Can Chip Makers Break Moore's Law with 10GHz Processors: MSNBC
MSNBC has a very intriguing story about the quest for 10Ghz. Several chip making pioneers have promising new fabrication techniques on the drawing board (or in prototype.)
A new company (Extreme Ultraviolet) has a new method of making chips called EUV (extreme ultraviolet lithography.) This new method increases the speeds capable on chips exponentially and potentially breaks the chip barrier known as Moores Law (Moore’s Law, formulated by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, states that the number of transistors a chip can hold will double every 18 to 24 months leading to chip speeds doubling in that same time period.) With EUV an image of a circuit is basically printed on a silicon wafer, layer by layer, using a technique called photolithography.
There is also another method on the horizon called E-Beam. This method uses a beam of electrons to etch the chip. Several companies are working on E-beam and a combination of photolithography combined with electron beams has been talked about.
These competing technologies will take a few years to pan out, and it will certainly be sometime before they make it to market. So rather than break Moores law, one, both or a combination may simply uphold it. At any rate, faster processor speeds are on the way for all kinds of devices.
Check the MSNBC story for more details.
Thanks to /. for the lead on this story (yeah, again, I am a /. reader, we often get to stories before they do, and we often repeat stories that they have, they are good stories so they get exposure from multiple places, and I always give the props to the place I first heard about it and the actual source.) Can Intel break Moore's Law with 10GHz Processors: MSNBC
