14 DAY TRIAL // Even now, end-users likely remember the availability problem that affected AMD and NVDIA GPUs based on the 40nm process last year, some may even fear something similar could happen with next chip nodes, but NVIDIA came out to offer the assurance that it studied the 28nm node much more closely.
Advanced Micro Devices and NVIDIA may have each developed their respective 40nm-based GPUs and cards last year, but this didn't exactly avail them.
The simple fact is that TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) had serious yield issues with the 40nm process.
This, in turn, caused a fairly severe shortage of both NVIDIA GeForce and AMD Radeon adapters for months.
Needless to say, after such an episode, some may fear that the next node will be similarly affected.
Aiming to dispel whatever fears of this sort may exist, NVIDIA has stepped forward to say it is as ready as it will ever be to dive into the 28 nm current, having spent more time studying the process technology and its potential issues.
“[Our experience with 28nm] is looking really good, it is looking much better than our experience with 40nm,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, chief executive officer of Nvidia.
“It is just a comprehensive, across-the-board engagement between TSMC and ourselves making sure that we are ready for production ramp when the time comes. So I feel really good about 28nm.”
When making the Fermi, the chips were invented without NVIDIA first learning about what problems the manufacturing process would run into. This is, NVIDIA claims, not the case with the upcoming Kepler and Maxwell (the planned successor).
"We are far better prepared for 28nm than we were for 40nm. Because we took it so much more seriously,” said the CEO.
“We were successful on so many different nodes for so long that we all collectively, as an industry, forgot how hard it is. So, one of the things that we did this time around was to set up an entire organization that is dedicated to advanced nodes. We have had many, many tests chips run on 28nm, we have working silicon.”