The end of Moore's law
Posted 26th February 2012 at 05:28 AM by abraxalito
Of late I've been enjoying snacking on this book EDAgraffiti which is a romp through various aspects of the economics of semiconductors. Recommended for those who are interested not just in the technical side of the digital revolution but also the commercial perspective too.
One comment from the book jumped out at me, which was a prediction made by Clayton Christensen a few years ago about the end of Moore's Law. He's reported as saying the following at an engineering conference organised by Cadence. Moore's Law will come to an end when the semiconductor industry tries to deliver more capability than the mainstream requires at a price which is higher than the mainstream wants to pay. 450mm wafer processing technology and EUV lithography pretty much do seem to fit the bill here.
This article on The Inquirer is saying pretty much the same thing - gaming and video transcoding have kept the push for faster PCs alive but even in those applications demand is now flagging.
One comment from the book jumped out at me, which was a prediction made by Clayton Christensen a few years ago about the end of Moore's Law. He's reported as saying the following at an engineering conference organised by Cadence. Moore's Law will come to an end when the semiconductor industry tries to deliver more capability than the mainstream requires at a price which is higher than the mainstream wants to pay. 450mm wafer processing technology and EUV lithography pretty much do seem to fit the bill here.
This article on The Inquirer is saying pretty much the same thing - gaming and video transcoding have kept the push for faster PCs alive but even in those applications demand is now flagging.
Total Comments 3
Comments
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Sure, this is kind of old news though. What's the point of displays that have higher resolution and faster refresh rates than the eye can perceive? none. 50Mbps home internet connections? Unless you have 10 people all streaming HD movies... That's just silly. The good enough wall has been hit.Posted 27th February 2012 at 10:57 PM by revboden
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Supply and demand. Why pay more for anything you don't really want or need?
Rather than 450mm wafers, isn't it much more a matter of feature size (eg lithography)? I don't even know what the SOTA is regarding this; I'm sure they've advanced from the 3.5 micron "standard" used when I was last close to this side of the industry.
This all really suggests to me that someone ought to be looking for a new application. I just hope it's the good guys.Posted 3rd March 2012 at 09:31 AM by sofaspud
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Yep, more than two orders of magnitude progress since the days of 3.5micron - when was that, like 1990 or so? As regards wafer size, I don't know what the economic arguments are. Just I'm doubtful that any fab really needs that size, but the equipment guys do seem to be pushing hard.Posted 3rd March 2012 at 03:40 PM by abraxalito
