It was about open-source hardware: monopolies can limit freedom in hardware too. The Pentium FDIV bug was trivial to validate at that time, since it was common even for an undergraduate at a small university to have accounts on Sun SPARCS, HP PA-RISC, and DEC Alpha in addition to POWER Macs and Windows x86. And there were other choices in the ecosystem like SGI MIPS.
Granted, that may seem like ancient history, but RDRAND is an indication that Intel still makes mistakes.
Less fragmentation is more efficient in many ways, but just like any monoculture, it is also fragile.
Granted, that may seem like ancient history, but RDRAND is an indication that Intel still makes mistakes.
Less fragmentation is more efficient in many ways, but just like any monoculture, it is also fragile.