Word: pentiums
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...refuses to ship computers with flawed Pentium chips...
Word of the flaw in Intel's Pentium chip, the powerful new brain in 4 million personal computers sold this year, began circulating before Thanksgiving. But the manufacturing problem was nothing compared with the flaw in Intel's understanding of how to keep good customer relations. Having kept the defect secret for months, Intel blithely dismissed the criticism at first, maintaining that the imperfection in the Pentium would affect only highly complex calculations. Most folks, said Intel, would encounter an inaccurate answer just once in 27,000 years; therefore, the errant chips would be replaced only if computer owners could...
...personal computers used in the world have "Intel inside." But the company didn't count on being blindsided by another behemoth. Last week IBM, the world's largest computer maker and one of Intel's biggest customers, announced that it was halting shipments of all its products containing the Pentium (about half the personal computers it is at present sending out to stores). Brandishing its own laboratory research, IBM contended that the chip's mistakes were far more frequent than Intel had let on. Said G. Richard Thoman, an IBM senior vice president: "We believe no one should have...
Just who needed protection was not clear. The Pentium's imperfection affects division problems involving numbers with many digits. For example, if 4,195,835 is divided by 3,145,727 and then multiplied by 3,145,727, the result should be the original number: 4,195,835. It doesn't even take a computer to figure that out. But machines with the flawed Pentium come up with a different answer: 4,195,579. Although most users might never encounter such a mistake, businesses running thousands of computations a day could possibly run into trouble. The flaw, some experts contend...
...delivered a stinging slap in the face today to the chipmaker that provides the brains behind many of its PCs: Intel. Big Blue announced that it will stop shipping personal computers using the Pentium chip because its problems are more significant than previously stated. Intel discovered a problem last summer in its chip but says the probability is so slim -- once every 27,000 years -- that it unlikely to cause problem. "We believe no one should have to wonder about the integrity of data calculated on IBM PCs," G. Richard Thoman, an IBM senior vice president, said in a statement...