What was the cheat in the 2024 Intel situation? The TomsHardware article and the Phoronix article they linked were quite vague. (Not to say I have any doubts, just curious, hadn’t heard of this one).
replyIntel basically benchmaxxed their compiler optimizations. They used detailed knowledge of the benchmark to make their compiler generate machine code to do better on the benchmark in a way that was not beneficial for non-benchmark scenarios.
replyI assumed as much, I’m just wondering what exactly they did. For example IIRC some phone company would detect that a benchmark was running by checking for the program name, and then allow the clock to boost higher (increase thermal limits) if it was a benchmark (like you could literally avoid the cheating behavior by changing the name of the program being run).
reply> It's almost like the benchmarks were designed with zero understanding of the history of benchmark manipulation.
replyI wonder if this common? We should call it Goodharts law while someone does the research on how common this is.
For real, I’ve assumed from the jump these things were all gamed, with the amount of money on the line.