Intel Alder Lake DRM Moment

Intel's new Chimera: Alder Lake 2022-04-24, 16:56:59 A chimera is a monster combining parts from different animals, or an organism containing multiple different sets of DNA. I am calling Intel's new Alder Lake processor a chimera because it is a hybrid containing two different kinds of CPU cores with very different designs. The Alder Lake processor contains from 2 to 8 cores of the 'Golden Cove' architecture, called P cores, and from 0 to 8 cores of the 'Gracemont' architecture, called E cores. The P cores (Performance cores) are high-performance CPU cores using the latest state-of-the-art technology to get maximum performance. The E cores (Efficiency cores) use same technology as the 'Atom' series with low power consumption and lower performance. The idea behind this design is that the P cores can give a high performance for a limited number of threads, while the E cores allow the CPU to run many threads and still limit the power consumption. This may sound like a nice compromise in theory, but it involves a lot of problems when the same program or the same thread can jump arbitrarily between two very different kinds of cores. The initial Alder Lake design had different CPUID numbers for the two kinds of cores. This gave problems with DRM software. If a program using DRM detects that the CPUID has changed, it will assume that the program has been moved to a different computer in violation of the license. This, of course, will stop the execution. Intel had to modify the Alder Lake and give it the same CPUID for all cores in order to fix this problem[1]. Now, it is difficult for a running program to detect what kind of core it is running on. DRM moment

На изображении показан скриншот технической статьи об архитектуре Intel Alder Lake с гибридными P- и E-ядрами. В тексте объясняется, что разные CPUID у ядер вызывали проблемы с DRM: программа могла принять смену ядра за перенос на другой компьютер и остановить выполнение. Подпись «DRM moment» иронично подчёркивает абсурдную ситуацию, когда защита от пиратства ломается из-за особенностей процессора. EN: The image shows a screenshot of a technical article about Intel Alder Lake's architecture with hybrid P- and E-cores. The text explains that different CPUIDs between the cores caused DRM problems: software could interpret a core switch as moving to another computer and stop execution. The caption “DRM moment” ironically highlights the absurd situation where anti-piracy protection breaks because of a processor's design.

• @gentoomemes / 10533 2024-04-11