Vulnerability in Intel processors

[Leonardo]

A few days ago I heard on the news that this is the security hole that affects Intel processors. Earlier today a message popup in Panda Protection, which I now use insted of Avast I once used.

https://www.pandasecurity.com/mediac...security-hole/

[Arminius28]

I never took this seriously, but that page is very useful and is making me think i should, its seems like this whole thing is such a mess i just bought a second laptop like 6 months ago. UUrrrg

[alQamar]

You are protected if you run Windows 10.
here are the manual patches to fix this: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...rocode-updates
the often propagated performance impacts won't happen outside benchmarks. I have tested older CPUs like Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge and the impact on daily use / gaming was not impressive.
however these patches only address Spectre V2 and new Spectre variants are yet unfixed. Make sure you have installed all Windows Update when running Windows 7, 8.1, or 10 to get protected against Spectre and Meltdown.

I've also implemented these patches in many different business environments and servers with no major issues so far. (older Fortinet 5.x VPN client is incompatible, upgrade to 6.x fixed this)

@moderators This one should get stickied for importance

AMD CPUs are also affected but there no fixes yet:
https://www.techarp.com/guides/compl...re-cpu-list/2/

[♔Greek Strategos♔]

I agree with al Qamar. I would only add one more thing. Most users won't be affected and will not understand even the slightest impact on their systems. I have also tested all my systems (2 desktops and 2 laptops)) and they actual performance impact is under 3-5% as it seems. These threats were designed to affect big corporations and server systems not your home pc. Sometimes it's just propaganda also cause PC sites or forums are click baiting and trying to create the wrong impressions. For example many sites say that AMD CPUs aren't affected but the truth is that they are also affected and also with no fixes available to the public. So don't panic and always search it a bit before you apply any kind of patch or fix.