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I’m a little surprised that they’re continuing to push shrinking transistors so hard. While it’s impressive, it introduces massive new problems to solve across

I’m a little surprised that they’re continuing to push shrinking transistors so hard. While it’s impressive, it introduces massive new problems to solve across the entire design and manufacturing process, every time. There are other ways to achieve their goals of reduced area, etc. One example is to save area by making the chip do less, and an outstanding place to start would have been to banish all of this DRM crap that no customer has ever asked for. It costs complexity, no doubt adding so much crap to the chip that they need to save area by shrinking the whole chip on an accelerated schedule.

mikhailt 8y ago
If there are other ways, you should patent it because it'll be worth trillions. They're not shrinking it just for the fun of it, they're progressing the technologies to accommodate the explosive growth in computing every year. The major problem with the growth is the energy consumption, we can't sustain it without reducing it. Shrinking the process node allows them to double the transistor capacity without doubling the power requirements and they were on the path of doing it every few years, alas also the Moore's law. Also, the mobile devices are outpacing the desktops, which means the market is demanding lighter, more power-efficient devices. It takes several years and tens of billions of dollars to develop a new fab, so Intel has to predict and work on future technologies continuously the best ways they can; they can't risk losing their businesses to other fabs that is also doing the same thing. DRM is the least of the problem, the biggest part of the Intel CPUs are the integrated graphics now.
- makecheck 8y ago
  I did give an example of another way: reducing the features of the chip. DRM is just one case. I am aware of the reasons for shrinking. I’m not saying they should never pursue a new process but they’re attempting to achieve it on a timeline that isn’t realistic. Also, power-inefficient design is something that is hard for Intel to change because too much depends on their architecture being the way it is. So between not wanting to get rid of stupid features and not being able to sell a backward-incompatible chip with power-efficient architecture changes, they’re left trying to shrink before everybody else.

mikhailt 8y ago

If there are other ways, you should patent it because it'll be worth trillions. They're not shrinking it just for the fun of it, they're progressing the technologies to accommodate the explosive growth in computing every year. The major problem with the growth is the energy consumption, we can't sustain it without reducing it. Shrinking the process node allows them to double the transistor capacity without doubling the power requirements and they were on the path of doing it every few years, alas also the Moore's law. Also, the mobile devices are outpacing the desktops, which means the market is demanding lighter, more power-efficient devices. It takes several years and tens of billions of dollars to develop a new fab, so Intel has to predict and work on future technologies continuously the best ways they can; they can't risk losing their businesses to other fabs that is also doing the same thing. DRM is the least of the problem, the biggest part of the Intel CPUs are the integrated graphics now.

makecheck 8y ago
I did give an example of another way: reducing the features of the chip. DRM is just one case. I am aware of the reasons for shrinking. I’m not saying they should never pursue a new process but they’re attempting to achieve it on a timeline that isn’t realistic. Also, power-inefficient design is something that is hard for Intel to change because too much depends on their architecture being the way it is. So between not wanting to get rid of stupid features and not being able to sell a backward-incompatible chip with power-efficient architecture changes, they’re left trying to shrink before everybody else.