Re: If Motorola and IBM are so danged far ahead in SOI, where are they for the very chips they say will beat Intel?
You'll have to wait just a little longer - IBM, AMD, and Motorola are all using similar technology and bringing volume production on-line at about the same time:
Intel is 18 months behind (as usual).
IBM Corp. has found a way to bring a niche chip-manufacturing technique to the mainstream and boost performance of its fastest microprocessors by more than 30%.
The Fishkill, N.Y., technology giant has incorporated the technique, known as silicon-on-insulator (SOI), into its main semiconductor production lines, and plans to introduce a 1-GHz PowerPC 750 chip in the first half of next year
ebnews.com
Cracking the 1-GHz barrier comes as a result of incorporating "silicon on insulator" (SOI) technology to the 700-MHz G4 processor described last year, Bearden said. SOI adds an extra layer of insulation that improves how electrons travel around a processor.
With SOI, PC manufacturers can shoot for higher performance or lower power consumption. Bearden, for instance, pointed out that Motorola has demonstrated a 22 percent increase in performance over identical non-SOI chips. Conversely, SOI-enabled processors consume 30 percent less power than non-SOI chips running at the same speed.
"The design will support maximum frequencies above 1 GHz," he said. "The V'Ger and the Apollo have fundamentally the same architecture...The difference is SOI."
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