Mass Production at Intel's 14 nanometer Node Begins This Year

[btarunr]

In addition to the industry's first fully-patterned 450 mm wafer, Intel announced that its 14 nanometer silicon fabrication node at three of its fabs will begin this year. The next leap forward from 22 nm, on which two of the company's CPU generations "Ivy Bridge" and "Haswell" are based, the 14 nm node will eventually facilitate production of the company's 5th generation Core "Broadwell" processors, which are due to arrive in 2014. Given the pace at which the 14 nm node is being developed, some of the first Broadwell Core chips, at least engineering samples, will be released to the industry within 2013. Among the three Intel facilities with 14 nm nodes are D1X, located in Oregon; Fab 42, located in Arizona; and Fab 24, located in Ireland.



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[The Von Matrices]

I (and many others) have always thought that each successive manufacturing node would require more work to develop than the previous and thus advancement would slow, but Intel seems to be doing the exact opposite and the pace of change is increasing. I guess the singularity is truly approaching.

 

[TheGuruStud]

If their "22nm" was actually 26-27, then what is this?

 

[_JP_]

Maybe 20nm?

Anyway, I'm hoping this "tick" will keep its feet numbered at 1150.

 

[seronx]

If their "22nm" was actually 26-27, then what is this?

18/16-nm.

 

[Jorge]

Yes Intel's 14nm is believed to actually be 18nm and 22nm actually 26nm. In Intel speak it's like 13w CPUs are really 7w CPUs if the PR flakes say so...

As far as node development, GloFo is already working on actual 20nm and 14nm concurrently. For those who don't know a node drop produces mostly a lower power consumption CPU/APU. With these micro node changes compared to the drop from 90nm to 65nm, there is minimal performance gains. In fact with the closer proximity of the transistors, there are thermal issues to deal with, as Intel found out with IB. FinFET/stacked transistors makers are going to need to address these thermal issues sooner than later.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Maybe 20nm?

Anyway, I'm hoping this "tick" will keep its feet numbered at 1150.

Id put money on a pin change, its getting harder for chipzila to ship stock these days due to proliferation

 

[de.das.dude]

Maybe 20nm?

Anyway, I'm hoping this "tick" will keep its feet numbered at 1150.

yeah hopefully amd will stick to using compatible sockets.



oh wait, this is intel.

 

[jihadjoe]

Yes Intel's 14nm is believed to actually be 18nm and 22nm actually 26nm. In Intel speak it's like 13w CPUs are really 7w CPUs if the PR flakes say so...

As far as node development, GloFo is already working on actual 20nm and 14nm concurrently. For those who don't know a node drop produces mostly a lower power consumption CPU/APU. With these micro node changes compared to the drop from 90nm to 65nm, there is minimal performance gains. In fact with the closer proximity of the transistors, there are thermal issues to deal with, as Intel found out with IB. FinFET/stacked transistors makers are going to need to address these thermal issues sooner than later.

Glofo's 14nm will be exactly the same size as Intel's 14nm.
Nobody's process node size is truly "actual size" anymore.

References:

Xbitlabs:

According to Globalfoundries, 14-nm FinFETs have a 48-nm fin pitch, which is identical to what Globalfoundries expects about Intel's FinFET fabrication process.

BSN:

GlobalFoundries’ transistor is a 14nm FinFET but the rest of the PDK is unchanged from their 20nm-LPM process. It is basically 20nm process with 14nm transistors (at 20nm spacing).

 

[Jorge]

Intel's 14nm is not 14nm but TSMC's and GloFo's node sizes are accurately stated. Just because someone claims to know or speculates about future tech, doesn't make it true.

 

[jihadjoe]

Intel's 14nm is not 14nm but TSMC's and GloFo's node sizes are accurately stated. Just because someone claims to know or speculates about future tech, doesn't make it true.

The part I quoted from xbit isn't their own speculation, it's a statement from GloFo themselves.

 

[Roph]

And AMD is still pushing out 32nm parts