Posted 27/01/2000 2:46pm by Mike Magee

Intel Pentium II rises from the dead

One peculiar side effect of Intel's current problems with supplying processors is the sudden availability, once more, of the Pentium II 400MHz processor.

Distributors have been told over the last few days that there is now wide availability of the processor, which actually entered the chip gulag many many months ago.

Just exactly what reputable distributors are supposed to do with these Pentium IIs is the really interesting thing. Do they suddenly start telling their system builder clients that while, no, they can't have Coppermines because there aren't any, they can instead revert to a trusted component from yesteryear?

It also begs the interesting question of just where Intel found these components which ought to be part of the chip dinosaur's fossil record.

Is there, we wonder, some large Intel warehouse somewhere filled with 8086s, 286s, i830s, 386s, 486s, FDIV Pentia and the rest? .

Link to story:

http://www.theregister.co.uk /

Link to Pentium III supplies worldwide cancelled for February:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/000126-000020.htm

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), January 27, 2000

Answers

Processor Devolution! I can't wait to get my hands on the latest 286/12!!!

What it really sounds like is that someone came up with an idea for dumping all those surplus Pentium II's.

-- Powder (Powder47keg@aol.com), January 27, 2000.

Can you spell M.O.N.O.P.O.L.Y????

-- Porky (Porky@in.cellblockD), January 27, 2000.

'Tis a creative challenge for Marketing and Sales--"The Pentium II-- The Phoenix for the New Millenium".

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), January 27, 2000.

Why would a company within an industry that lives and dies on innovation try to sell an old has been, dusty chip. I think they are desperate to move product or at least to be able to say to buyers that they have some type of product named Pentium that they can sell. This is a P.R. nightmare for a company like this to be laughed at and associated with this Dumb and Dumber move.

-- Joe (ewest@123.com), January 27, 2000.

At 14:06 today 01/27/2000 Intel is trading at $98.4375 UP $1.9375 for a 2.01% gain on volume of 21.218,800 shares.

Go figure.

Maybe they are being rewarded for improved inventory control.

-- Bill P (porterwn@one.net), January 27, 2000.

It appears that the source for this article is a small "gadfly" publication in the UK, so this information may take quite a while to become more widely known. Wonder if any of the US PC pubs will pick it up...

-- DeeEmBee (macbeth1@pacbell.net), January 27, 2000.

This could be Intel's way of getting rid of the old backlog of stock that they "innovated" themselves right past into P-III as they competed with AMD !? They can now get some money out of their past, prematurely released chips... (premature in that they should never have been released as they were with the P-III's right around the corner-- all part of planned obselesence. The Pentium "Pro", predecessor to the P-II, was a blazing example of selling antiquated tech. before it hits the shelf).

A great ploy, if so. And certainly not the first time such business tactics have been used.
It's the way the Big Auto manufacturers sell "2,000" model cars in early '99. How can they be based on 2,000 technology??? The year isn't here yet! They should ONLY be called the year in which they were designed and engineered.

There, I feel better!
;)

-- It's Me (Not@here.com), January 27, 2000.

---you don't need intel products. Motorola makes dandy chips, in real world application testing they mostly trounce any intel stuff, or AMD for that matter. There's "numbers" used for PR sales pitches, then there's actual use in programs, those are the "benchmarks" a consumer should use, my opinion. Mr. Yourdon, have anything more to add to this in tech speak? Or anyone else? Thankyou.

-- zog (zzoggy@yahoo.com), January 27, 2000.

It's just as well -- stay with the Pentium II or AMD. Pentium III is a spy chip. (Each has a serial number burned in for tracking you [your machine] on the internet.)

Hopefully, as technology progesses, that more chip and O/S makers will enter the fray -- and that some of them will cater to us USERS, and not to government, big business and vendors, in the areas of security and privacy.

-- A (A@AisA.com), January 27, 2000.

Of course, its a shame that Y2K didn't shut down the whole spy technology of the PIII right then and there, isn't it?

Well, I for one am glad to know that the big G is so interested in me that its tracking my whereabouts on the Internet. It sure beats having them focus on spending my good money on wasteful government programs like interstate highways and other blatant parts of the NWO conspiracy.

And I'm glad that Intel, a publicly traded corporation, is in on the whole scheme. Maybe they get a cut of our brains when the Illuminati eat us for lunch. I'm sure that while I type Intel is currently supplying the US Government with the sales receipts for each computer so they can match serial numbers with names. In fact, I bet that Zenith and RCA were doing the same all along with serial numbers for televisions. And why haven't I noticed all of those UPC symbols on books I read and the groceries that I buy? HELP!

