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Chinese CPUs could soon give Intel a run for its money:
If Intel's venture into the graphics card market has you wishing for more variety for processors too then you might be in luck. According to a report from Taiwan's DigiTimes, an Intel exec claims that Chinese CPU makers will become "strong competitors" to Intel within the next three to five years.
These comments were made by Rui Wang, SVP of Intel Corporation and chair of Intel China at the 2022 National Party Congress on March 11, though no specific maker of Chinese processors was named. Tom's Hardware also notes in its own report that this could simply be Wang trying to be polite given the event was hosted by the Chinese Communist Party given the lack of data provided alongside the predictions.
In fact, the only real support we can see provided for this prediction comes from China's Minister of Information and Technology, Xiao Yaqing, who asserted that the domestic chip industry had grown by a third since this time last year.
[...] Still, China's IT infrastructure is growing at an incredible rate, so while these claims may seem like nothing but appeasement, there is a chance that they could prove true if we see hardware that was previously exclusive to the region released globally. Right now, China provides around a quarter of Intel's annual revenue alone though, so whatever rival processors are hoping to bring the heat, they will need to start on home turf first.
(Score: 2) by MrGuy on Friday March 18 2022, @12:57PM (4 children)
Nobody, absolutely no one, is going to trust a chip with a “Trusted” Platform Module built in China.
Heck, I don’t trust the ones built by Intel. But effectively giving invisible root access to uninspectable code written by a company this inevitable have ties to the Chinese government is silly in its face.
The Huatai ban has nothing on what would happen to these chips.
Now, if they ship chips which provable contain no TPM-like module, and this might someone lead the industry away from TPM as a terrible idea, then I’m all for it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 18 2022, @01:57PM (1 child)
As late capitalism squeezes more people they will have no choice but to go with the cheapest product
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 18 2022, @08:56PM
Still better than the national socialism of Germany or soviet socialism of Russia.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 18 2022, @03:38PM
I don't live in China. I'd rather the CCP spy on me than my own government.
(Score: 2) by Rich on Friday March 18 2022, @04:33PM
Don't confuse TPM, locked bootloaders, secure enclaves, and ME. The TPM('s remote attestation feature) is "merely" there to audit the software running and report that to your masters. (In practice they will try to leverage that feature to cut you off software, media, and business if you're not a good little pawn and run what you're told).
The ME is what you describe, a separate processor with invisible root in the background. The combination of locked boot and secure enclave is a cheapskate attempt at something like a ME. But as long as you control the "trust root" here (and have a Debian-like repo upstream for your software supply), you're good. I think such a configuration is the case for RK3588 SBC systems.