Comment by hex4def6
3 years ago
Of the to of my head:
* Intel xeon processors have software defined feature sets that are unlocked by a license.
* Nvidia low hash rate GPUs
* Nvidia vGPU on consumer GPUs (there are hacks to enable it)
* hardware video / audio encoders in mobile processors that require licensing to use.
* Sony cameras have licenses that allow you to unlock extra features
* Cisco do this all the time with their router HW.
Features that are locked off permanently are less scummy. It's a bad way of emulating different production lines, but at least it doesn't let them charge ongoing rent.
If I am not mistaken sometimes this is due to yield rates in chip manufacturing. Iirc there were 3 core pentiums at some point that were basically faulty 4 core chips where one core did not pass QC.
This is extremely common on CPUs and GPUs. gx104 from Nvidia was famously identical to gx100 with cache, cores fused out, probably because they were defective. It's a good way to increase yield for monolithic dies.