AMD and IBM have now made a press release where they explain how they will compete with Intel’s new 45nm manufacturing process. Intel has already started to manufacture processor samples with the new process and even if AMD and IBM say that their technology won’t appear until 2008 they hope to have some real technological breakthroughs to make the process extra competitive. The new 45nm process will use immersion litography and ultra-low-K transistors. The latter is a way for AMD and IBM to keep the power consumption at a minimum despite an increased performance.
Immersion litography will according to the companies make it easier to develop 45nm circuits and basically they’ve added distilled water to increase the performance of the circuits and at the same time improve the manufacturing efficiency. AMD claims to have seen improved performance at about 15% with SRAM circuits by using this manufacturing process.
At the International Electron Device Meeting (IEDM) today, IBM (NYSE: IBM) and AMD (NYSE: AMD) presented papers describing the use of immersion lithography, ultra-low-K interconnect dielectrics, and multiple enhanced transistor strain techniques for application to the 45nm microprocessor process generation. AMD and IBM expect the first 45nm products using immersion lithography and ultra-low-K interconnect dielectrics to be available in mid-2008.
