Meltdown and Spector flaws. Will it slow down my PC?

[Easto]

I've been watching the latest news regarding these CPU flaws and how Intel and other OS manufacturers are racing to patch them. But they are also saying that the patches may slow down a PC by 30%. Whether this is true or not, is there now going to be a whole new generation of CPUs? Will CPUs be advertised as "pre" flaw or "post" flaw? Will a difference be noticeable or am I worrying about nothing?

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/hardware/intel-denies-reports-of-huge-performance-dip-due-to-patches-for-cpu-security-bug/

[Philip]

AMD says their processors are not affected (rather affected by only one of the two)... People are overreacting because of the sheer number of affected machines, heh. Intel stock is taking a dive, AMD is going up.

Intel (INTC)
43.75-1.51 (-3.35%) As of 11:28AM EST

AMD
12.23+0.68 (+5.84%) As of 11:28AM EST


I don't think the patch will cause noticeable performance decrease. On a separate note, that Ryzen box I just built is performing beautifully.

[Easto]

I'm not necessarily panicking. Intel is downplaying any major bottlenecks or slowdowns. But I still think it will be interesting if they start identifying CPUs as pre or post.

[Philip]

I think it will be a software patch to isolate the RAM areas, which may in turn slow down the kernel some.

[YeOldeStonecat]

My hunch, once it'll be addressed in the immediate future with rushed out software patches, those patches will cause slowdowns.
As they get time to iron out the kinks in the patches, groom the code, make it more efficient...you may see less of a slowdown as the original patch gets replaced with improved versions.

As for some exact % of performance loss..there's just no accurate way to guess at that, look at all the various systems out there and their different states of health and software combinations..nearly infinite.

[Philip]

Qualcomm also admits their ARM Snapdragon chips are affected...
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/01/06/qualcomm_processor_security_vulnerabilities/

This affects all types of mobile devices and routers as well it seems.

[YARDofSTUF]

Windows 7 and 8 hold outs are gonna feel it more than the rest, also those on older CPUs.

[Easto]

I've seen some of the reports and it doesn't seem to be as bad as I had originally thought. I was also a little concerned since a new build is in the future here and I wanted to try and cover all my bases.

[Easto]

"Intel posts record Q4 and yearly results, says new Meltdown/Spectre-protected chips will arrive in 2018"

It does look like there will be a difference in "pre" and "post" chipset editions.

[YARDofSTUF]

Ya I'm gonna try and wait for the newer repaired slicon chips and compare with AMD at that time. Linus Torvalds mentioned on twitter that the fixes intel gave to them and MS didnt enable the fix by defualt, possibly to help with benchmarks. Crappy time to be building a PC.

[Easto]

Ya I'm gonna try and wait for the newer repaired slicon chips and compare with AMD at that time. Linus Torvalds mentioned on twitter that the fixes intel gave to them and MS didnt enable the fix by defualt, possibly to help with benchmarks. Crappy time to be building a PC.

All of this has pretty much put a damper on any upcoming build. When I see the price of memory I just think that maybe I'll wait a while. Fortunately I do have everything else. Mostly just looking for a Mobo/CPU/memory config.

[Mark]

so what can these meltdown and spector deals do to an unpatched PC on windows 7 ?

i doubt my 3-4year old mobo will get a bios update for it and i hear the updates are slowing down the PC's pretty bad ?

should i even worry about it ?

[YARDofSTUF]

Right now, I would say do nothing. All depends on how these exploits end up being used.

[Mark]

thumbsup :)