ATi recently released a pressrelease where it said that TSMC had started to massproduce ATi’s new 90nm graphic circuits, R520, RV530 and RV515. It took the oppurtunity to shower TSMC with praise and its manufacturing of the circuits. Now it seems all is not as well as it may seem. According to DigiTimes ATi has contacted TSMC’s competitor UMC (United Microelectronics Corporation). The order will carry the circuits R521, RV531 and RV516, which is equivalents to the ones made by TSMC. The reason that UMC got this order was that TSMC has a too low yield rate, which means that too few of the manufactured circuits can be used to make graphic cards. What seperates these circuits from the ones made by TSMC is uncertain.
Source: DigiTimes
