SSE3 Royalties

[Vee]

Originally posted by: BEL6772
BTW, EM64T stands for Extended Memory 64 Technology.

Nah, that's just what they pretend to outsiders if they're asked.

In reality, it stands for "Emergency Marketable 64 bit Technology".

 

[Zebo]

As they said "Specific terms of the 10-year agreement remain undisclosed."

I think Intel needs AMD around (antitrust) at least as much as AMD needs Intel (x86 and intels extensions on it) so it's probably a free for all but we'll never know.

 

[pm]

There's patents, trade secrets, trademarks, and copyrights.

SSE3, 3DNow! and others are trademarked names for microarchitectural extensions to the processor's microcode. Microcode is essentially a form of software (implemented in hardware) and historically has not been patented. They are generally considered trade secrets and thus are covered under trade secret law.

According to a FAQ that I found at the "patentcafe" website via Google (http://www.patentcafe.com/faq/index.asp?id=13):

Trade secrets" is the legal term for confidential business information. A good nonlegal definition of a "trade secret" is a secret belonging to a business. This information allows your company to compete effectively. Examples of trade secrets include customer identities and preferences, vendors, product pricing, marketing strategies, company finances, manufacturing processes and other competitively valuable information.

Under the Uniform Trade Secret Act, information must meet three criteria to qualify as a trade secret. First, the information must not be "generally known or readily ascertainable" through proper means. Second, the information must have "independent economic value due to its secrecy." And third, the trade secret holder must use "reasonable measures under the circumstances to protect" the secrecy of the information. These requirements are explored throughout these frequently asked questions.

Intel and AMD have a broad cross-licensing agreement that dates back to a litigation settlement (as mentioned above by Zebo). In fact, most major companies in the semiconductor industry have patent cross-licensing agreements. Usually, these agreements do not also cover trademarks and trade secrets. I am not familar with the agreement between AMD and Intel, so I have no idea what is cross-licensed and what isn't. I don't believe that either company has disclosed any specific details on what technologies are cross-licensed and so in my opinion any answers to this question will be based on guesses.

This is just a proof that HyperThreading was AMD's invention, which Intel claimed as theirs.

Hyperthreading is a form of simultaneous multithreading technology (SMT). Most of the pioneering work on SMT was done by Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC) and the University of Washington, and Intel disclosed that it licensed the rights to these technologies several years back. AMD's patent refers to a specific implemention of SMT and how to speed up context thread switches. It doesn't cover the fundamental idea of multi-threading.

Oh.. sorry.. they invented my wife.. alright.. Now tell me, who copies who??

I am not aware that Intel has done any research in spouses and I doubt that they have invented anyone's wife. As far as who has copied who, the entire semiconductor industry is, to me, an example in competitive cooperation. Every company uses methods and inventions that were invented by other companies. AMD has contributed many things to the overall industry and so has Intel.

 

[ahock]

Hey PM dou you think that Hyper threading is included in their cross licensing???? Does chipsets covered in the trade secrets??? NOticed that Intel is using its chipsets in most of its technologies which I think they are not covered

 

[ToeJam13]

Didn't AMD call their SSE implementation 3DNow! Proffesional or something like that?

3dNOW is a different technology than SSE. 3dNOW was introducted in mid 1998 with the K6-2 series. SSE didn't come along until 1999 when the P3 was release as a drop in replacement to the P2

Correct, 3DNow! was AMD's answer to the MMX instruction set Intel added to the Pentium line (first arriving on a P166MMX). SSE is a newer technology.

 

[Vee]

Originally posted by: ToeJam13

Didn't AMD call their SSE implementation 3DNow! Proffesional or something like that?

3dNOW is a different technology than SSE. 3dNOW was introducted in mid 1998 with the K6-2 series. SSE didn't come along until 1999 when the P3 was release as a drop in replacement to the P2

Correct, 3DNow! was AMD's answer to the MMX instruction set Intel added to the Pentium line (first arriving on a P166MMX). SSE is a newer technology.

I wasn't particularly interested in AMD at the time. But 3DNow and SSE serves the same purpose, providing packed singleprecision FP math. MMX is just packed logic for bytes and words. I also think already the K6 supported MMX, while I'm certain 3DNow arrived with K6II. So it's maybe more relevant to see SSE as Intel's answer to 3DNow. Even if SSE was planned since MMX.
AMD later improved 3DNow to 3DNow+, and then also added full support for SSE, I think.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

IIRC SSE first showed up on Palomino and Morgan.