
8MB cache
dual-channel memory controller

$75 per year
3.0GHz quad-core
8MB cache
dual-channel memory controller

$100 per year
3.6Ghz quad-core
dual-channel memory controller
8MB cache
Hyper-threading

$150 per year
3.2 GHz six-core
triple-channel memory controller
16MB cache

$200 per year
3.6GHz  six-core
triple-channel memory controller
16MB cache

$250 per year
3.0 GHz eight-core
quad-channel memory controller
24MB cache

$400 per year
3.6GHz eight-core
quad-channel memory controller
32MB cache
Hyperthreading
 
If you buy it, you should own it 100% and be able to do what you want with it, and not have stuff spy on you.
 
The minute I have to subscribe to use my processors full potential is the minute I give up computing.

Seriously, Intel may be the performance king, but I'm not sure I'd want to support this with any of my $$$. Let's hope AMD can give them enough competition to end crap like this.
 
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