Intel's Ivy Bridge promises paradigm shift in computing
Intel's Ivy Bridge processors will mark a paradigm shift in computing.
Over the past few years Intel has been progressively reducing the size of the transistors on its microchips. The i5 and i7 processors on your new computer are 32 nanometers wide. To put that in perspective, the width of a human hair is around 60,000 nanometers.
And now Intel is getting threedimensional on this nano turf. The world's largest manufacturer of computer chips recently announced its decision to use three-dimensional silicon etching on its new Ivy Bridge family of processors to replace the traditional planar, or two-dimensional, microprocessors. This new chipset can dramatically change the way we use computers.
Without getting too heavily into geek territory, what is different about these new processors is that the silicon on the chip, which earlier used to be flat, will now be etched into the 'fins'. (The fins are just like those on an aircooled motorcycle engine - only many, many thousand times smaller.).
This makes the new chips much more efficient in terms of power usage. Less power is consumed when the transistors are in use and less power is lost when they are not. And varying the number of fins will drive speed and performance.
Intel claims this new family of processors will consume half the power at the same switching speed but will be 37 per cent faster at the same voltage, particularly the lower voltages required for mobile computing devices. They will be 18 per cent faster on high-end consumer machines and servers.
What does this mean? Well, it shows Intel continues to follow Moore's law - after Gordon Moore, one of Intel's founders, who famously stated way back in 1965 that the number of transistors on a processor would double every two years. But the increasing number of transistors have made computers faster, while the per-unit cost of processing power has gone down dramatically.
The new 3D microprocessor will allow the processors on handheld and portable devices to become even faster. A smartphone today has the processing power of a standard desktop computer of half a decade back. The new Samsung Galaxy S2 and the upcoming iPhone 4S have dualcore processors.
Whether this new technology will help Intel make a mark in the portable devices space remains to be seen, but the technology major is expected to introduce an Atom-class lowcost processor using this technology in 2012. What it means is that technology will become even faster and more pervasive than it is today.
Vinod Dham was the brain behind the Pentium processor. Again, the person behind Intel's drive to make processors ever smaller is another Indian. Kaizad Mistry is an alumnus of the 1984 batch of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. And what about the technology that allows Intel to make the silicon cuts on microprocessers smaller and smaller? There is an Indian behind that as well: Kanti Jain, an alumnus of IIT-Kharagpur, who developed a technology in 1982 that allowed lasers to make smaller and smaller etches on silicon wafers.
And now Intel is getting threedimensional on this nano turf. The world's largest manufacturer of computer chips recently announced its decision to use three-dimensional silicon etching on its new Ivy Bridge family of processors to replace the traditional planar, or two-dimensional, microprocessors. This new chipset can dramatically change the way we use computers.
Without getting too heavily into geek territory, what is different about these new processors is that the silicon on the chip, which earlier used to be flat, will now be etched into the 'fins'. (The fins are just like those on an aircooled motorcycle engine - only many, many thousand times smaller.).
This makes the new chips much more efficient in terms of power usage. Less power is consumed when the transistors are in use and less power is lost when they are not. And varying the number of fins will drive speed and performance.
Intel claims this new family of processors will consume half the power at the same switching speed but will be 37 per cent faster at the same voltage, particularly the lower voltages required for mobile computing devices. They will be 18 per cent faster on high-end consumer machines and servers.
Kushan Mitra
The new 3D microprocessor will allow the processors on handheld and portable devices to become even faster. A smartphone today has the processing power of a standard desktop computer of half a decade back. The new Samsung Galaxy S2 and the upcoming iPhone 4S have dualcore processors.
Whether this new technology will help Intel make a mark in the portable devices space remains to be seen, but the technology major is expected to introduce an Atom-class lowcost processor using this technology in 2012. What it means is that technology will become even faster and more pervasive than it is today.
Vinod Dham was the brain behind the Pentium processor. Again, the person behind Intel's drive to make processors ever smaller is another Indian. Kaizad Mistry is an alumnus of the 1984 batch of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. And what about the technology that allows Intel to make the silicon cuts on microprocessers smaller and smaller? There is an Indian behind that as well: Kanti Jain, an alumnus of IIT-Kharagpur, who developed a technology in 1982 that allowed lasers to make smaller and smaller etches on silicon wafers.
