SoCs
Throughout the world, if there's one universal constant in the smartphone and mobile device market, it's Arm. Whether it's mobile chip makers basing their SoCs on Arm's fully synthesized CPU cores, or just relying on the Arm ISA and designing their own chips, at the end of the day, Arm underlies virtually all of it. That kind of market saturation and relevance is a testament to all of the hard work that Arm has done in the last few decades getting to this point, but it's also a grave responsibility – for most mobile SoCs, their performance only moves forward as quickly as Arm's own CPU core designs and associated IP do. Consequently, we've seen Arm settle into a yearly cadence for their client IP...
Apple Announces Event for November 10th: Arm-Based Macs Expected
We don’t normally publish news posts about Apple sending out RSVPs for product launch events, but this one should be especially interesting. This morning Apple has sent notice that they’re...
67 by Ryan Smith on 11/2/2020
Imagination Announces B-Series GPU IP: Scaling up with Multi-GPU
It’s almost been a year since Imagination had announced its brand-new A-series GPU IP, a release which at the time the company called its most important in 15 years...
74 by Andrei Frumusanu on 10/13/2020
NUVIA Completes Series B Funding Round: $240M
One of the more interesting startups of late is NUVIA, with promises of a new Arm-based processor for the datacenter to rival the x86 dominance of AMD and Intel...
21 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 9/24/2020
Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 750G: Cortex-A77 & mmWave in the Premium Range
Today Qualcomm is announcing a new entry into their premium tier Snapdragon 700-series with the brand-new Snapdragon 750G platform and SoC. The new SoC, as its name implies, lies...
13 by Andrei Frumusanu on 9/22/2020
Apple Announces 5nm A14 SoC - Meagre Upgrades, Or Just Less Power Hungry?
Amongst the new iPad and Watch devices released today, Apple made news in releasing the new A14 SoC chip. Apple’s newest generation silicon design is noteworthy in that is...
127 by Andrei Frumusanu on 9/15/2020
It’s Official: NVIDIA To Acquire Arm For $40 Billion
Following a number of rumors and leaks, NVIDIA this evening announced that it is buying Arm Limited for $40 billion. The cash and stock deal will see NVIDIA buy...
140 by Ryan Smith on 9/13/2020
Intel Launches 11th Gen Core Tiger Lake: Up to 4.8 GHz at 50 W, 2x GPU with Xe, New Branding
In August, Intel ran one of its rare Architecture Days where the company went into some detail about its upcoming Tiger Lake processor. This included target markets, core counts...
349 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 9/2/2020
Intel Launches Tiger Lake: A Live Blog (Noon ET, 9am PT)
Intel is about to launch Tiger Lake. Follow along with our Live Blog!
54 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 9/2/2020
3DFabric: The Home for TSMC’s 2.5D and 3D Stacking Roadmap
Interposers. EMIB. Foveros. Die-to-die stacking. ODI. AIB.TSVs. All these words and acronyms have one overriding feature – they are all involved in how two bits of silicon physically connect...
9 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 9/2/2020
Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 732G: 730G Gets a Speed Bump
Today Qualcomm is announcing an update to its Snapdragon 730G platform, introducing the higher-binned Snapdragon 732G. The new chip gives the platform a slight boost in terms of clock...
16 by Andrei Frumusanu on 8/31/2020
TSMC Launches New N12e Process: FinFET at 0.4V for IoT
One of the main drivers for the semiconductor industry is the growth in always-connected devices that require silicon inside, either for compute, communication, or control. The ‘Internet of Things&rsquo...
27 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/27/2020
TSMC and Graphcore Prepare for AI Acceleration on 3nm
One of the side announcements made during TSMC’s Technology Symposium was that it already has customers on hand with product development progressing for its future 3nm process node technology...
2 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/27/2020
Where are my GAA-FETs? TSMC to Stay with FinFET for 3nm
As we passed that 22nm to 16nm barrier, almost all the major semiconductor fabrication companies on the leading edge transitioned from planar transistors to FinFET transistors. The benefits of...
37 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/26/2020
‘Better Yield on 5nm than 7nm’: TSMC Update on Defect Rates for N5
One of the key metrics on how well a semiconductor process is developing is looking at its quantitative chip yield – or rather, its defect density. A manufacturing process...
107 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/25/2020
342 Transistors for Every Person In the World: Cerebras 2nd Gen Wafer Scale Engine Teased
One of the highlights of Hot Chips from 2019 was the startup Cerebras showcasing its product – a large ‘wafer-scale’ AI chip that was literally the size of a...
32 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/18/2020
Intel’s 11th Gen Core Tiger Lake SoC Detailed: SuperFin, Willow Cove and Xe-LP
At the start of the year, Intel ‘foolishly’ handed me a wafer of its next generation Tiger Lake processors, as the moment it came into my hands I attempted...
71 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/13/2020
NUVIA Phoenix Targets +40-50% ST Performance Over Zen 2 for Only 33% the Power
In November 2019, the company NUVIA broke out of stealth mode. Founded by former senior Apple and Google processor architects, John Bruno, Manu Gulati and Gerard Williams III, the...
50 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/11/2020
Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 865+: Breaking the 3GHz Threshold
Today Qualcomm is announcing an update to its extremely successful Snapdragon 865 SoC: the new Snapdragon 865+. The Snapdragon 865 had already seen tremendous success with over 140 different...
88 by Andrei Frumusanu on 7/8/2020
HPC Systems Special Offer: Two A64FX Nodes in a 2U for $40k
It was recently announced that the Fugaku supercomputer, located at Riken in Japan, has scored the #1 position on the TOP500 supercomputer list, as well as #1 positions in...
38 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 6/26/2020
AMD Succeeds in its 25x20 Goal: Renoir Crosses the Line in 2020
One of the stories bubbling away in the background of the industry is the AMD self-imposed ‘25x20’ goal. Starting with performance in 2014, AMD committed to itself, to customers...
83 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 6/25/2020
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
