Some Intel Chips Can Be Reconfigured to Support AES

D. Hugh Redelmeier hugh-pmF8o41NoarQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org
Sun Dec 23 23:58:53 UTC 2012


| From: Ivan Avery Frey <ivan.avery.frey-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org>

| Some products can support AES New Instructions with a Processor Configuration
| update, in particular, i7-2630QM/i7-2635QM, i7-2670QM/i7-2675QM,
| i5-2430M/i5-2435M, i5-2410M/i5-2415M. Please contact OEM for the BIOS that
| includes the latest Processor configuration update.

This might just be a configuration switch under control of the BIOS.
I remember when VT-x was in processor chips but many BIOSes disabled
it.  Idiots!  This might be the same.

Kind of odd that a BIOS would be able to disable things that subequent
programs cannot reverse.  But there are many magic things in x86.
Like all of SMM <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Management_Mode>.
How about A20
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A20_line#The_80286_and_the_high_memory_area>?
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