IBM wasn't the only one that did this. Most of the BUNCH did too (Burroughs, Univac, NCR, CDC, Honeywell). You paid for a particular performance level. For a higher performance level, you paid more.
It makes good sense to me. Then and now. (I'm an unrepentant capitalist - I admit it.) The only different between the mainframe guys and Intel, IMO, is that almost nothing about the mainframes was documented, so reverse-engineering something like that was almost impossible (certainly very difficult); not to mention a violation of their licensing agreements. For Intel/AMD - they are heavily documented, and there are experts in reverse-engineering them. Regards, Michael B. Smith Consultant and Exchange MVP http://TheEssentialExchange.com -----Original Message----- From: Ben Scott [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, September 20, 2010 5:08 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: Intel wants to charge to unlock features already on your CPU On Mon, Sep 20, 2010 at 5:03 PM, Andrew S. Baker <[email protected]> wrote: > What's old is new again. > This was done way back when with the 486 line. I'm told IBM did this back in the 1960s or 70s. Friend told a story where, in order to "install" the "CPU upgrade" they had purchased, an IBM System Engineer came out and *cut a wire* in the CPU cabinet. These days, it's standard operating procedure in the world of phone systems to buy "more ports", which really just means entering a key code to enable the facilities which are already there. "There is nothing new under the sun." (from Ecclesiastes 1:9-14, reportedly written about 2250 years ago) -- Ben ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
