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Intel seems to be multiple years behind at this point. They might make a bit of a comeback, but it would have to be a huge process size shrink to be competitive

Intel seems to be multiple years behind at this point. They might make a bit of a comeback, but it would have to be a huge process size shrink to be competitive. Based on their previous years, I doubt that an extra year will help that much.

dannyw 6y ago
Intel is shipping 10nm superfin (I'm typing this on a Tiger Lake NUC). Density wise, this is comparable to TSMC 7nm (used by AMD).
- adrian_b 6y ago
  While Intel 10 nm SuperFin might be comparable in density with TSMC 7 nm, it definitely is much worse for the yields of chips with large area. Six years ago, in 2015, Intel had no problems to introduce the smaller Skylake U and the larger Skylake H at the same time. Now, Intel needs more than half of year to increase the yields of 10 nm SuperFin enough to be able to introduce the larger Tiger Lake H after the smaller Tiger Lake U introduced last year. This happens even if now the area difference between Tiger Lake H and Tiger Lake U is not so great as in the previous generations, because a good part of the twice larger CPU is compensated by the 3 times smaller GPU. On the other hand, the previous variant of the Intel 10 nm process (non-SuperFin), which is still used for Ice Lake Server, has much worse electrical properties than the TSMC 7 nm, because at the same number of active cores and the same power consumption AMD Epyc 7xx3 can have a clock frequency up to 50% higher. Moreover, the similar density of the Intel process means absolutely nothing when the competition using the TSMC process can deliver a more than 3 times greater L3 cache memory at the same price and in the same package size. The density does not have any importance if you cannot deliver more transistors in a given package, because you cannot manufacture large enough chips and because you have been unable to predict that you will never be able to manufacture large enough chips, so that you should have designed from the beginning your product as multi-chip.
- philliphaydon 6y ago
  Why does everyone make this excuse for Intel? It really sounds like fanboyism. Not trying to offend.
  - totalZero 6y ago
    Is it an excuse, or a fact?
axaxs 6y ago
Behind on...what? Against the latest and greatest Apple or AMD? Maybe. I'd probably put it at a generation at most. That aside, there's a -huge- market for chips that aren't the latest and greatest. Intel expanding into that, which if I read right is what they're doing, could be a huge moneymaker.

dannyw 6y ago

Intel is shipping 10nm superfin (I'm typing this on a Tiger Lake NUC). Density wise, this is comparable to TSMC 7nm (used by AMD).

adrian_b 6y ago
While Intel 10 nm SuperFin might be comparable in density with TSMC 7 nm, it definitely is much worse for the yields of chips with large area. Six years ago, in 2015, Intel had no problems to introduce the smaller Skylake U and the larger Skylake H at the same time. Now, Intel needs more than half of year to increase the yields of 10 nm SuperFin enough to be able to introduce the larger Tiger Lake H after the smaller Tiger Lake U introduced last year. This happens even if now the area difference between Tiger Lake H and Tiger Lake U is not so great as in the previous generations, because a good part of the twice larger CPU is compensated by the 3 times smaller GPU. On the other hand, the previous variant of the Intel 10 nm process (non-SuperFin), which is still used for Ice Lake Server, has much worse electrical properties than the TSMC 7 nm, because at the same number of active cores and the same power consumption AMD Epyc 7xx3 can have a clock frequency up to 50% higher. Moreover, the similar density of the Intel process means absolutely nothing when the competition using the TSMC process can deliver a more than 3 times greater L3 cache memory at the same price and in the same package size. The density does not have any importance if you cannot deliver more transistors in a given package, because you cannot manufacture large enough chips and because you have been unable to predict that you will never be able to manufacture large enough chips, so that you should have designed from the beginning your product as multi-chip.
philliphaydon 6y ago
Why does everyone make this excuse for Intel? It really sounds like fanboyism. Not trying to offend.
- totalZero 6y ago
  Is it an excuse, or a fact?

axaxs 6y ago

Behind on...what? Against the latest and greatest Apple or AMD? Maybe. I'd probably put it at a generation at most. That aside, there's a -huge- market for chips that aren't the latest and greatest. Intel expanding into that, which if I read right is what they're doing, could be a huge moneymaker.