Intel forced to return to 22nm manufacturing

[LemmingOverlrd]

Why it matters: Intel's first step to mitigate its 14nm supply constraint is starting to take shape and a smart decision has been made, indicating that someone at Intel is actually at the wheel.

Struggling to keep up 14nm wafer supply due to its 10nm train wreck, Intel is taking the first measures to stave off the silicon shortage, it seems. Intel has picked a high-volume silicon part to manufacture on a different process, and is currently in the first stages of shipping out the chipset.

Having undertaken the first step of dialing back volume silicon to the 22nm node, relieving the tight supply on 14nm silicon, the first chipset going "big" is the H310. The decision is quite understandable as the original H310 is the simplest and lowest-end chipset for Intel's 8th (and 9th, we're told) generation Core CPUs, and is used extensively in a high-volume of office and consumer PCs, due to the lower requirements for on-board communications and limited expansibility. It's cheap and cheerful and it's taking up 14nm capacity which Intel cannot afford.

According to sources in China, the first offspring of this decision is dubbed the H310C chipset, depicted below.

H310C (on the left, 22nm) v. H310 (on the right, 14nm). The sizing differences are clear.

The H310C chipset carries sSpec SRCXT and reportedly measures 10mm x 7mm, while the 14nm H310 (sSpec SRCXY) measures just 8.5mm x 6.5mm. The original H310 design was rated for 6W TDP, but this is not expected to change much, or impact OEM designs at any stage. In fact, it might bring more options to system manufacturers as, in an unlikely side-effect of the current state of driver development, this also means Intel is bringing back support for Windows 7 on H310C.

While consumers and businesses will be oblivious to the new chipset, it will have a dramatic effect overall for Intel, we believe. At the end of it, we're happy to hear Intel isn't completely zoned out of the manufacturing side and someone there knows what they're doing. Hopefully this will bring about slightly lower Intel CPU prices as supply meets demand.

Maybe Intel will also bring back Mark Bohr's videos.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/76536-intel-forced-return-22nm-manufacturing.html

 

[misor]

Bring back 22nm manufacturing process? no big deal if actual retail product prices are cheaper than the competition.

I personally believe that the 'shortage' is artificial and is meant to drive prices up or at a target price range.

 

[mbrowne5061]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

 

[gigantor21]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

Seriously.

If they "knew what they were doing" they would've been on 10nm a while ago without issue.

 

[ForgottenLegion]

Come on AMD. This is a great opportunity to steal some marketshare.

 

[seeprime]

Bring back 22nm manufacturing process? no big deal if actual retail product prices are cheaper than the competition.

I personally believe that the 'shortage' is artificial and is meant to drive prices up or at a target price range.

In one respect you're right. The shortage appears artificial, but only because Intel failed to successfully move to 7 or 10nm in the expected time frames, along with the chaos their faulty (Specter - already at 14 variants) chip design has brought on. They have to plan and then have a long wait as the plan changes for whatever reason. The time it takes to process a batch of wafers at 14nm is about 60 days. It's less for larger traces. Here's some information: https://semiengineering.com/battling-fab-cycle-times/

 

[ShObiT]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

Exactly... Like if AMD did this, it would look like, "AMD its Doomed, going backward 5 years to keep up"!

 

[noel24]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

I think this article might show signs of sarcastic undertone lingering here and there, which some failed to notice...

 

[bandit8623]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

I think this article might show signs of sarcastic undertone lingering here and there, which some failed to notice...

the way it was written I failed to notice too.

 

[skipmichael]

Chip sets from China.... seems like a nice place for tariffs.

Hit them once here and they will squirm and buckel.

 

[misor]

In one respect you're right. The shortage appears artificial, but only because Intel failed to successfully move to 7 or 10nm in the expected time frames, along with the chaos their faulty (Specter - already at 14 variants) chip design has brought on. They have to plan and then have a long wait as the plan changes for whatever reason. The time it takes to process a batch of wafers at 14nm is about 60 days. It's less for larger traces. Here's some information: https://semiengineering.com/battling-fab-cycle-times/

the 'shortage' really does not make sense. newegg even offers intel cpus + free pubg combo sale.

 

[LemmingOverlrd]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm
>"We here at TechSpot think this is wonderful and proves Intel knows what they are doing, especially with manufacturing"

wut?

I think this article might show signs of sarcastic undertone lingering here and there, which some failed to notice...

the way it was written I failed to notice too.

Except... it wasn't ever written like that. The sentence (I believe) that is being misquoted is "At the end of it, we're happy to hear Intel isn't completely zoned out of the manufacturing side and someone there knows what they're doing".

It doesn't - ever - make up for the fact they messed up 10nm. But it tells us that smart business decisions are (finally?) being made, and that Intel is getting its house in order. If someone reads this as a bad thing... I don't know.

