Items tagged with 5nm
The global shortage of silicon is not preventing tech companies from continuing to innovate, and traveling down their respected roadmaps (ETAs just might need to be adjusted on occasion). We bring this up because a prominent leaker has already begun discussing supposed details related to AMD's eventual fourth generation Radeon DNA (or RDNA 4) architecture. For anyone who is wondering, AMD's latest crop of graphics cards are based on its RDNA 2 architecture, and that also includes the custom graphics silicon sitting pretty inside Microsoft's Xbox Series X and Sony's PlayStation 5 consoles (some have referred to the graphics implementation inside the PS5 unofficially as RDNA 1.5, but that's a whole...
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Most people would agree that AMD has done a fantastic job under the guidance of Dr. Lisa Su, who navigated the company into Zen and RDNA waters, the two major architectures that underpin its modern CPUs and GPUs. Having once again established itself as a relevant force in the high-end space, AMD is looking to keep the pedal firmly pushed to the metal, and is on track to launch Zen 4 and RDNA 3 next year. Next year is going to be interesting indeed. Bear in mind that rival Intel is getting ready to release its Alder Lake lineup this year, with supporting platforms (like the 600 series chipset) supporting DDR5 memory and PCI Express 5.0. Some of the early leaks surrounding Alder Lake suggest it...
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It is never too early to discuss what might come next in the PC hardware space, and as it relates to NVIDIA and its GPU roadmap, its latest generation Ampere architecture is now a little over a year old. The big question is what does NVIDIA have in store for its eventual GeForce RTX 40 series. And the answer? Quite possible Ada Lovelace. Nothing is ever truly written in stone until a company makes an official announcement, and even then, chiseled plans can sometimes crumble. Nevertheless, leaker Greymon55 is very confident NVIDIA will power its next generation graphics cards built for gaming with Ada Lovelace, which is a GPU codename that has popped up in past rumors. Greymon55's comment about...
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Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) is the global leader in [contract] semiconductor production, and the company shows no signs of slowing down. While the bulk of the company's manufacturing capacity resides in its home market of Taiwan, TSMC has initiated construction on a new 5nm fab right here in the United States. TSMC announced the fab back in April 2020, and construction is "well underway" in Phoenix, Arizona. The company's decision to build its new fab in Arizona was undoubtedly sweetened by the city of Phoenix footing the bill for roads and other infrastructure. The infrastructure incentives alone are worth $200 million, and that's not counting any long-term tax incentives that...
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There has been a lot of talk about chip fab expansion in recent months due to immense global demand from multiple sectors. To address this demand, Samsung announced earlier this month that it would devote $151 billion to expand its chipmaking footprint over the next decade. While that significant announcement was geared toward fabs in South Korea, Samsung is also looking to investments within the United States. According to a new report out of South Korea, Samsung will build a new 5nm EUV fab in Austin, Texas. 5nm is [currently] Samsung's state-of-the-art process node used for its own products like Exynos 2100. However, by the time this new fab comes online in 2024, 5nm will likely be a more...
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Are you frustrated by the silicon shortage that is contributing to the near-constant out-of-stock status of the latest hardware, from standalone CPUs and GPUs, to the newest game consoles? We feel your pain. Good news, though—Taiwain Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is rumored to be opening up half a dozen factories in the US, which could go a long way towards alleviating strained output in the future. There are many reasons why it is difficult to find an Xbox Series X, PlayStation 5, or some of the latest PC hardware in stock and priced at (or close) to MSRP. Cryptocurrency mining and scalpers armed with scripted bots are contributing to the situation. But the root cause is that...
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AMD is in the midst of one heck of a run. Remember the company's Bulldozer architecture? It's ancient history at this point, and scores of gamers and PC users in general are clamoring for the company's latest generation Ryzen 5000 series CPUs, based on its Zen 3 architecture. They're fresh from the oven and in short supply. Be that as it may, AMD took a moment to talk about what it is cooking up next—Zen 4 and Zen 5. This is the perfect time to discuss such things. That may seem quirky with Zen 3 being so new, but future plans are always topics of discussion during CES week. AMD's future plans have added interest because Intel has confidence that its 11th Gen Core desktop processors (Rocket...
