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Sure, Apple did the same thing with TSMC's 5nm node. They still lost in performance-per-watt in direct comparison with Nvidia GPUs using Samsung's 8nm node. Mon
by talldayo 2y ago
Sure, Apple did the same thing with TSMC's 5nm node. They still lost in performance-per-watt in direct comparison with Nvidia GPUs using Samsung's 8nm node. Money isn't everything, even when you have so much of it that you can deny your competitors access to the tech you use.
Nvidia's lead is not only cemented by dense silicon. Their designs are extremely competitive, perhaps even a generational leap over what their competitors offer.
- amelius 2y agoLet me phrase it differently. If Nvidia pulls the plug we can still go to AMD and have a reasonable alternative. If TSMC pulls the plug, however ...
- david-gpu 2y agoSamsung's fabrication is about as good as TSMC. Or at least it was when I retired a few years ago.
- talldayo 2y agoThen so what? It's whataboutism. The practical answer is that all of FAANG will have to pick up the pieces once their supply chain is shattered. Samsung would quickly reach capacity with AMD and potentially Nvidia as priority customers, and Intel will be trying to court Nvidia and Apple as high-margin customers for some low-yield 18A contract. Depending on whether TSMC's Arizona foundry ever reaches operational capacity, they will be balancing orders from Nvidia and Apple in the same way they do today. Given the pitifully low investment, it's not really likely the Arizona facility will make a dent in the supply chain. Fact is, Nvidia is well positioned to pick up the pieces even if 5nm> processes go away for the next decade. The only question is whether or not people will continue to have demand for CUDA, and the answer has been "yes" since long before crypto and AI were popular. If TSMC was bombed tomorrow, Nvidia would still have demand for their product and they would still have the capacity to sell it. Their competition with AMD would be somewhat normalized and Apple would be blown into the stratosphere upon realizing that they have to contract either Samsung or Intel to stay afloat. The implications for the American economy are a little upsetting but there's nothing particularly world-ending about that scenario. It would be a sad day to be a Geekbench enthusiast but life would go on.
- amelius 2y agoIt could be. But I don't read anything about upcoming AI chip companies. My predicition is there will be some strong competition for Nvidia in the coming years. Since most people use CUDA through some other library (like Torch or TF), I think the dependence on CUDA isn't as strong as you make it seem.
- pjmlp 2y agoWhat is the reasonable alternative to CUDA Fortran on AMD? One example out of many I can point out from CUDA ecosystem.