StarWraith 3D Games Forum

As some of you may have heard, flaws in Intel processors are requiring updates to roll out for operating systems (Windows, Linux, and MacOS) that may have up to a 30% or higher reduction in performance on those systems, at least for certain common operations. I don't know yet if/how game performance will be impacted, but it seems most users should expect reductions in performance with their systems as the updates roll out in the coming days/weeks.

You can read more about the issue around the net as articles are popping up all over now. Here are a few:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/01/0 ... sign_flaw/
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/01 ... s-patches/

As a precaution, I may push back the roll out of the next planned updates for my games until I have more time to run tests and analyze any changes in performance or reliability. It will be good to wait a bit to make sure things still run as they are supposed to after major code changes in Windows begin to roll out next week and considering my games have also had significant code changes themselves that have been in the works over the last few months.

I'll be interested in hearing from others about their experiences with the Windows operating system changes, in terms of both reliability and performance... including with games in general (posted here or sent via e-mail to starwraith.com > contact if you prefer that route).

Come back from a bout with the flu and this is what awaits. I noticed a significant slowdown just in the bootup of my laptop. No idea yet how it will affect gaming. But due to my experiences with unfamiliar websites over the last month, I hesitate to go anywhere on the Net unless I have full faith and trust. So, if you could give a quick lowdown on what it is that caused Intel to send its processors dragging, I'd be curious.

Commonly/currently described as a 'mysterious security flaw' (PC World) on the hardware level for just about all Intel processors (x86-x64) that leaves certain 'protected' contents in virtual memory vulnerable to retrieval. If I understand the descriptions correctly.

Sounds like something which would eventually glut the processor's RAM.

The irony for me is that I've always been careful about turning off my computer when not actively using it. But the same can't be said for the Amazon Alexa I got for Christmas. (It hears everything we say.)

My PC is about a decade old - but apart from the upgraded graphics card I installed to run legacy it still seems to be running faster than I can type!

I've got an Intel core i5 750 running at 2.67GHz running on Windows 7 with SP1

Surely it can't have taken them 10 years or more to discover the flaws - or does it only apply to more recent processors? The statement in the first URL you gave ...
' Impact: It is understood the bug is present in modern Intel processors produced in the past decade. ' doesn't bode well

Seems to impact most Intel processors going back over a decade at least.

The Windows patches should start to roll out for most users starting next Tuesday. After that, we may get a better picture of what kind of impact it may have. I don't anticipate much of an impact with my software (early results with an early patch appear good so far), but that not may be the case in a broader sense. I've read of one developer so far running into significant performance/reliability issues with their online server system, which may be largely due to dependencies on particular functions/operations and/or ties to cloud systems where such a CPU bottleneck might have more of an impact.