[nandhp]

Hasn't Dell offered AMD chips for a long time? Dell currently sells AMD-based laptops, and was doing so back in 2008 as well.

For example, this Ryzen laptop: http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/new-inspiron-15-...

[acdha]

Before then – in the 90s both Intel and Microsoft used a lot of backroom deals to keep big vendors exclusive. If memory serves it took the Opteron’s crushing performance advantage before we started seeing that break for Intel servers; Linux users for years were stuck paying for OEM Windows installs which were never used.

[Twirrim]

Yes, but I've been around the industry a while. I specifically remember this happening during the late 90s and just in to the 2000s.

It was occurring at a time when AMD was fairly firmly beating Intel on a straight $/performance basis (~K6 era). If Dell had started shipping AMD based systems back then it could have been a big game changer.

The general narrative around the tech press at the time was that Intel knew this and were desperate to keep Dell as Intel exclusive.

[sitkack]

These are probably to prevent action from the FTC.

[ggg9990]

I think they are talking about when Dell made serious profits in PCs.