Last week, overclocking hardware site Hard OCP reported that AMD had hired a law firm to pursue people who modify and then re-sell the chip company's Athlon microprocessor. Now it appears that the first legal actions have been taken by AMD's lawyers, Pattishall, McAuliffe, Newbury, Hilliard & Geraldson. Computer Nerd says it has been told it is breaching AMD's patents by selling overclocked "Nerdlon" units. AMD's lawyers have issued Computernerd with a "cease and desist" notice or will otherwise take legal action against the company. Computernerd is asking people who are opposed AMD's actions to to register their displeasure at United Overclockers. One European distributor, who declined to be named, said that "the subtle difference" between Intel and AMD processors was that you needed to get inside the casing to overclock the Athlons. He had not noticed any significant loss of business, however, from those he described as the "turbo nutter bastards". Many hardware sites have cheerfully overclocked Athlon processors and in the process given AMD a reputation for clock speed, which has undoubtedly boosted chip sales. AMD doesn't now call itself Tyrannazilla for nothing, you know. Nor could the firm be contacted at press time for comment on the move. ® See also AMD gives Athlon Tyrannazilla epithet Daily Hardware Roundup, which contains a reference to the threat from last week