The renowned Cell processor, the heart of Sony’s PlayStation 3 video game console, has at lest one rather big drawback, but not for long. It’ still being processed at the 65nm node. This is something Toshiba aims to change at the beginning of next year when Cell go into mass production at 45nm. With a more efficient manufacturing process Toshiba should be able to lower power consumption and to some degree the heat development with the new chip and this is of course even more important now that more and more of Toshiba’s HDTVs comes with Cell inside.
But it is not just Toshiba’s TVs that will gain from a more power efficient Cell processor. We have no doubt that Sony will release an updated PlayStation 3 when the new processor becomes available in sufficient quantities.
With less power being consumed and less heat being emitted you need less space for cooling hopefully Sony will use this to come up with a slimmer design. Toshiba would also be able to manufacture 1.5 times as many Cell processors per wafer, which obviously gives them better margins.
Neither Sony nor Toshiba have revealed anything official on 45bn Cell, but it should only be a matter of time before Cell comes out wearing its new 45nm suit.
