How one bold move from Intel wiped an entire company off the map

The article traces how Intel’s move away from Socket 7 reshaped the x86 CPU market in the late 1990s. In the mid-1990s, Socket 7 was unusually open, letting the same motherboard platform support processors from Intel, AMD, Cyrix, and IDT. That cross-brand compatibility lowered friction for PC builders and helped price-competitive players like Cyrix compete despite weaker floating-point performance. The shift came in 1997 when Intel introduced the Pentium II and moved to Slot 1, a proprietary cartridge-style interface for its P6 platform. The result: competitors had to scramble because their CPUs could not easily plug into Intel’s new platform.