-- Sarcasm (is a subtle@virtue.com), January 27, 2000.

PPro -- a good chip, way ahead of the competition, and out _years_ prior to the PII.

The "spy chip" nonsense -- Sun (and others) have been putting a queryable SN in their CPUs for a hound's age, no one seems to care. It's all a load of twaddle anyway, because every time you log on, you're _logged_. Your ISP knows who you are, and will hand over the goods when The Man asks.

That's how net.crooks end up in jail.

Now, past all the anti-MS agitprop that was non-artfully cloaked (with its arse hanging out the costume) as anti-Intel agitprop, and on to the heart of the matter -- supply chain y2k issues:

Intel was very up front about their dependency on PACRIM operations that were looking _very_ shaky pre-rollover.

Is it any surprise that the very things they warned about are now happening?

-- Sluggo (sluggo@your.head), January 27, 2000.

P II's and even 486's are still in production for use in *embedded systems*. In fact there are still 386 single-board computers being built today. While the home and office market is "bigger and faster" oriented, the industrial and aerospace sectors are more concerned about lowest possible cost and "good enough", not "fastest is better" performance.

At work, we're just starting to work putting 100MHz Pentiums into aircraft systems. Seems these old warhorses are just reaching the magic point of "Five years successfully demonstrated in-the-field performance" which qualifies them for use in military products.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), January 27, 2000.

Q: What have you got to hide?
A: None of your f*ing business?

If there weren't people who were ready to put you in jail or kill you for what you eat, drink, smoke, screw, look at, read, think, wear, maybe the ID thing would be no big deal.

Maybe it there weren't people who want to know every detail of your life so they can "target" market you or figure out how much mney you make or how you spend it (so they can tax you on what they consider their money, and maybe give you creidt for spending it in PC ways) maybe the ID thing would would be no big deal.

Of course, if people weren't such busybody/fascists in the first place, no one would have considered burning IDs into chips into the first place.

Also -- about the ISP records: Yes, they keep records, BUT WHAT FOR? No business (even supermarkets) needs YOUR specific spending information. All they need is AGGREGATE information. There is NO NECESSITY other than "maybe we'll need it later" or for some official busybody or official extortionist for a merchant to keep SPECIFCS on you.

Note that I am not talking aboutr banks or credit cards, who may need to keep specific records for some period in case of an account screwup -- but that has to be only for 6 months or a year -- not the many years MANDATED by Big Brother.

All you political pollyannas -- wake up! Read Orwell's "1984" and "Animal Farm". Read the articles on the free (non-member) pages of
http://www.sovereignsociety.com

-- A (A@AisA.com), January 27, 2000.

Hey, what's wrong with PII 400's?! I'm using a PII 266, and it's OK! I won't say I love it, but I do respect it in the morning!! I'll trade it for a PII 400 and give you $100 boot.

-- BZ (beezee@statesville.net), January 27, 2000.

ISPs keep records because they need to be able to track down spammers, harassers, and other abusers.

No great mystery there.

Besides which, every connection you make -- SMTP, HTTP, FTP, whatever -- points back to your originating IP. It _has_ to, otherwise there'd be no way for you to do _anything_ on the net.

The whole chip-ID thing is a red herring.

-- Sluggo (sluggo@your.head), January 27, 2000.

Hey Powder,

I got enough stuff hanging around I could give you a deal on a 286 (8 or 10) or a 386 (12?). I might even throw in a couple hundred 5.25 double and high density floppies. Actually they are good hardware skeletons - I leave the cases open with drive controller wires nice and accessible change a drive, change the setup and data on old floppies can be copied to 3.5 diskettes. (Guess who has made a couple bucks moving data from 5.25's to 3.5's - how badly do you need that data on those 5.25's ???)

jh

-- john hebert (jt_hebert@hotmail.com), January 27, 2000.

Sluggo -- all they need is a session ID. One of the main reasons they keep all those records is simply just because they can.

Doesn't seem like their present record keeping does much about spam, does it? For a whole month, I sent every instance of spam I received to Earthlink's "abuse" e-mail location. All I ever got back was a form letter e-mail, and my spam received has INCREASED. So, I've learned how to use filters, which cuts it in half.

Point is, the busybodies alway argue like: "Well, if we implanted a chip in every baby at birth, then no one would ever be kidnapped or lost on a hiking trip again." (Save the children, sob, sniff, snuffle.) Well, maybe a lot, even most people, may not want themselves and their children tracked. Why not? THEY DON'T HAVE TO GIVE YOU OR THE BUSYBODIES/FASCISTS A REASON!! GET IT!!

-- A (A@AisA.com), January 27, 2000.