 

[Footlong]

Come on AMD. This is a great opportunity to steal some marketshare.

AMD can't produce very cheap yet. They can produce cheap parts, but not very cheap. AMD is a much smaller company and this shows in the segments it can operate. AMD right now needs to make a GPU, since Nvidia has the previous gen and the next gen on PC by a landslide.
PS: yes I'm aware AMD has the console ecosystem. Both Sony and Microsoft are set to use AMD CPU+GPU on their next system, but profit margins on consoles are much tighter than on PC.

 

[Dimitrios]

>Intel messes up 10nm, can't keep up at 14nm, and so is forced to bring back 22nm

Exactly... Like if AMD did this, it would look like, "AMD its Doomed, going backward 5 years to keep up"!

Most truest comment on this subject. You win the comment section of TECHSPOT and I have been a lurker on this site reading about Tech News for a very loooooooooooooooooooooooooong time.

 

[mbrowne5061]

Chip sets from China.... seems like a nice place for tariffs.

Hit them once here and they will squirm and buckel.

Those are our chipsets. We would be tariffing ourselves... which I wouldn't put past this administration to accidentally do. Also, both TSMC and GlobalFoundries build their tech in Taiwan and Singapore, not China - specifically because we don't want China getting access to those chips.

 

[mbrowne5061]

Except... it wasn't ever written like that. The sentence (I believe) that is being misquoted is "At the end of it, we're happy to hear Intel isn't completely zoned out of the manufacturing side and someone there knows what they're doing".

It doesn't - ever - make up for the fact they messed up 10nm. But it tells us that smart business decisions are (finally?) being made, and that Intel is getting its house in order. If someone reads this as a bad thing... I don't know.

Short-term business plan wise, sure. It keeps them from completely floundering. Long term, it is a terrible sign.

Intel doesn't get credit for not messing things up any worse than they already have by dusting off an established process. Its like saying "well, the crashed the car into the jersey barrier and rear-ended the one in front of them, but at least they didn't deliberately aim for the tractor-trailer and are at least attempting to turn away from it before impact".

 

[Danny101]

This will likely be a trend. Surprised it hadn't happen sooner. Smaller nm is about speed and heat. For slower chips, it's not critical. Leading edge and mobile chips will need the smaller nm's.

 

[thews86]

If AMD's next chips are on 7nm as rumored, they could make an impact on the laptop/mobile market as well. Glad to see the monopoly fall!

 

[cliffordcooley]

Glad to see the monopoly fall!

That has yet to be seen. Only time will tell. Even then I doubt it will come to pass.

And technically there never was a monopoly. That would indicate there has been only one seller.

 

[pcnthuziast]

And yet AMD is still clearly and solidified #2.

 

[Jimster480]

Bring back 22nm manufacturing process? no big deal if actual retail product prices are cheaper than the competition.

I personally believe that the 'shortage' is artificial and is meant to drive prices up or at a target price range.

In one respect you're right. The shortage appears artificial, but only because Intel failed to successfully move to 7 or 10nm in the expected time frames, along with the chaos their faulty (Specter - already at 14 variants) chip design has brought on. They have to plan and then have a long wait as the plan changes for whatever reason. The time it takes to process a batch of wafers at 14nm is about 60 days. It's less for larger traces. Here's some information: https://semiengineering.com/battling-fab-cycle-times/

Especially when the demand for their CPU's now is much lower than it was before considering how Ryzen is raining all over their parade for 1.5 years now!

 

[Jimster480]

Come on AMD. This is a great opportunity to steal some marketshare.

AMD can't produce very cheap yet. They can produce cheap parts, but not very cheap. AMD is a much smaller company and this shows in the segments it can operate. AMD right now needs to make a GPU, since Nvidia has the previous gen and the next gen on PC by a landslide.
PS: yes I'm aware AMD has the console ecosystem. Both Sony and Microsoft are set to use AMD CPU+GPU on their next system, but profit margins on consoles are much tighter than on PC.

Vega is actually very competitive, especially at the current market prices.
It is possible to tune a Vega56 to have Vega64+ levels of performance....
Which means 1080 OC performance for $400 or less.

 

[cliffordcooley]

considering how Ryzen is raining all over their parade for 1.5 years now!

You mean the same raining parade AMD has been standing in for 10+ years. And they are still not out from under the weather yet. It's a bit early to be having that party just yet.

 

[Jimster480]

You mean the same raining parade AMD has been standing in for 10+ years. And they are still not out from under the weather yet. It's a bit early to be having that party just yet.

10+ years?????
FX came out in 2012, its 2018.

That was literally 6 years.
Before that AMD was totally competitive with Intel.

 

[Danny101]

AMD has always been competitive. Just not in performance. I use AMD for cost reasons, not performance. And so Intel wouldn't be a monopoly. If it was the reverse, I would use Intel.