DECEIVING OURSELVES: THE PENTIUM COVER-UP
Intel learned that its Pentium processing chip had a flaw. The chip would occasionally give wrong answers for division problems using large numbers. Intel believed this was a minor flaw, something they felt would affect the average user once every twenty-seven thousand years. So Intel decided not to make known the flaw and for months continued to promote and sell the flawed computer chip.
But by Thanksgiving word of the flaw began circulating among computer users. Intel finally acknowledged the problem, but tried to downplay its significance. They refused to exchange the flawed chip except in special circumstances. Only when IBM decided to stop selling computers with a Pentium chip did Intel back down, and agree to exchange the chip when anyone requested.
The Pentium affair was a huge black eye on the image of the company, less because
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