4 ms·

Mass manufacturing is really hard, it's not really a surprise that many things that we can do on lab scale can't be made to work (in an economical fashion) at m

by WJW 3y ago

Mass manufacturing is really hard, it's not really a surprise that many things that we can do on lab scale can't be made to work (in an economical fashion) at mass production scale.

adhesive_wombat 3y ago
We're incredibly lucky that copper and silicon are so (relatively) easy to work with. Imagine if even basic electrical systems needed wires made of rhodium and semiconductors only worked at cryogenic temperatures. We'd never have gotten over the "technological activation energy" in the 1800s.
- WJW 3y ago
  For sure. When you look at a used car lot or a smartphone for a few hundred dollars, it is easy to forget that they are the product of a system involving (at least!) hundreds of thousands of people working together in a system that has been studied and optimized for decades. Maybe we'll eventually reach consumer grade graphene processors, but if we do it will probably take decades for the technology to advance through the technology readiness levels.
- amelius 3y ago
  I think about this sometimes. Also, what if Pythagoras' formula didn't exist or was some king of hypothesis or a very long formula: where would technology be?
- lizknope 3y ago
  Copper was not always easy to work with in semiconductor chips. When I started in the industry in the 1990's all the wiring was aluminum. Articles about copper for wiring were research projects and which company would be the first to get it to mass production. IBM was the first in 1997 and then others followed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_interconnects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_interconnects That's how technology is. Things start out hard and with a lot of work and time we invent new methods. Aluminum was once worth more than gold. Then we invented new processes of extraction and refinement. https://clintonaluminum.com/aluminum-was-once-worth-more-than-gold-and-silver/ https://clintonaluminum.com/aluminum-was-once-worth-more-tha...
  - magicalhippo 3y ago
    Asianometry recently released a nice video[1] going into the transition to copper interconnects. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHrQ-Pmvwao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHrQ-Pmvwao
  - gosub100 3y ago
    Can I ask an un-related question? In a CPU with thousands of pins, how come they use N pins for ground, N pins for VCC, when it seems simpler to have continuous bar-shaped contacts? Then pins would only be necessary for signals that actually changed. I see this in computer power supplies as well, they use N separate wires to carry V+ and N more for GND, but if you need more current why not use a thicker wire and only have 2?
    - dmoy 3y ago
      > In a CPU with thousands of pins, how come they use N pins for ground, N pins for VCC, when it seems simpler to have continuous bar-shaped contacts? I can't speak to cpus with thousands of pins, but with significantly smaller chips that often have N>1 vcc or ground, it's typically due to layout convenience. The multiple vcc may be on e.g. opposite sides of the chip, and that makes it easier to route a pure vcc signal to a spot that needs it. It's easier to route outside the chip than inside the chip, because there's more space.
      - mrWiz 3y ago
        Additionally, there's also a benefit to standardization. Adding different pin styles makes the part harder to design and manufacture.
    - Thetawaves 3y ago
      This improves the impedance of high speed signal transmission - at high speeds the currents want to flow through the ground path as close to the signal path as is possible. Said another way - designers work to reduce the total area inside the electric circuit to support high switching speeds. The additional power pins in high pin count chips serve to reduce the distance between high speed signal paths and their return ground paths. This is actually true for both ground and vcc, but is easier to visualize when working with signals and their grounds.
- m463 3y ago
  I think what happened is we found something rare with interesting properties, then we sort of cost-optimized with other materials until we found something cheaper with similar properties. I think the germanium point contact transistor was sold, but eventually got us via practical methods to the silicon chips we have now. We have had more expensive exotic materials like gallium arsenide. So I think his comment in the article will happen: “Now that we know what structural and electronic properties are needed to achieve the new transport regime discovered in this work, there is good likelihood that we will find earth-abundant alternatives to this rhenium-based material that also show impressive transport properties,” Delor says.
da_chicken 3y ago
It's also turned out that carbon nanotubes are toxic in a similar fashion to asbestos. While a completed chip would be sealed, it does raise concerns about the safety of manufacture. Similar concerns have been raised about graphene.
- runeks 3y ago
  I’m not convinced that’s a problem, since chip fabs require people to wear cleanroom suits anyway.
  - da_chicken 3y ago
    It's possible, but cleanroom suits are primarily designed to protect the product from the employees. They keep foreign contaminants out of the manufacturing environment. They're not necessarily capable of protecting the employees from the hazards of the manufacturing environment itself, nor do they necessarily account for the removal of hazardous material before venting the production area to the atmosphere. It might further add to the costs of the fabrication facility.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - lazide 3y ago
      Adding hepa filters on exhaust (and issuing respirators) and not just intake would not budge the cost of a chip at all.
- WJW 3y ago
  Honestly asbestos (and by analogy graphene) would be some of the more benign chemicals involved in semiconductor manufacturing. It regularly uses carcinogens, things that will cause miscarriages in pregnant women and acids strong enough to cause bone damage after being absorbed through the skin. Have a gander at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_hazards_in_semiconductor_manufacturing_occupations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_hazards_in_semiconducto... for more info.

by WJW 3y ago

Mass manufacturing is really hard, it's not really a surprise that many things that we can do on lab scale can't be made to work (in an economical fashion) at mass production scale.

adhesive_wombat 3y ago

We're incredibly lucky that copper and silicon are so (relatively) easy to work with. Imagine if even basic electrical systems needed wires made of rhodium and semiconductors only worked at cryogenic temperatures. We'd never have gotten over the "technological activation energy" in the 1800s.

