How AMD plans to take over the market by adding DRM directly to CPU

This is some pretty scary stuff when you really stop and think about it.

The AMD rep spelled it out in words that would have been undiplomatic coming from me: He said that the new chips will “block unauthorized access to the frame buffer.” In short, that means an unauthorized party can’t save the contents of the display to a file on disk unless the content owner approves it.

There is a short list of parties who will be unauthorized to access your frame buffer: You. There is a long list of parties who are authorized to access your frame buffer, and that list includes Microsoft, Apple, AMD, Intel, ATI, NVidia, Sony Pictures, Paramount, HBO, CBS, Macrovision, and all other content owners and enablers that want your machine to themselves whenever you’re watching, listening to, reading, or shooting monsters with their products.

http://www.infoworld.../28/14OPcurve_1.html

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What scares me about this is how the big companies will embrace this kind of thinking.

I know what you are thinking...I won't use AMD...I'll use Intel. But there is a problem with that. If Intel doesn't follow and do the same they could stand to lose a lot of the market share.

There has already been a Windows version that will only run on AMD64 processors. How hard would it be for Microsoft to make it so their OS will only run on approved DRM enabled CPU's?

That would mean that if OEM's want to include Windows, they would have to include an AMD processor.

This means that Intel would either have to put the same kind of DRM crap in their CPU's or the only thing that will run on them will be *nix. I think we know what Intel would do in a situation like this.

The average consumer isn't tech savvy...they don't know the difference between AMD and Intel...DRM and a bottle of Coca Cola...but they do know they want Windows. The average consumer being oblivious to this, will buy whatever is on the shelf...as long as it has Windows.

The uneducated consumers outnumber the rest of us. They will spoil the computing world as we know it...for all of us. They will go right along with the AMD/DRM crap like sheep.

Then we approach the day, for example, where you can't do a proper software review because the software vendor hasn't authorized YOU to take a screenshot of HIS application and your CPU says you aren't allowed to do that.

It won't matter how much you paid for the software...you will only be able to use it in a manner approved by the vendor.

So you say...ok...I won't run Windows...I'll install Linux. This won't bypass CPU level DRM. Your hands will still be tied.