5 ms·
Fun factoid: Chips need to have patterns, even where there is nothing to print! This is because you want the acid etchant to be consumed the same way everywhere
by BenoitP 3y ago
Fun factoid: Chips need to have patterns, even where there is nothing to print! This is because you want the acid etchant to be consumed the same way everywhere. So you choose a random repeating pattern that has the same density as your other signals density; it will serves no purpose other than consuming nitric acid. But you have freedom in choosing the exact shape.
Source: a friend of mine working at a chip company 20 years ago. They considered disparaging the competition billions of time in tiny 250nm letters. It occurred right after a patent dispute where it was highly likely they had reverse-engineered part of their design. A disdainful message only their competitor would read, to the tune of "we know you're cheating, and fart in your general direction". It was mostly a joke though, they did not go through with it.
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AMD's one is only in one corner of the chip, so I don't think it applies here.
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EDIT: this was a long time ago. Seems like filling has evolved quite a lot [1]. Timing, signal integrity, and probably capacitance too are so constrained nowadays you can no longer write a personalized message to your competitors.
[1] https://semiengineering.com/knowledge_centers/materials/fill/advanced-smart-fill/ https://semiengineering.com/knowledge_centers/materials/fill...
- FirmwareBurner 3y agoThen why no anime girls etched in chips yet?
- diggan 3y agoSeems we're slowly getting there, we've only gotten as far as to making the casing/fan covers "anime inspired" so far, ignoring individual custom mods of course. - Radeon RX 7900 Sakura - https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/yeston-rx-7900-xtx-sakura.b9981 https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/yeston-rx-7900-xtx-sak... - MAXSUN Geforce RTX 4070 Ti iCraft Limited Edition - https://www.amazon.com/Geforce-iCraft-OC-Graphics-Computer/dp/B0BTNSS6GG https://www.amazon.com/Geforce-iCraft-OC-Graphics-Computer/d...
- BenoitP 3y agoChips was a mistake
- FirmwareBurner 3y agoSo someone is selling a GPU with an anime furry with huge boobs and thick thighs? What kind of consumers do they have in mind?
- Maken 3y agoPeople who thinks sticking anime girls on their PC cases is not enough, I guess.
- _chu1 3y agoKemonomimi ≠ furry
- Lammy 3y agoEverything old is new again https://i.imgur.com/6wKkitF.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/6wKkitF.jpeg
- FirmwareBurner 3y agoYeah, but those had more clothes on, and no animal body parts or gigantic human body parts.
- glitchc 3y agoCopyright? Wouldn't be great to have to pay a license fee per CPU.
- hexagonwin 3y agoIf we're being more serious here some has their own mascott anime girl for asian markets
- djmips 3y agoThere's PCB of course https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F6q9nbnoag5x31.png https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F6...
- Kirby64 3y agoThere is a similar requirement for PCB manufacturing known as 'Thieving' - If you don't have a certain amount of copper, plating will not be uniform. See: https://resources.altium.com/p/what-thieving-pcbs-and-why-it-done https://resources.altium.com/p/what-thieving-pcbs-and-why-it...