It seems that AMD is doing a quiet recall of XPs that are still on store shelves. There hasn't been an official release.

Over at chipgeek.com they suspect is may have something to do with the XP/MP chips being identical yet the MP costs 70 bucks more. Maybe they forgot to lock out dual proc abiloity on the XP...

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Manu Narayan

Hum, I have rooting for AMD lately, but if they are not trying to sell the best dam chip without holding back... They deserve bad business.

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what do I type here?

Sounds like someone took a risk in releasing the product and it turned out to be a bad risk. I wouldn't want to be them.

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We aren't discussing anything.

Let's not forget the Pentium 4 chip was recalled as well...

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Artist formerly known as Reindeer

Originally posted by Turbostang:
Let's not forget the Pentium 4 chip was recalled as well...



As was Pentium III. Also, lets not forget about the errors in the original Pentium chip...



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Formerly known as 74Mav
(Mav dropped the no. 2 connecting rod and I'm pissed)

An update on this issue from Anandtech...

AMD has NOT recalled anything
Date: October 17th, 2001 3:44 PM
Author Anand Lal Shimpi


"In response to the alleged Athlon XP recall by AMD Taiwan here is AMD's official statement:

"AMD has not recalled any AMD Athlon XP processors. We continue to ramp shipments
of the worlds highest performance processors for desktop PCs."

I just thought it was worth mentioning to you all."


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Formerly known as 74Mav
(Mav dropped the no. 2 connecting rod and I'm pissed)

Thanks Brian. :-)

I was not pointing at them saying that it was bad they were doing a recall, recalls happen. I was merely stating a recall to remove MP capability from a chip that would be shady.

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Manu Narayan

Originally posted by Manu:
a recall to remove MP capability from a chip that would be shady.

exactly

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what do I type here?

They wouldn't really have to do a recall to deal with them, though. It's not really significant that the first processors from the XP line are MP capable... and I suspect that they'll remain so for the forseeable future. I've heard that the EV6 bus that the Athlon architecture uses requires MP functionality, although that's a bit beyond my understanding.

Regardless, the first shipments of Thunderbirds were factory unlocked (in terms of multiplier) and AMD never recalled those. So I'd highly doubt a recall in this case.

I suspect the XP/MP difference here is just that the MPs are MP certified, but that both will work in MP boards... Like what happened in the PPGA celeron line: celerons weren't MP supported, but neither were they specifically prevented from being used in an MP configuration. Businesses and professional workstation users will pay the premium for MP, but home users will use the cheaper version, just like how most PIII Xeons are exactly the same as regular PIIIs except they cost more.