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Not too interesting for those interested in high performance desktop and server offerings. The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low powe

Not too interesting for those interested in high performance desktop and server offerings. The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low power products suggests their yields are still poor. AMD did a really smart thing with their processor designs. Instead of doing a large monolithic multiprocessor like Intel (which may be able to eek out some extra performance due to optimized wire placements), they use smaller chiplets. This results in requiring no manufacturing errors on a much smaller area of the die (which becomes exponentially less probable as the area increases). Even if AMD was using Intel's 10nm process, their yields would be better because of their modular designs that get soldered together after the lithography. Intel can still bin out some errors (the 10300-10900k are all the same chip with different parts turned off due to manufacturing errors), but the less modular design likely makes this less efficient. That's my understanding, anyway -- correct me if I'm wrong.

ajross 6y ago
> The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low power products suggests their yields are still poor. That logic seems backwards. If you have poor yields you tend to favor higher-margin products (i.e. datacenter CPUs). This is a laptop CPU intended to sell at significantly lower $/mm2. As far as chiplets: multichip packages are an ancient idea, and the industry goes back and forth on them. Both Intel and AMD shippsed multi-chip solutions way back in the day, the current age of integration is actually the anomaly. You win on yield but lose on package costs, and the decision as to which to use depends on the specifics of the market you're trying to target. Certainly AMD would prefer to ship single-chip solutions and pocket the savings, but they can't. Likewise Intel accepts some loss of scaling because of the need to share die designs across the product line.
- ustolemyname 6y ago
  The issue is your defect rate for larger chips. If a small laptop CPU only has 25% of chips being fully functional, a 4x the size server chip will only yield 0.39% of chips being defect free. I say this having no idea what Intel's defect rate is right now, and I acknowledge fusing of bad sections can mitigate this a bit.
- aryonoco 6y ago
  Laptops (and for that matter mobile SoCs) are smaller, so higher defect rates can be tolerated as you can still get reasonable yields. you need a mature process to manufacture large chips (economically).
kllrnohj 6y ago
> That's my understanding, anyway -- correct me if I'm wrong. Since these are mobile processors your understanding is incorrect. What you've described is what AMD did on the server & desktop side. But on mobile, to hit the power efficiency targets, AMD stuck with the single monolithic die. And it's a decently large one, at that: https://www.anandtech.com/show/15381/amd-ryzen-mobile-4000-measuring-renoirs-die-size https://www.anandtech.com/show/15381/amd-ryzen-mobile-4000-m... So no AMD wouldn't yield better on Intel's 10NM+, not in this case. In the desktop usage they would, as their desktop CPU dies are way smaller than their mobile CPU dies. But the mobile die sizes are fairly equivalent between AMD & Intel.
- celrod 6y ago
  If I understood lend000 correctly: > The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low power products suggests their yields are still poor. Their argument was that, had they followed AMD's approach, they would be able to produce desktop and server chips despite being yield-limited to "<= 6 core" per chiplet.
disillusioned 6y ago
>(the 10300-10900k are all the same chip with different parts turned off due to manufacturing errors) Wow. Is this a relatively new phenomenon, or something that's been the norm in processor mfg for a long time? I know that the Ks were usually just binned/higher tested chips so they'd unlock those and charge a premium for them, but the idea that they're disabling parts of the die and separating the chip offering that way is crazy to me. Are the parts being disabled redundant or are they reducing the instruction set space? I don't know anything about how any of that would work.
- dr_zoidberg 6y ago
  I remember hearing 10 years ago that Phenom x3 was a 4 core part that always got a dead core in manufacturing (: So no, nothing new under the sun.
- jagannathtech 6y ago
  insert the ohio astronauts meme wait, it's all just binning? it always has been. ;)
- leovailati 6y ago
  I remember hearing something about the Cell processors on Playstation 3's being the ones with manufacturing errors. The 100% good ones were supposedly sold to the US military. I realize that second part was probably just a myth. Who knows, maybe it was all an internet myth! The PS3 was released in 2006, so the idea itself is not new.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  The disabled parts are the broken parts.
- Voliokis 6y ago
  It's been done for as long as I can remember. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning Iirc, early Celeron were often just Pentiums with defective (and disabled) cache Edit: https://www.anandtech.com/show/568/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/568/2
- 6y ago

