APU

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. has delayed volume production of chips using 16nm FinFET manufacturing technologies by several quarters. As a result, it now has to reconsider plans regarding production of semiconductors using 10nm FinFET fabrication process. Previously it was expected that the company will produce 10nm chips in late 2016, …

Intel shipped 46 million application processors for tablets last year and became one of the largest suppliers of this kind of system-on-chips in the world. Although the company clearly exceeded its original tablet SoC sales goal in 2014, Intel set a rather cautious target for this year. “We set a …

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. has confirmed that it is developing yet another version of its 16nm FinFET fabrication process. The new manufacturing technology will be used to make chips for ultra-low-power as well as high-performance applications. “We are also working on 16nm ULP technology development,” said Mark Liu, co-CEO of …

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. has clarified the timeframe when it intends to start mass production of chips using 16nm FinFET fabrication process. The world’s largest contract maker of semiconductors once again will delay 16nm FF volume production by a month or two to the third quarter of 2015. Back in …

The latest mobile application processors from MediaTek already offer performance comparable to that of mobile system-on-chips from companies like Qualcomm. Apparently, the company is working on two new SoCs that promise to offer truly unbeatable performance. Unfortunately, it is completely unclear whether the new APs will be used for mobile …

Confirmation just in on that third AMD exit, as the corporate web site gets updated to show the future line-up. KitGuru continues to be confused at the number and level of changes. Regardless of the reasons why any of these execs left AMD today, one thing is for certain – …

Quite an amazing day over at AMD HQ. News in that a statutory 8K filing has revealed that the company has just lost its heads of marketing and strategy. What is going on in Texas we wonder? From time to time a large organisation will see senior personnel come and …

Advanced Micro Devices has demonstrated three laptops based on the code-named “Carrizo” accelerated processing units (APUs) at the Consumer Electronics Show 2015. The demonstrations prove that AMD already has working “Carrizo” silicon at hands; however, it is still unclear when exactly the company plans to initiate commercial shipments of the new …

Intel Corp. said it had begun to ship a new breed of system-on-chips for tablets. The new application processors promise to boost performance and cut-down power consumption of Intel’s chips for slates thanks to a new x86 micro-architecture, a new graphics processing unit as well as 14nm fabrication process. The …

Intel's announced it's new SoC (system-on-chip) for wearable devices today at CES. Scheduled for release in the second half of 2015 this tiny all in one system will be able to fit just about anywhere, with it being around the same size as your thumbnail. Intel have also revealed plans with several …

Although Nvidia Corp. decided not to use its custom ARMv8-compatible 64-bit “Denver” core inside its Tegra X1 system-on-chip, the company claims that it can use it inside other application processors. What is unclear is when and inside which application processors. “The reason we did not use Denver on Tegra X1 …

Nvidia Corp. on Monday introduced its latest addition to the Tegra family of system-on-chips for mobile devices, the Tegra X1. The new application processor features the latest ARMv8 64-bit cores, Maxwell architecture graphics, ultra-high-definition video support as well as a massive amount of camera throughput. The all-new Nvidia Tegra X1 …

A technology enthusiast has conducted the first benchmarks of Intel Core i7-5500U “Broadwell” processor’s integrated graphics engine and compared it to that of Intel Core i7-4510U “Haswell” processor. While the results are promising, they do not demonstrate any radical performance boosts. Intel Corp. has been gradually improving performance and capabilities …

GlobalFoundries, the world’s second largest contract manufacturer of chips, late on Tuesday denied existence of problems with the ramp up of production using 14nm fabrication process. According to the foundry, it specifically stockpiles manufacturing equipment at a warehouse so that to install it once the fab 8 facility becomes compatible …

Although GlobalFoundries has licensed 14nm FinFET manufacturing technology from Samsung Electronics back in May, 2014, it looks like the company may have to delay mass production using the fabrication process. According to a media report, the company has stopped installation of equipment required to make chips using 14nm FinFET technology. …