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Unless you've been living under a big rock for the past few years, you know that Intel has run into difficulties shifting to smaller process nodes. The company has relied on its venerable 14nm process node for far longer than it had originally anticipated -- the upcoming Rocket Lake family should be the last new consumer desktop processors to use the node -- and its shift to 10nm so far has been limited to mobile processors. With this in mind, Intel has been looking at other options to ensure that it can stay competitive with perennial rival AMD, which has been kicking butt and taking names (and market share) with its Zen family of processorsin all market segments that Intel competes...
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Many people are bidding a not-so-fond 'good riddance' to 2020 as we settle into whatever 2021 brings us, but it was not all bad. That is especially true for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). The chip maker apparently pulled in record revenue last month, ending the year with a bang. As a result, it is making a major investment in 5-nanometer chip production for 2021. TSMC has not yet officially announced its earnings for December. Looking at November, however, the company posted consolidated revenues of NT$124.87 billion (around $4.5 billion in US currency). That represents a 4.7 percent increase from the previous month, and a 15.7 percent year-over-year increase. The numbers...
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One thing we can say about NVIDIA is that it is generally good about keeping its internal plans relatively close to the vest. For example, its GeForce RTX 30 series launched with higher specs at lower price points than just about everyone was anticipating. Nevertheless, not all secrets stay closely guarded, like the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti leaks that preceded its actual launch. So maybe there is something to the latest GPU roadmap rumor. I know, I know—we are barely acquainted with Ampere at this still-early stage, and on the consumer side, snagging a GeForce RTX 30 series card at MSRP is...challenging, to say the least. And from comments NVIDIA has made, this will probably be the case throughout...
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Reports are surfacing once again of Apple having booked up the bulk of 5-namometer chip production from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), leaving not a lot of capacity for other customers who might be interested in the semiconductor fab's 5nm node. Between Apple's iPhone lineup and its new Mac systems, there is plenty of production to keep TSMC busy. Bear in mind that Apple is on a two-year transition plan to wean itself off of Intel's processors, in favor of its own custom silicon across its entire Mac lineup. We have already seen this play out with the introduction of its new M1 chip, which powers a recently refreshed MacBook Air, MacBook Pro 13, and Mac mini (check out our...
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Samsung on Thursday officially the lifted the curtain to unveil a new mid-range mobile processor, the Exynos 1080. Billed as a "5G processor that will make your phone fly," the new chip combines 5G and artificial intelligence capabilities into a slice of silicon built on Samsung's 5-nanometer extreme ultraviolet (EUV) manufacturing process. As the model name implies, the Exynos 1080 supplants the Exynos 980 (as found in the Galaxy A Quantum) in the mid-range category. But unlike the previous generation chip, which sports a 2+6 configuration (2x Cortex-A77 at 2.2GHz and 6x Cortex-A55 at 1.8GHz), the Exynos 1080 adopts a 1+3+4 CPU arrangement. Specifically, it wields a Cortex-A78 core clocked 2.8GHz,...
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We’re likely a month away (give or take a week) from the official unveil of Apple’s iPhone 12 family. Analysts are expecting for this to be a Super Cycle upgrade for customers, which means that Apple should see a big increase in sales year-over-year. So, why would there be an iPhone 12 Super Cycle? Well, we’re glad you asked. The iPhone 12 family is supposed to bring 1) an all-new design language, 2) the first 5G support in the iPhone range, and 3) a faster and more efficient A14 Bionic SoC. It’s that last point that is our primary focus today. Reliable leaker Komiya claims to have the inside track on A14 Bionic performance, and says that the new SoC...
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Every indication up to this point is that AMD's upcoming Zen 3 CPUs will be based on an enhanced 7-nanometer manufacturing process, with Zen 4 seeing an eventual shift to 5nm. But what if that was not the case? What if AMD decided to shake things up and jump straight to 5nm with its next round of CPUs instead, in pursuit of continued process leadership over rival Intel? That would certainly be something. On the desktop, Intel is still coaxing as much performance as it can out of its 14nm node, with 10nm silicon only showing up on mobile so far (like Ice Lake). This includes its latest round of processors, Comet Lake-S, which represents yet another iteration of 14nm. While there is more to the...
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The rumblings turned out to be true—Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) has confirmed plans to build and operate another chip manufacturing plant in the United States, and specifically in Arizona. TSMC said it the made the decision with the understanding that it would receive support from the US government and Arizona officials. "TSMC welcomes continued strong partnership with the U.S. administration and the State of Arizona on this project. This project will require significant capital and technology investments from TSMC. The strong investment climate in the United States, and its talented workforce make this and future investments in the U.S. attractive to TSMC," the chip...
