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Forums - Sony Discussion - PS3 Graphics Chip Goes 65nm in Fall

SamuelRSmith said:
@tombi - This is a question I've always asked, how much does shrinking component size save? And is it worth doing it so often when there is so much R&D involved in doing so.

 

typically cuts a large chunk of production costs and materials for wafers due to the fact like NJ5 said that they can fit more onto a wafer so less wafers are needed.

Also making the parts smaller allows for a smaller motherboard, power supply, and cooling system. Basically they could cut at least $40 - $70 off the cost of the console with this shift to a smaller dye.



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SamuelRSmith said:
@tombi - This is a question I've always asked, how much does shrinking component size save? And is it worth doing it so often when there is so much R&D involved in doing so.

i m no expert in it.. but wot little knowledge i gathered during my studies is that there r two types of shrinking... first is in which you redesign the floorplan or layout of the chip and then shrink.. the advantage is that u can shrink more or u can decrease the power and heat more or u can increase speed more depending upon quality attribute you focussed when you redesign of the floor plan of the chip...

 

Other is simple and straightforward shrinking in which you donot do any of these customized...  keep the same floorplan and layout of the componend and just make them smaller.. only thing u have to do in this is to retest and revalidate and unless nothing unexpected is discovered you can have a shrinking for very cheap ....

 

As sony does not need to increase speed or reduce extra power or heat from the chip to fit them in blade servers i think they will be following the second type of shrinking and the cost of doing it will be recovered a lot quickly then one can imagine..

 



Not really going to help the PS3 in gaining sales as the 360 is also rumored to be switching to 65nm chips. Plus by changing the chips this might actually make SONY not lose money and they still wont be making any so no price cut in the near future. While MS probably can.



Cremator said:
Not really going to help the PS3 in gaining sales as the 360 is also rumored to be switching to 65nm chips. Plus by changing the chips this might actually make SONY not lose money and they still wont be making any so no price cut in the near future. While MS probably can.

 

 1. Was this suppose to help?

2. Whats the key word there?

3. so now your a Sony CEO?

4. and a MS on too...



It usually also means they have to put a less large power supply in there, which may save a few bucks. Cooling may be less complex too. Hell, we may even see a slim PS3 this year if Sony is feeling really saucy.



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Slim PS3 FTW



90nm to 65nm shrink is a quit big shrink. nvidia managed to get the 8800 chip from 484 to 334 mm2 down with the 90 to 65 nm shrink. so if they manage to get the same gain of roughly a third they will get out more than 30% more chiips from each wafer.
when you add that the shrinked chips probably will have a higher yield of chips running at the needed clockspeed too you might end up with 40-50% higher output of usuable chips per manufactoring process.

but to see how much money that actually saves we would need to know how much a rsx in 90nm costs atm.

also as said before they also might be able to save on mainbord size, colling and such things too.
so every chip shrink is a big step in the profitability of a console, thats why companies try to get them done as soon as possible.

but with nvidia being a fabless copmany they have to rely on companies with fabs for hire (like tsmc http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSMC) to have the 65nm process up and running and the required quantities available.



also, aren't these chips made with semi precious metals? so if they are able to make a smaller chip they use less of these expensive metals and that would save a lot of money when you are dealing with the millions of chips that are made.



Does that mean the 45nm cell will include as soon as the RSX reduces to 65nm? Hopefully a slim version.



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Noobie said:
good news.. so we might have a price drop before 2008 holiday season

Yeah slimmer version gonna look cool, have you seen prototype pictures of it? looks nice, thats what i like about sony, they remake their current gen consoles