ajross 6y ago

> The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low power products suggests their yields are still poor. That logic seems backwards. If you have poor yields you tend to favor higher-margin products (i.e. datacenter CPUs). This is a laptop CPU intended to sell at significantly lower $/mm2. As far as chiplets: multichip packages are an ancient idea, and the industry goes back and forth on them. Both Intel and AMD shippsed multi-chip solutions way back in the day, the current age of integration is actually the anomaly. You win on yield but lose on package costs, and the decision as to which to use depends on the specifics of the market you're trying to target. Certainly AMD would prefer to ship single-chip solutions and pocket the savings, but they can't. Likewise Intel accepts some loss of scaling because of the need to share die designs across the product line.

ustolemyname 6y ago
The issue is your defect rate for larger chips. If a small laptop CPU only has 25% of chips being fully functional, a 4x the size server chip will only yield 0.39% of chips being defect free. I say this having no idea what Intel's defect rate is right now, and I acknowledge fusing of bad sections can mitigate this a bit.
aryonoco 6y ago
Laptops (and for that matter mobile SoCs) are smaller, so higher defect rates can be tolerated as you can still get reasonable yields. you need a mature process to manufacture large chips (economically).

kllrnohj 6y ago

> That's my understanding, anyway -- correct me if I'm wrong. Since these are mobile processors your understanding is incorrect. What you've described is what AMD did on the server & desktop side. But on mobile, to hit the power efficiency targets, AMD stuck with the single monolithic die. And it's a decently large one, at that: https://www.anandtech.com/show/15381/amd-ryzen-mobile-4000-measuring-renoirs-die-size https://www.anandtech.com/show/15381/amd-ryzen-mobile-4000-m... So no AMD wouldn't yield better on Intel's 10NM+, not in this case. In the desktop usage they would, as their desktop CPU dies are way smaller than their mobile CPU dies. But the mobile die sizes are fairly equivalent between AMD & Intel.

celrod 6y ago
If I understood lend000 correctly: > The fact that Intel's only new releases on 10nm are <=6 core low power products suggests their yields are still poor. Their argument was that, had they followed AMD's approach, they would be able to produce desktop and server chips despite being yield-limited to "<= 6 core" per chiplet.

disillusioned 6y ago

>(the 10300-10900k are all the same chip with different parts turned off due to manufacturing errors) Wow. Is this a relatively new phenomenon, or something that's been the norm in processor mfg for a long time? I know that the Ks were usually just binned/higher tested chips so they'd unlock those and charge a premium for them, but the idea that they're disabling parts of the die and separating the chip offering that way is crazy to me. Are the parts being disabled redundant or are they reducing the instruction set space? I don't know anything about how any of that would work.

dr_zoidberg 6y ago
I remember hearing 10 years ago that Phenom x3 was a 4 core part that always got a dead core in manufacturing (: So no, nothing new under the sun.
jagannathtech 6y ago
insert the ohio astronauts meme wait, it's all just binning? it always has been. ;)
leovailati 6y ago
I remember hearing something about the Cell processors on Playstation 3's being the ones with manufacturing errors. The 100% good ones were supposedly sold to the US military. I realize that second part was probably just a myth. Who knows, maybe it was all an internet myth! The PS3 was released in 2006, so the idea itself is not new.
srtjstjsj 6y ago
The disabled parts are the broken parts.
Voliokis 6y ago
It's been done for as long as I can remember. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning Iirc, early Celeron were often just Pentiums with defective (and disabled) cache Edit: https://www.anandtech.com/show/568/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/568/2
6y ago