WJW 3y ago
For sure. When you look at a used car lot or a smartphone for a few hundred dollars, it is easy to forget that they are the product of a system involving (at least!) hundreds of thousands of people working together in a system that has been studied and optimized for decades. Maybe we'll eventually reach consumer grade graphene processors, but if we do it will probably take decades for the technology to advance through the technology readiness levels.
amelius 3y ago
I think about this sometimes. Also, what if Pythagoras' formula didn't exist or was some king of hypothesis or a very long formula: where would technology be?
lizknope 3y ago
Copper was not always easy to work with in semiconductor chips. When I started in the industry in the 1990's all the wiring was aluminum. Articles about copper for wiring were research projects and which company would be the first to get it to mass production. IBM was the first in 1997 and then others followed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_interconnects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_interconnects That's how technology is. Things start out hard and with a lot of work and time we invent new methods. Aluminum was once worth more than gold. Then we invented new processes of extraction and refinement. https://clintonaluminum.com/aluminum-was-once-worth-more-than-gold-and-silver/ https://clintonaluminum.com/aluminum-was-once-worth-more-tha...
- magicalhippo 3y ago
  Asianometry recently released a nice video[1] going into the transition to copper interconnects. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHrQ-Pmvwao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHrQ-Pmvwao
- gosub100 3y ago
  Can I ask an un-related question? In a CPU with thousands of pins, how come they use N pins for ground, N pins for VCC, when it seems simpler to have continuous bar-shaped contacts? Then pins would only be necessary for signals that actually changed. I see this in computer power supplies as well, they use N separate wires to carry V+ and N more for GND, but if you need more current why not use a thicker wire and only have 2?
  - dmoy 3y ago
    > In a CPU with thousands of pins, how come they use N pins for ground, N pins for VCC, when it seems simpler to have continuous bar-shaped contacts? I can't speak to cpus with thousands of pins, but with significantly smaller chips that often have N>1 vcc or ground, it's typically due to layout convenience. The multiple vcc may be on e.g. opposite sides of the chip, and that makes it easier to route a pure vcc signal to a spot that needs it. It's easier to route outside the chip than inside the chip, because there's more space.
    - mrWiz 3y ago
      Additionally, there's also a benefit to standardization. Adding different pin styles makes the part harder to design and manufacture.
  - Thetawaves 3y ago
    This improves the impedance of high speed signal transmission - at high speeds the currents want to flow through the ground path as close to the signal path as is possible. Said another way - designers work to reduce the total area inside the electric circuit to support high switching speeds. The additional power pins in high pin count chips serve to reduce the distance between high speed signal paths and their return ground paths. This is actually true for both ground and vcc, but is easier to visualize when working with signals and their grounds.
m463 3y ago
I think what happened is we found something rare with interesting properties, then we sort of cost-optimized with other materials until we found something cheaper with similar properties. I think the germanium point contact transistor was sold, but eventually got us via practical methods to the silicon chips we have now. We have had more expensive exotic materials like gallium arsenide. So I think his comment in the article will happen: “Now that we know what structural and electronic properties are needed to achieve the new transport regime discovered in this work, there is good likelihood that we will find earth-abundant alternatives to this rhenium-based material that also show impressive transport properties,” Delor says.

da_chicken 3y ago

It's also turned out that carbon nanotubes are toxic in a similar fashion to asbestos. While a completed chip would be sealed, it does raise concerns about the safety of manufacture. Similar concerns have been raised about graphene.

runeks 3y ago
I’m not convinced that’s a problem, since chip fabs require people to wear cleanroom suits anyway.
- da_chicken 3y ago
  It's possible, but cleanroom suits are primarily designed to protect the product from the employees. They keep foreign contaminants out of the manufacturing environment. They're not necessarily capable of protecting the employees from the hazards of the manufacturing environment itself, nor do they necessarily account for the removal of hazardous material before venting the production area to the atmosphere. It might further add to the costs of the fabrication facility.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - lazide 3y ago
    Adding hepa filters on exhaust (and issuing respirators) and not just intake would not budge the cost of a chip at all.
WJW 3y ago
Honestly asbestos (and by analogy graphene) would be some of the more benign chemicals involved in semiconductor manufacturing. It regularly uses carcinogens, things that will cause miscarriages in pregnant women and acids strong enough to cause bone damage after being absorbed through the skin. Have a gander at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_hazards_in_semiconductor_manufacturing_occupations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_hazards_in_semiconducto... for more info.