Make your own custom ICs for very cheap !

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Amazing !
I just found out that you can order your own design ICs at very low prices (relatively speaking) !
Here is the link:

http://www.europractice-ic.com/docs/MPW2011-general-v7.pdf

The cheapest is EUR 360/mm^2 with a minimum of 5mm^2.

So for EUR 1800 you can have 30 ICs of your own design ! Packaging, testing and shipping is extra.

The process is 0.7um. So I'm wondering if you can do interesting stuff with that process.
What kind of op amp can you make with such a process ? For example what the slew-rate or gain bandwidth can you achieve ?
 
You're right the cheapest one is rated at 5V.

On the same list there are also 0.7um processes with quite high voltages:
-0.7um 30V for EUR 440-500/mm^2, so min. price is: EUR 3520-4000
-0.7um 100V for EUR 550-600/mm^2 so min. price is: EUR 5500-6000

They are more expensive, but 30V should be enough for an interesting audio circuit like op. amp., preamp., head phone amp. etc..
 
Undoubtly , good frequency caracteristic is inherent to such small
nodes, but the price is a total rip off as even high performance
X86 processors waffers cost is less than 0.4 eur/mm2 , although the
mask cost is substancial with low volumes.

Also , you should have the relevant tool for designing the layout,
and such softs are not exactly what would be called affordable..
 
For this kind of service, there's also MOSIS. Last I looked, their scalable CMOS process was 1.6 um, 2P/2M.

For audio circuits - or most other low- to medium-speed op-amps - the feature size isn't the limiting factor. Most devices are drawn at 2x or 4x minimum for matching or noise reasons. But as others point out, the thin gate oxides limit you to low voltages. Also note that the high-voltage modules may be extended drain devices, hence, only the Vds supports 30 V, but Vgs is limited to, say, 3.3 or 5.0 V.

Most importantly, though, I'd look at the design kits that are offered. If I'm to blow $2k on a fab run, I want reasonable confidence that the chips will work when they come back from the fab. The simulation models better be reasonably accurate for that...

In my professional life I've designed CMOS op-amps in a process similar to what you describe - though with many more metals than two... They've shown good performance with 80~100 dB of loop gain, good current drive, stability into capacitive loads, etc. As I recall, the area was around 300x400 um. So you can fit a good handful of circuitry on a 5 mm^2 chip.

~Tom
 
In my professional life I've designed CMOS op-amps in a process similar to what you describe - though with many more metals than two... They've shown good performance with 80~100 dB of loop gain, good current drive, stability into capacitive loads, etc. As I recall, the area was around 300x400 um. So you can fit a good handful of circuitry on a 5 mm^2 chip.

~Tom

Interesting ! What process and what software did you use ?
 
Also , you should have the relevant tool for designing the layout,
and such softs are not exactly what would be called affordable..

For an audio circuit with ~ 50 transistors or less one can probably use an open source software (like Electric, etc.).
Of course, if you want to design a mixed signal circuit with >100k gates you have to get a much more expensive commercial software.
 
DIY semiconductors ?

Any know how possible it is to make transistors at home (along the lines of the 1949 Shockley, Bardeen, Brattain invention, or better) ?

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For this kind of service, there's also MOSIS.

MOSIS also has some higher priced runs through major fabs. They do a "pizza mask" service. They collect everyones designs create a reticle with one copy of each design, then step and repeat it to fill a wafer. Still far outside the budget of most DIYers.

There is another alternative in the US. Many colleges that have electronic or computer engineering curriculums get grant money from the NSF to fab student chips through MOSIS at no cost to the school. I got two different chips fabbed through Florida Atlantic University for only the cost of tuition for the class, which my employer paid for. I even collected a Masters degree in the process. This was about 14 years ago and the technology was 1.2 micron CMOS. The package was a 40 pin ceramic DIP. I made some CMOS opamps and simple CMOS logic with a GBW of about 2 MHz.

At the time we had either L-edit (Windows) or MAGIC (Unix, Linux, or OS2) for layout / parametric extraction and H-spice for simulation. I used MAGIC on OS2 Warp and H-spice on Unix. The finished chips and the simulations correlated quite well.
 
MOSIS also has some higher priced runs through major fabs. They do a "pizza mask" service. They collect everyones designs create a reticle with one copy of each design, then step and repeat it to fill a wafer.

I think the EU company I mentioned also uses multi project wafers.

At the time we had either L-edit (Windows) or MAGIC (Unix, Linux, or OS2) for layout / parametric extraction and H-spice for simulation. I used MAGIC on OS2 Warp and H-spice on Unix. The finished chips and the simulations correlated quite well.

I see that Magic is free, as is Electric and Alliance. Do you know which one is the best ?

Still far outside the budget of most DIYers.

I don't know about the MOSIS prices but the EU company has relatively low prices for an IC prototype. It doesn't mean that it is low enough for the audio DIY-ers to abandon building F5 amps and start fabricating their own ICs but it's starting to creep into the realm of possible.
Some DIY-ers spend a few thousands for a class A amp or a tube amp, etc.. For the same money they could be making their own ICs.

Let us know if you have some advice to give for such an enterprise.
 
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