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I’m rooting for both Intel and Samsung. It sounds to me like Intel is ever so slowly getting back on track with Pat there (good interview on the Decoder podcast

by atty 4y ago

I’m rooting for both Intel and Samsung. It sounds to me like Intel is ever so slowly getting back on track with Pat there (good interview on the Decoder podcast with him recently, if anyone is interested), but I’d guess we won’t really be able to see if Intel can get their crap together until ~2024-28, considering how long the lead time is for stuff like this. I don’t think Samsung had basically a failed decade like Intel did, but they haven’t been as quick or have as good yields on the last few nodes as TSMC has been, if I understand correctly. TSMC being a node or 2 ahead has basically let them hold their customers by the balls, forcing them to take price increases and extreme lead times because there’s simply nowhere else to go for the same quality and performance. It would be great if we got to a place where we had 3 foundries on roughly equal footing, especially for national security and global supply chain robustness. But also because competition is good for us mere consumers as well, of course :)

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sfmike 4y ago
It's great Taiwan is 2 steps ahead. Keeps the Hegemony aligned correctly.
gmm1990 4y ago
I'm not sure why one or two process nodes ahead is considered such a national security issue. Is it like an encryption breaking ability or something else?
- MrFoof 4y ago
  It's because it's not easy to catch up. In some cases, it can actually be impossible. Particularly if issues such as embargoes, sanctions and/or blockades can functionally block access to required equipment or talent. For example, it'd be hard to bring a new fab online when the ships or planes carrying the fabrication equipment get blown up. Take a look at how Russia attempted and failed to scale up semiconductor fabrication into the 1980s and 1990s. They weren't 2 nodes back. They were WAY further back than that, and even today are still struggling to bring online nationally-developed fabrication technology of which the equivalent has existed elsewhere for 20-30 years. China's SMIC is going to be bringing on "7nm" soon, despite being unable to purchase EUV equipment due to sales embargo. I can't imagine the effort that was required to make 193nm DUV machines produce chips reliably with a "7nm" feature size. EUV isn't required, but it surely makes things much easier.
  - ksec 4y ago
    SMIC 7nm size is actually 7nm in TSMC terms, or Intel 7 / original Intel 10nm. Which didn't use EUV at all.
- opportune 4y ago
  Because it lowers demand for the domestic nodes outside of military, making them more expensive and reducing R&D budget. Also even for non-military uses, if all of that market switched to foreign semis, it’d cause a lot of economic problems if we couldn’t import foreign semis any longer. Absent an embargo or war, that still gives countries that produce the better semis a lot of leverage.

by atty 4y ago

deleted 4y ago

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sfmike 4y ago

It's great Taiwan is 2 steps ahead. Keeps the Hegemony aligned correctly.

gmm1990 4y ago

I'm not sure why one or two process nodes ahead is considered such a national security issue. Is it like an encryption breaking ability or something else?

MrFoof 4y ago
It's because it's not easy to catch up. In some cases, it can actually be impossible. Particularly if issues such as embargoes, sanctions and/or blockades can functionally block access to required equipment or talent. For example, it'd be hard to bring a new fab online when the ships or planes carrying the fabrication equipment get blown up. Take a look at how Russia attempted and failed to scale up semiconductor fabrication into the 1980s and 1990s. They weren't 2 nodes back. They were WAY further back than that, and even today are still struggling to bring online nationally-developed fabrication technology of which the equivalent has existed elsewhere for 20-30 years. China's SMIC is going to be bringing on "7nm" soon, despite being unable to purchase EUV equipment due to sales embargo. I can't imagine the effort that was required to make 193nm DUV machines produce chips reliably with a "7nm" feature size. EUV isn't required, but it surely makes things much easier.
- ksec 4y ago
  SMIC 7nm size is actually 7nm in TSMC terms, or Intel 7 / original Intel 10nm. Which didn't use EUV at all.
opportune 4y ago
Because it lowers demand for the domestic nodes outside of military, making them more expensive and reducing R&D budget. Also even for non-military uses, if all of that market switched to foreign semis, it’d cause a lot of economic problems if we couldn’t import foreign semis any longer. Absent an embargo or war, that still gives countries that produce the better semis a lot of leverage.