3 ms·

Just to head off the inevitable comments about how 2nm isn't really 2nm: yes, we know, it's just a convention in the industry to indicate relative performance.

Just to head off the inevitable comments about how 2nm isn't really 2nm: yes, we know, it's just a convention in the industry to indicate relative performance. It's basically a marketing term, more than anything else. The numbers VLSI engineers actually care about are things like millions of transistors per square millimeter (MTr/mm^2), power per bit in picojoules (pJ), transistor rise times in nanoseconds, etc... In those metrics, steady gains have been made, it's just that the actual component sizes haven't matched up to the gains recently. Instead, new types of technologies like "gate-all-around" have been used to eke out more performance instead of simply shrinking everything proportionally.

sgift 3y ago
I really hope they can all decide on a better number which everyone agrees on soon. It's ridiculous having to look up each time if Intel 10nm is the same as which one from TSMC again and all of that. There have been some contenders, but the lure of saying "hey, I have the smallest number, so my process is best!" is just too strong it seems.
- jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
  Have you considered that things are complicated enough now it can't be boiled down to single number comparisons?
  - sgift 3y ago
    Sure, but I know that there have been various proposals for a better number. Different companies just couldn't decide on which proposal they like the best.
- verall 3y ago
  Since Intel changed their node names you can roughly assume that for a given node TSMC > Intel > Samsung. This might change in the future if Intel gets their shit together but I'm not buying their stock yet, they look like the Boeing of microchips to me.
- DeathArrow 3y ago
  >I really hope they can all decide on a better number which everyone agrees on soon. How about 2nm, 2nm Ultra, 2nm Ultra Pro and 2nm Ultra Pro Max. Or, like Intel used to call iterations of their 14nn technology, 10nm, 10nm+, 10nm++, 10nm+++ and 10nm++++.
fennecbutt 3y ago
Only CPP and MMP really matter. Different foundries offer slightly different numbers for either, usually if they're better at one, they're slightly worse at the other. This was interesting, though idt it's been standardised: https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-better-way-to-measure-progress-in-semiconductors https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-better-way-to-measure-progress-i.... Measure node by factors of density of logic, memory, interconnects all together, which is pretty well balanced.

sgift 3y ago

I really hope they can all decide on a better number which everyone agrees on soon. It's ridiculous having to look up each time if Intel 10nm is the same as which one from TSMC again and all of that. There have been some contenders, but the lure of saying "hey, I have the smallest number, so my process is best!" is just too strong it seems.

jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
Have you considered that things are complicated enough now it can't be boiled down to single number comparisons?
- sgift 3y ago
  Sure, but I know that there have been various proposals for a better number. Different companies just couldn't decide on which proposal they like the best.
verall 3y ago
Since Intel changed their node names you can roughly assume that for a given node TSMC > Intel > Samsung. This might change in the future if Intel gets their shit together but I'm not buying their stock yet, they look like the Boeing of microchips to me.
DeathArrow 3y ago
>I really hope they can all decide on a better number which everyone agrees on soon. How about 2nm, 2nm Ultra, 2nm Ultra Pro and 2nm Ultra Pro Max. Or, like Intel used to call iterations of their 14nn technology, 10nm, 10nm+, 10nm++, 10nm+++ and 10nm++++.

fennecbutt 3y ago

Only CPP and MMP really matter. Different foundries offer slightly different numbers for either, usually if they're better at one, they're slightly worse at the other. This was interesting, though idt it's been standardised: https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-better-way-to-measure-progress-in-semiconductors https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-better-way-to-measure-progress-i.... Measure node by factors of density of logic, memory, interconnects all together, which is pretty well balanced.