It is a well-known fact that owners of large datacenters, such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Corp. and other, have very diverse requirements for servers and microprocessors inside their servers. In the recent years both Intel Corp. and AMD offered custom central processing units to large clients in order to …

While non-standard fabrication processes are sometimes challenging and make it harder to re-use intellectual property across different product lineups, they are just what the doctor ordered when one needs to achieve certain goals. According to GlobalFoundries, the No. 2 contract maker of chips, many customized process technologies are gaining importance …

GlobalFoundries, the world’s second largest contract maker of semiconductors, plans to start volume production of chips using 14nm fabrication process in the first half of 2015, a little later than Samsung Electronics, but, possibly, earlier than Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. The company does not reveal who will be the first …

Advanced Micro Devices on Monday promoted Mario Silveira to lead worldwide consumer sales within the company's computing and graphics business unit. Mario Silveira, who is 40 years old, joined AMD in 2010 and most recently served as head of consumer go-to-market sales for the EMEA region. Mr. Silveira will report …

Samsung Electronics has begun volume production of semiconductors using 14nm FinFET fabrication process in accordance with its plans outlined earlier this year. The company does not disclose which chips it produces using its 14LPE (low-power early) manufacturing technology and for which companies. Kim Ki-nam, president of Samsung's semiconductor business and …

Advanced Micro Devices may introduce its all-new graphics architecture in late 2015 and then ramp it up in 2016. At least, Mark Papermaster, chief technology officer of AMD, implied on such scenario this week. Graphics architectures from ATI Technologies and Advanced Micro Devices live active life for about four years …

Advanced Micro Devices may not have a clear product roadmap for 2015, when it essentially will continue selling current-generation products and will not increase performance of its chips significantly. Nonetheless, the company pins many hopes on its 2016 lineup when it will have a number of new products that are …

Although Advanced Micro Devices has not revealed any details about its 2015 roadmap this year, the company continues to unveil pieces of the puzzle. Last week the firm implied that it will use 20nm fabrication process for select products, but on Tuesday AMD hinted that products made using 14nm and 16nm …

Semi-custom system-on-chips for video-game consoles account for a significant portion of AMD’s sales. Many market observers have been concerned that while SoCs for Microsoft Xbox One and Sony PlayStation 4 bring in huge revenue, profit margin of such business may be negligible. While the margins of the SoCs are below …

Advanced Micro Devices on Wednesday implied that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.’s 20nm fabrication process would only be used for select products, whereas the main focus of the chip designer is on more advanced fabrication processes with FinFET transistors. Unfortunately, AMD did not reveal any actual plans. “From an overall standpoint, today …

GlobalFoundries, the world’s second largest contract maker of semiconductors, has leading edge process technologies and advanced fabs. However, in the recent years the company had to significantly alter its plans, which affected its performance and relations with customers. Fortunately, according to AMD, a key client of GF, the problems seem …

Samsung Electronics has world-class semiconductor manufacturing facilities and leading-edge process technologies. While the company designs its own system-on-chips for mobile devices, Samsung continues to use application processors from Qualcomm for its high-end smartphones and extensively uses intellectual property from ARM Holdings and Imagination Technologies. Apparently, Samsung wants to change that …

Although AMD’s next-generation accelerated processing unit (APU) code-named “Carrizo” employs the company’s upcoming high-performance “Excavator” x86 cores, they may never make it to high-performance desktop computers as AMD tailored its forthcoming APUs specifically for mobile devices. In order to cut-down power consumption of “Carrizo” chips compared to current-generation “Kaveri” APUs, …

Advanced Micro Devices recently set a goal to improve energy efficiency of its accelerated processing units by 25 times by 2020. To achieve this goal, AMD will have to outpace historical energy efficiency trend by over 70 per cent, but the company claims it knows what to do and even …

We do not know exactly when companies like Intel Corp., Samsung Electronics or Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. make their first chips using 7nm, 5nm, 3nm or 2nm process technologies. But we do know what should happen before leading semiconductor producers manufacture their new chips using ultra-thin process technologies: ASML should sell …