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Anandtech did a decent piece on this last month [1]. To paraphrase their description: every other year Intel keep their manufacturing process the same, but rel
by recoil 15y ago
Anandtech did a decent piece on this last month [1].
To paraphrase their description: every other year Intel keep their manufacturing process the same, but release a new microprocessor architecture (Sandybridge was one of those years), but in the other years they introduce a new manufacturing process (e.g. the new tri-gate 22nm transistors which will be found in the Ivy Bridge).
[1] http://www.anandtech.com/show/4830/intels-ivy-bridge-architecture-exposed http://www.anandtech.com/show/4830/intels-ivy-bridge-archite...
- rkalla 15y agoRight-o, that is the "tick-tock" terminology that I believe Anand popularized. They keep tech the same and shrink die (32->22) then in the tock, they keep the die size the same and improve tech. Then the next tick, take all that new tech and shrink it again and on and on. Seems to have worked out well for them. SandyBridge (as you pointed out) was the "tick" (32nm) with the 22nm "tock" IvyBridge planned for next year. I think the wildcard in this "tock" is the tri-gate transistor stuff. It'll either be incremental and we'll see our standard 15% hop in performance, or it will unlock a lot of potential on the high end for power savings, over clocking and growth which could be very exciting. OR, we are all blindsided by ARM chips from Qualcom/NVIDIA/Samsung and start working on our phones :)