StewartTBF

Functionally, it seems like the logical combination of binning and the market pressure for cheaper machines. (Binning-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning)

Say you are Intel and Gateway/Dell/OEM orders X lower-end CPUs... great. However, you don't have enough that binned that far down. So, you have to cripple some ones that are more capable. Do you write it off? No, offer a way to have the end-user pay for the difference! Hey user, you want to unlock the difference between what OEM paid for and what we happened to give them? Here's a painless way to unlock it.

Functionally most of the electronics you buy are capable of more. Take a look at this: http://hackaday.com/2013/03/18/hack-removes-firmware-crippli... Okay, so what happens? Either everything's great and you got a free upgrade or the thing has a bad shader or memory chip and now you have an unreliable card.

I don't agree with the whole up-sale aspect of it, but, it just strikes me as Intel trying to make back some money on what likely was a crap deal for them.