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News Intel tooling up for 14nm transistors

Discussion in 'Article Discussion' started by Claave, 13 Sep 2011.

  1. Claave

    Claave You Rebel scum

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  2. jcb121

    jcb121 What's a Dremel?

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    so in 14nm, how many transistors could i swallow at once?
     
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  3. MrGumby

    MrGumby CPC 464 User

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    Reminds me of a cpc article years ago, regarding future chip design. Think we we at 65nm at the time and mentioned 45nm and 32nm. Its fun to go back and re-read these articles and see how close some predictions were.
     
  4. Action_Parsnip

    Action_Parsnip What's a Dremel?

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    I have a feeling 22nm will be around for alot longer than they hope it will be. The pace of change has already slowed down some.
     
  5. sstteevveenn

    sstteevveenn What's a Dremel?

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  6. SpAceman

    SpAceman What's a Dremel?

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    I'm sure I had heard that 15nm was next.... This is even better!

    I found an old PC at work the other day that was hidden in the corner of the IT department (2 desks in the corner) and booted it up to find Win2K and a 130nm Athlon XP. Its amazing how far we have come with transistor technology.
     
  7. fluxtatic

    fluxtatic What's a Dremel?

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    Even at 32nm, as I recall, aren't there Nvidia GPUs with just over a billion already? So, if you don't mind a little scratching on the way down, say, 2.25 bn?
     
  8. Anneon

    Anneon What's a Dremel?

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    Assuming you dont want to risk choking on your bite of silicon goodness I would assume you would want a bite of around a 2cm sphere. Therefore giving you a bit more at 2.99 billion. Let me know how that works out or you please.
     
  9. Xir

    Xir Modder

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    Hmmm, not very nutricious but...be my guest.
     
  10. l3v1ck

    l3v1ck Fueling the world, one oil well at a time.

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    Can someone just remine me how wide a single layer of atoms is?
    How low can they theortically go?
     
  11. azazel1024

    azazel1024 What's a Dremel?

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    It depends on the atoms. IIRC at 14nm there is something around 30 atoms composing the width of the transistor. Now this varies depending on the atomic composition as some molecules have bonds that are larger and some smaller.

    As it is we are rapidly getting to the point where transistors litterally can't get smaller because they are single atoms. Now really that is a decade + away even if the current pace on miniturization keeps up, but we are getting there in my life time if we don't hit some kind of quantum barrier before then.

    I think at some point, I don't know when, but I'd guess in the 6-10nm range making the transistors smaller is going to produce almost no benifit and that we are going to need to focus more on making them switch faster and more efficient. Could be when hybrid electrooptical circuits are needed, or even all optical.
     
  12. rickysio

    rickysio N900 | HJE900

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    There's also quantum tunnelling mucking things up at scales that small.
     
  13. thehippoz

    thehippoz What's a Dremel?

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    go intel =]

    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: 14 Sep 2011
  14. Bluephoenix

    Bluephoenix Spoon? What spoon?

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    based on the scientific articles about very early research on carbon nanotube transistors, if that technology were to be made workable it would be near electrically perfect and about 3nm in width.

    so quite small, but almost there!
     
  15. Xir

    Xir Modder

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    That's already beeing used really :D
    Switching voltages for Transistors are effectively lower than they shoud be in theory
    Remember we're talking structure width here...structure thickness has reached the level of one-atom-less-and-it-won't-work-anymore a couple of years ago ;)

    Gate oxide thickness has been under 10A for ...gee, half a decade at least? :D
     
  16. leeds_manc

    leeds_manc What's a Dremel?

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    I'll let my four year old PC off then, relative to this, it's made from transistors the size of breezeblocks. I wonder though if 22nm will prove to be the sweet spot for speed and reliability, with 14/11nm being iPhone/iPad 17 only?
     
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