So how about a translation into plain english of what Bill Holt said. Is the cost still going down with each node, how low can we go, when will we see ultraviolet lithography and next gen materials?
Thanks for the write up! I think describing themselves as not a PC company is a little premature when it makes up 60% of their revenue...
So how about a translation into plain english of what Bill Holt said. Is the cost still going down with each node, how low can we go, when will we see ultraviolet lithography and next gen materials?
Do you know if slides are available?
I dunno.
You should really look at the slides when they become available.
Yeah, I can't really describe a whole slide, let alone in a few seconds.
But no. This 0.7x is the naive density comparison. The whole point of these foils from Holt is to show that you are not comparing apples to apples. You have to normalize the die composition.
If you do that, you'll see that Intel is 1.4x denser than 20nm BEOL. Just like theoretically predicted in 2013!
(Anyone remember the A8 and Core m comparison of 2B transistors vs 1.3B? It naively suggests Apple's 20nm is vastly denser, but in fact it's the 1.4x number as bad.)
contacted gate pitch 90nm --> 78nm
metal layer 1 pitch 80nm --> 64nm
Exynos 5433 vs 7420 113mm2 --> 78mm^2The slides can be viewed in the video around 2h15m
They are shockingly ignorant really, worthless.
One example, they still manage to claim that Samsung's density at 14nm is
the same as at 20nm. When is someone going to tell them that is nonsense?
Samsung 20nm to 14nm
Density increased by a factor 1.45 which is nicely illustrated byCode:contacted gate pitch 90nm --> 78nm metal layer 1 pitch 80nm --> 64nm Exynos 5433 vs 7420 113mm2 --> 78mm^2
the scaling of the 20nm Exynos 5533 to the 14nm Exynos 7240.
The slides can be viewed in the video around 2h15m
They are shockingly ignorant really, worthless.
One example, they still manage to claim that Samsung's density at 14nm is
the same as at 20nm. When is someone going to tell them that is nonsense?
Samsung 20nm to 14nm
Density increased by a factor 1.45 which is nicely illustrated byCode:contacted gate pitch 90nm --> 78nm metal layer 1 pitch 80nm --> 64nm Exynos 5433 vs 7420 113mm2 --> 78mm^2
the scaling of the 20nm Exynos 5533 to the 14nm Exynos 7240.
This is common knowledge but not to the people who should know apparently.
http://www.avsusergroups.org/jtg_pdfs/JTG2015_7JamesRevSm.pdf
If you accept those numbers for Samsung 20 nm, then it's not any denser than Intel's 22 nm node. (Those metal and gate pitches are exactly the same as Intel's 22 nm.) They did have a published 20 nm process with 64 nm metal pitch...I don't know if any products were released with this.
Intel N22:
Gate Pitch: 90nm
Metal1: 90nm
Metal2: 80nm
1D layouts
Samsung N20:
Gate Pitch: 90nm
Metal1: 80nm
Metal2: 80nm
2D layouts
You are suggesting that 1D layouts are density neutral. Do you have any source on this?
Thanks.
PS: The numbers are from Dick James, Chipworks:
http://www.avsusergroups.org/jtg_pdfs/JTG2015_7JamesRevSm.pdf
Progress: 14nm update + cost per transistor
Competitiveness
* Chart from last year (year of production on x-axis; transistor x metal pitch on y-axis)
* Chart from 2013! Adjusted for both SS and TSMC
* Comparison of Apple products A8 and A9, both SS and TSMC!!!! LOL .
* A9 hardly denser than A8!
* BDW and SKL worse than A8 and A9! (Like 0.7x as dense) (Note: this is before normalization, so don't draw your conclusions yet )
=> composition of die: most is SRAM, then reg files, logic short cell, IO and tall cell logic
* Comparison of compositions (in terms of % of full die for each of the 4 products)
* Normalized (for die composition) comparison: BDW and SKL 1.4x better than SS A9
* Updated comparison of 2013 chart! SS slightly better than TSMC, but still worse than Intel by a lot, basically the slide doesn't change even with the real product numbers from Apple A8/A8 substituted
* Update on 10nm numbers with available information => lead will continue (competition's 10nm will be sligtly below Intel 14nm)
Summary: 14nm maturing, cost/transistor, economics = solid, view of competition unchanged, research pipeline = full
Thats why they invest in areas where there is profit - as the chairman said. Its just the positive way to frame it there is plenty opportunities for improvements. And easy ones. They just have to let it go and get on.Intel's comparison of density of transistors in Apple's A9 and Intel's Broadwell and Skylake may be flawed.
They normalise Apple's A9 density, but they ignore the fact that Intel's CPUs need a 'chipset' chip, which is on a lower density process; if they normalised taking the chipset into account, they might find a different result, I suspect.
They also seem to admit that their client group is in trouble. They do not seem to be making progress in tablets or phones, and the 2015 client group profits will be significantly less than those for PCs in 2014, to the tune of $6.6 billion, by my estimate; even if 3 - 4 billion is attributable to mobile phones and tablets, their client group is doing badly, despite their supposedly better production process.
I suspect that in five years time, most mobile computing, including laptops, will use SoCs, not CPUs, from sources other than Intel.
So I haven't spent much time viewing this presentation yet, but it looks like 14nm yields are still not great and the company is significantly scaling back its investments in the mobile chip market.
14nm is shaping up to be a train wreck of huge proportions for Intel, and given how big 10nm leverages on it, that doesn't look good at all.
14nm is shaping up to be a train wreck of huge proportions for Intel, and given how big 10nm leverages on it, that doesn't look good at all.
Intel's comparison of density of transistors in Apple's A9 and Intel's Broadwell and Skylake may be flawed.
They normalise Apple's A9 density, but they ignore the fact that Intel's CPUs need a 'chipset' chip, which is on a lower density process; if they normalised taking the chipset into account, they might find a different result, I suspect.
All the foundries are having problems, it's not just Intel.