Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

TSMC Paves Way for 5nm A14 Chip in 2020 iPhones

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
68,606
39,474



Paving the way for a 5nm-sized A14 chip in 2020 iPhones, TSMC has announced the release of its complete 5nm chip design infrastructure.

a12bionicchip-800x563.jpg

TSMC's continued packaging advancements coupled with Apple's industry-leading mobile chip designs is beneficial for the performance, battery life, and thermal management of future iPhones. That will continue with the 5nm process:
Compared with TSMC's 7nm process, its innovative scaling features deliver 1.8X logic density and 15% speed gain on an ARM® Cortex®-A72 core, along with superior SRAM and analog area reduction enabled by the process architecture. The 5nm process enjoys the benefits of process simplification provided by EUV lithography, and is making excellent progress in yield learning, achieving the best technology maturity at the same corresponding stage as compared to TSMC's previous nodes.
Click to expand...
TSMC's 5nm process is already in preliminary risk production and the chipmaker plans to invest $25 billion towards volume production by 2020.

TSMC has been Apple's exclusive supplier of A-series chips since 2016, fulfilling all orders for the A10 Fusion chip in the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, the A11 Bionic chip in the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone X, and the A12 Bionic chip in the latest iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR.

TSMC's packaging offerings are widely considered to be superior to that of other chipmakers, including Samsung and Intel, so it's not surprising that its exclusivity is poised to continue with A13 chips in 2019 and A14 chips in 2020.

TSMC has been gradually shrinking the size of its dies over the years as it continues to refine its manufacturing process: the A10 Fusion is 16nm, the A11 Bionic is 10nm, and the A12 Bionic is 7nm. A13 chips will likely be 7nm+, benefitting from the process simplification of EUV lithography.

Article Link: TSMC Paves Way for 5nm A14 Chip in 2020 iPhones
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2019/04/08/tsmc-5nm-chip-infrastructure-2020-iphones/
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: AlexH
Exciting, looking forward to see what Apple can do with this. Hopefully they've already started working on a way to go below this, as many consider 5nm the floor for traditional silicon chips...
 
  • Like
Reactions: nekonokami
Falhófnir said:
Exciting, looking forward to see what Apple can do with this. Hopefully they've already started working on a way to go below this, as many consider 5nm the floor for traditional silicon chips...
Click to expand...

It is considered the floor because it is pretty much impossible to make smaller transistors. Quantum computing will be next but that's still years away.
 
  • Like
Reactions: mentaluproar and orbital~debris
Falhófnir said:
Exciting, looking forward to see what Apple can do with this. Hopefully they've already started working on a way to go below this, as many consider 5nm the floor for traditional silicon chips...
Click to expand...
Its good then that the 5nm and 7nm is just pure marketing that does not correspond to any actual structure size (keep in mind that Intel 10nm is higher transistor density than TSMC 7nm), also, the floor is closer to 2nm (with ångström precision on the fin structure) and that is for CPP, TSMC 7nm has a CPP of 40nm, their 5nm process maybe will get down to 35nm, so its a long long long way down to 2nm CPP.
 
  • Like
Reactions: theorist9, Yakibomb, calzon65 and 2 others
mozumder said:
If there's an ARM Mac, this is where the process will start.

Also, expect per-core Geekbench in the 7000 range... a true beast.
Click to expand...

Apple is paving the way with MacOS to support iOS apps. Clearly, there is some merger ahead. Hopefully Apple will keep them separate enough, but, I'd expect a scaled up version of their mobile chip to obliterate Intel. The performance per watt of Apple's A series chips is off the charts.
[doublepost=1554740109][/doublepost]
MoreRumors? said:
Oh, so nice and cute it got smaller.... now get going with the modem!!
Click to expand...

Really! And, can't this be incorporated in the processor?
 
Bboble said:
Apple is paving the way with MacOS to support iOS apps. Clearly, there is some merger ahead. Hopefully Apple will keep them separate enough, but, I'd expect a scaled up version of their mobile chip to obliterate Intel. The performance per watt of Apple's A series chips is off the charts.
[doublepost=1554740109][/doublepost]

Really! And, can't this be incorporated in the processor?
Click to expand...
I was thinking we would get a hybrid with both intel and arm chips -- anything iOS related push to the arm....but marzipan pretty much negates this idea...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back