Tuesday, April 22nd 2014
No 20 nm GPUs from AMD This Year
It's not just NVIDIA, which will lack 20 nm GPUs in its portfolio this year. AMD senior vice-president Lisa Su, responding to a question by Wells Fargo, in its Q1 investors call, confirmed that her company will stay on 28 nm throughout 2014, and it's only later that it will move on to 20 nm, and FinFET after that. "I think what I said earlier sort of what we're doing in terms of technology strategy, we are 28 this year, we have 20-nanometer in design, and then FinFET thereafter. So that's the overall product portfolio," she said.
AMD and NVIDIA manufacture their GPUs on a common foundry, TSMC, which has faced delays in implementing its 20 nanometer silicon fab node transition, forcing both companies to come up with new GPUs on existing 28 nm nodes. A huge leap in performance could be a tough ask for those new GPUs. NVIDIA is expected to tape out its performance-segment GM204 and mid-range GM206 chips, both of which are 28 nm, later this month, and the first GeForce GTX products based on the two are expected to roll out by late-Q4 2014 and early-Q1 2015, respectively.
Source:
Seeking Alpha
AMD and NVIDIA manufacture their GPUs on a common foundry, TSMC, which has faced delays in implementing its 20 nanometer silicon fab node transition, forcing both companies to come up with new GPUs on existing 28 nm nodes. A huge leap in performance could be a tough ask for those new GPUs. NVIDIA is expected to tape out its performance-segment GM204 and mid-range GM206 chips, both of which are 28 nm, later this month, and the first GeForce GTX products based on the two are expected to roll out by late-Q4 2014 and early-Q1 2015, respectively.
42 Comments on No 20 nm GPUs from AMD This Year
They might also spit out something like R9 285X (if they'll need to get rid of HD 7990 remains, LOL), but that's most unlikely.
With Globalfoundries' announcementthat they'll lease Samsung's 14nm finfet process there are interesting times ahead in semiconductor land for sure!
GM204, either a 870 or 880 on a 28nm node.
Now I can wait for 20nm AND DX12 next year. Maxwell will offer a bit better performance and a bit better power usage/heat production (if 750 Ti is anything to go by), but it's easy enough to wait.
Meanwhile, this puts nVidia into a forced tick-tock cadence. nVidia goes to a new architecture on existing fab, then next year moves to a newer fab with existing architecture. In a lot of ways, this plays to nVidia's interests regardless of whether it was forced on them or not.
And you just know that initial 20nm production is being centered on mobile device hardware anyway.
*Never mind*
Answered my own question....
"
Yes, planned for June.
GM204, either a 870 or 880 on a 28nm node."
Sigh.... so both companies are going to release another minor step in performance for 6 months then release the real deal. ....... Sigh again figures!
What they should do is hold off and wait fro the real new Gen.
them.
At lease there is hope in the future - GlobalFoundries recently signed licensing terms with Samsung for the 14nm FinFET and abandoned their in house 14nm.
It's much more economic for both AMD and NVIDIA to wait. This has been known for ages. All the bullshit about 20nm cards (mainly NVIDIA) this year had been completely fabricated, either just idle speculation or made up to promote page views.
Add to the above that NVIDIA simply can't use the low power process (they have to use the high power process) and there's enormous competition for wafers on the 20nm low power process from ARM SoCs, and it makes absolutely no sense for either to use it this year (or perhaps at all).
AMD's next cards will either be TSMC 28nm or GF 28nm (the latter is looking increasingly likely), with the next generation definitely moving to GF on either FD-SOI and / or a smaller process.
NVIDIA's next cards will be 28nm, ones after may well skip 20nm entirely if 14nm isn't hugely delayed.