Google Engineers Are Becoming Concerned Over Some Arm Platforms Lacking Spectre V2 Mitigations

[ldesnogu]

They didn't mention any licensees, they named ARM specifically. I didn't take that as a blame, merely a directed request at a specific company.

That's because ARM takes care of generic modifications for ARM LLVM, I'm not aware of any licensee doing generic ARM work on LLVM (except perhaps Apple), so obviously they're asking ARM for some help

[Guest]

But have you ever gone hungry? Have you ever had to beg for food? Have you ever slept on the street?
The living conditions of people makes the difference!

My post is oriented against greed on expense of others, and against stealing due to lazyness to earn money in ethical way,... Many homeless people are just lazy to take care of themselves,...

However, some people are just in bad life situation, which isn't their fault, and I'm not against those people,.. Actually, it's sad. Usually, they are victims of wars lead by USA, Russia, Europe,.. So, wars are cause of the most of the poverty. And, then alcoholic addiction.

I'm anti people, who are entitled, and taking from others, without contributing back. .. In my country, it's common standard to drink lots and try to work/contribute back to society as least as possible,..

[Charlie68]

My post is oriented against greed on expense of others, and against stealing due to lazyness to earn money in ethical way,... Many homeless people are just lazy to take care of themselves,...

However, some people are just in bad life situation, which isn't their fault, and I'm not against those people,.. Actually, it's sad. Usually, they are victims of wars lead by USA, Russia, Europe,.. So, wars are cause of the most of the poverty. And, then alcoholic addiction.

I'm anti people, who are entitled, and taking from others, without contributing back. .. In my country, it's common standard to drink lots and try to work/contribute back to society as least as possible,..

I didn't want to justify them, it was just to say that sometimes life can lead people to do things they wouldn't do in other conditions.
The point is that there will always be the danger of a burglary in the house, as there will always be the danger that some cyber criminal tries to enter a PC to plunder it. They should be captured and made harmless but if it were that simple, we shouldn't lock the front door and always try to make computers safer.

[NotMine999]

lol, these forums are a troll's paradise.

So much of this thread needs the attention of a forum moderator to delete or clearly flag the OT posts. Sadly, forum moderator probably opens up Michael to legal issues.

[zyxxel]

Proper approach would still be disabling all mitigations on all platforms and imprisoning those who exploit the vulnerabilities. It's a crime after all, in most countries.

You don't stop selling knives because some people use them to kill. You don't lock cars to 10 km/h because some people cause accidents.

You don't leave bank vaults unlocked just because the "right way" is to just imprison all thieves.

What you are failing to understand is that Internet spans the whole world. And it's very complicated to try to catch and convict someone living in the "wrong" country. Next thing - what does it help that the person gets imprisoned, when the person has already created damages for billions of dollars?

Security can only be proactive. That means the need for technical solutions. Going for the guilty party is a completely secondary step, but the only way to maintain security is to make systems as robust as is reasonably possible without making it too hard or inefficient to use the systems.

[zyxxel]

Sure, but take a look at his entire track record. Intel should have hired him way earlier.

Intel already has lots of great engineers - their problems isn't too bad engineers. Intel suffers a management issue.

It was management - not engineers - who wanted about 30 steps pipeline in the P4 just hoping to have the highest GHz value when selling instead of having the fastest processor.
It was management - not engineers - who wanted Intel chipsets to only support RAMBUS memory.
It was management - not engineers - ...

Intel engineers can do wonders - when they are allowed to fly. Most of the time, they are relegated to cost as little as possible while Intel dishes out the same processor with new coating to maximize the profit.

[vladpetric]

Intel already has lots of great engineers - their problems isn't too bad engineers. Intel suffers a management issue.

It was management - not engineers - who wanted about 30 steps pipeline in the P4 just hoping to have the highest GHz value when selling instead of having the fastest processor.
It was management - not engineers - who wanted Intel chipsets to only support RAMBUS memory.
It was management - not engineers - ...

Intel engineers can do wonders - when they are allowed to fly. Most of the time, they are relegated to cost as little as possible while Intel dishes out the same processor with new coating to maximize the profit.

I generally agree about management being an issue.

But I think you're significantly underestimating the contributions of an engineering superstar, like Jim Keller. Why don't general ARM chips (not Apple's implementation) work as well as Intel/AMD? Because their superscalar microarchitecture is rather mediocre. And I'm sure they have good engineers.

Between the Athlon/Opteron era and Ryzen, AMD sucked ... massively. Who was the lead with the first Athlon? Jim Keller. Who was the lead with the Ryzen? Oh, Jim Keller again. What happened in between? He was elsewhere ...

The main issue with Intel right now is that they're a roughly a technology node behind AMD. Intel 10 nm is comparable to AMD 7 nm, in terms of things that actually matter (density of transistor/logic/memory - nanometers are not the size of a transistor, FWIW). But AMD's had it running at high volume for more than a year now, Intel's barely getting up to speed with it.

P4 was an issue 18 years ago. It isn't now.

[zyxxel]

I generally agree about management being an issue.

But I think you're significantly underestimating the contributions of an engineering superstar, like Jim Keller. Why don't general ARM chips (not Apple's implementation) work as well as Intel/AMD? Because their superscalar microarchitecture is rather mediocre. And I'm sure they have good engineers.

Between the Athlon/Opteron era and Ryzen, AMD sucked ... massively. Who was the lead with the first Athlon? Jim Keller. Who was the lead with the Ryzen? Oh, Jim Keller again. What happened in between? He was elsewhere ...

The main issue with Intel right now is that they're a roughly a technology node behind AMD. Intel 10 nm is comparable to AMD 7 nm, in terms of things that actually matter (density of transistor/logic/memory - nanometers are not the size of a transistor, FWIW). But AMD's had it running at high volume for more than a year now, Intel's barely getting up to speed with it.

P4 was an issue 18 years ago. It isn't now.

There are other factors involved here. It costs huge amounts of money to develop a chip. AMD got robbed of receiving the incomes they should have from the Opteron processors because of illegal Intel marketing actions. That was money AMD should have used to develop their next line of chips.

Right now, Intel have managed to run their company into a wall. Which means it has been much easier for AMD management to show that there is an open market to compete for. Which makes it much easier for AMD to get a go-ahead to go all-in developing newer implementations. As long as the competition has much better products and you have to settle for low-priced chips in the low-end segments, it's hard to motivate the owners to invest - how can you make them believe that you can not only match but beat the huge competitor?

[vladpetric]

There are other factors involved here. It costs huge amounts of money to develop a chip. AMD got robbed of receiving the incomes they should have from the Opteron processors because of illegal Intel marketing actions. That was money AMD should have used to develop their next line of chips.

Right now, Intel have managed to run their company into a wall. Which means it has been much easier for AMD management to show that there is an open market to compete for. Which makes it much easier for AMD to get a go-ahead to go all-in developing newer implementations. As long as the competition has much better products and you have to settle for low-priced chips in the low-end segments, it's hard to motivate the owners to invest - how can you make them believe that you can not only match but beat the huge competitor?

Well, you seem to be completely ignoring what I'm telling you.

[zyxxel]

Well, you seem to be completely ignoring what I'm telling you.

I'd say you seem to be completely failing at keeping up a debate. Now try a better response where you actually argue.

Hint here - there are more than one factor needed to make a good processor. So a good chief designer is one important factor. But that isn't mutually exclusive from having a very large walled needed to finance the work. And the current market situation affects the ability to be allowed to invest that huge amount of money.