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Intel Foundries Able to Produce ARM-Based Chips Under New Licensing Deal
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You're being so inconsiderate of people who live in cold climates!
[doublepost=1471417942][/doublepost]Folks are always throwing around, "Apple should just buy XYZ" ideas (my favorite was always the one that they could buy the entire NFL - for no particular purpose, but it'd be funny)... it'd never actually transpire, but imagine what would/could happen if Apple outright bought Intel: suddenly they'd own some of the very best fabs and could put them to work making A-series processors on smaller processes, they could prioritize exactly the types of CPUs they needed for laptops and desktops without having to wait on a roadmap that suits Intel's needs/whims, I'm guessing Intel has a treasure-trove of patents they could use license-free for bits for the A-series chips, and they could put some of their in-house chip engineers into Intel's design labs to add bits that Apple found especially useful into Mac-specific x86 chips. If they wanted to be mean, they could cut off, or severely curtail, the supply of CPUs to other computer makers (depending on what long-term contracts others have in place with Intel), but again, that'd be cruel, and would likely raise the ire of the FTC. But at least they wouldn't have to wait their turn near the back of the line for the specific CPU variations they wanted to order.
Because it allows ARM to control the descendants of the instruction set, ensures quality of their brand and product, offset costs to producers, and most importantly: allows them to profit massively from the success of others using their existing IP. Take your pick, there are many more reasons.
Lol Apple does not get to write their own little magic book that allows them to supersede the fact that it's not their technology because they're a "tough negotiator". ARM can do whatever they want to profit off their work and Apples investments into the A series would not be possible without ARMs IP which is in ever single iPhone. It's how ARM and the entire market operates: Apple can choose anyone, anyone who is a part of the foundry program.
Quoting this entire thing. Thanks for getting this.
I've been in this industry for awhile now.
Years ago it may have been a huge boon. There was huge disparity in the lithography process of Intel vs everyone else. 45nm vs 22nm or whatever it was a few yeasr ago.
But not so anymore. I don't follow this segment much anymore, but a quick google search shows Intel's latest and greatest 6th gen processors are on 14nm technology, but very simliarly is Apple's A9 using Samsung's 14nm.
And there is probably some difference between the two different 14nm processes... and while technologically/scientifically significant. At the end user level, I feel like it's probably splitting hairs.
So this is a whole lot of ... meh to me. Too late. The mobile movement by Android/iOS gave urgency and funding and motivation for so many other fabs to catch up, keep up, and close the gap.
Is Intel running scared? They need some of this mobile cash flow they've been missing out on...?
Seems like a conflict of interest. Doesn't Intel have chips that are, at least theoretically, in competition to the ARM processors?
ARM is the architecture that both Qualcomm and Apple use. Think of it like x86.
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Where? They just killed their mobile atoms. Core M give off too much heat to be in tablets, let alone phones.
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I want to say a roadmap once said they were shooting for as small as 7nm before they hit a wall on that.
Isn't that equally so with the GPU? It could be used for dedicated 4K playback in laptops.
I remember when years ago when it was "common knowledge" that the circuit paths couldn't possibly get any smaller, because they were hitting the limits of physics. But the nanometer counts in question then were an order of magnitude higher than now. And the whole cycle had also repeated already. They found ways around the foreseen limits several times already, I suspect they may do it again.
I don't think you realise what each foundry names their process is not really a good indication of performance. Intel's 14nm process is far superior to Samsungs or TSMC's 14/16nm processes.
Yup, this is good. Intel keeps raising the revenue it needs to stay ahead of the foundry game, consumers get better chips in their phones + more competition in the marketplace. Now all we need is for AMD to smash it with Zen and the world of silicon and chips will be back to something exciting and competitive.