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Nearly half a year has passed since Google launched its Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL phones, and the Pixel 4a and Pixel 4a XL are right around the corner. Is it too early to start talking about the Pixel 5? Of course not! And as it pertains to Google's next flagship smartphone series, there is chatter that the next round of flagships might adopt Samsung's Exynos SoC hardware. It is a bit of an interesting situation all around—Samsung itself uses Qualcomm's Snapdragon processors in its Galaxy handsets sold in the US and various other regions, but also sources its own Exynos chips for models in some places. This is the case with the Galaxy S20 as well, which sports either a Snapdragon 865 or Exynos...
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TSMC has been critical to AMD’s resurgence as a dominant force in the processor market, and the company has also been beneficial in ensuring that Apple has a steady flow of A12 and A13 SoCs on hand for its hot-selling iPhone and iPad product lines. As TSMC is looking to grapple with the demands of these high-profile customers while shifting to smaller process nodes, it needs to invest in its fabs. Luckily for the company, its board this week approved approximately $6.7 billion to expand it facilities used to produce chips. The capital appropriations have been narrowed down to these five areas according to TSMC: Fab construction and installation of fab facility systems Installation...
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Enthusiasts and enterprise customers have only been swimming in 7nm Zen 2 goodness for the past few months or so, but AMD is not sitting still when it comes to the rapid-fire development and release of its processors. Zen 3-based CPUs based on TSMC's 7nm+ process node are on track for launch likely during the second half of 2020. And now a new report today coming from China Times (hat tip to WCCFTech), says that TSMC is already progressing nicely with its next-generation 5nm process node. The company has three companies lined up with first production run: Apple, HiSilicon, and AMD. According to the report, TSMC is already seeing promising yields from 5nm (currently sitting...
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When it comes to 7nm chip production, TSMC has been on the bleeding edge of technological development. TSMC is the leading producer of 7nm designs for a number of leading tech giants like Qualcomm, AMD, and Apple (among others). While the company is well on its way to sampling 5nm parts to customers, it is also laying the groundwork for 3nm production in the near future. TSMC 3nm And 5nm Process Nodes The Electronic Times is reporting that TSMC has just begun construction on its next-generation 3nm fab. The manufacturing line is allegedly being constructed on 74 acres of land within the Southern Taiwan Science and Technology Park. TSMC reportedly has $19.5 billion at...
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If you own an Android phone, there is a high chance it is rocking a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor of some kind inside. Sometime in the not-too-distant future, Qualcomm will unleash a new flagship SoC, the Snapdragon 865, yet there is already talk of what comes after. That would be the Snapdragon 875, assuming Qualcomm sticks to its conventional naming scheme. Based on a recent leak, the Snapdragon 865 is shaping up to be a worthy successor to the current-generation Snapdragon 855 (and 855 Plus). Codename "Kona," a recent entry in Geekbench's database shows the Snapdragon 865 benefiting from a healthy boost in single-threaded performance, and posting gains in multi-threaded workloads. According...
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TSMC generated $7.75 billion in revenue during the second quarter of 2019, which is down 1.4 percent year-over-year but up 9.2 percent from the previous quarter. In a subsequent conference call with investors, TSMC talked about powering through softening economic conditions, and what the future holds in regards to 5-nanometer (nm) and 3nm process nodes. Referred to by TSMC as N5 and N3, the company is currently busy churning out N7 (or 7nm) silicon, as featured in AMD's third-generation Ryzen processors. AMD has also moved to a 7nm node for its newest generation Navi GPUs and is doing rather well for itself, with a gigantic assist from TSMC on the manufacturing front. Looking ahead, TSMC anticipates...
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In just a few weeks, AMD is expected to roll out its new Ryzen 3000 series of CPUs based on its Zen 2 architecture. These new parts are being built by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) on a 7-nanometer node. Looking ahead, however, TSMC is already talking about 6nm and even 5nm, the latter of which will bring improved logic density by 1.8X over 7nm, the company says. TSMC talked a little bit about its 5nm manufacturing process during a recent earnings call with investors. The company said its 5nm development is "well on track," having entered a phase called "risk production" in the first quarter. It expects a "tape out" in the first half of 2020. That is when designs by clients...
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