Dan, Re: "Intel unveiled its SOI process with a lot of confidence that it knew something the other guys didn't, and they clearly thought they were faster than anyone else - otherwise, why set themselves up the black eye they received days after they did all their bragging?"
I think you are confusing Intel's 15nm transistors with their recently announced Terahertz transistor. These are two entirely different things. The former is just a technology demo to show that it's possible to push Moore's Law out to the end of the decade. Since both Intel and AMD are on the same EUV Consortium, I assume they both have enough access to the machinery required to do this. However, since the intercept point for this technology isn't until 2009, it hardly makes a difference. In 7 years, both Intel and AMD will have vastly improved on their 15nm transistor designs.
Intel's Terahertz Transistor, on the other hand, is a technology scheduled for the 65nm process node (with 30nm transistor gates) to be launched in 2005. And this isn't some pie-in-the-sky technology demo, either. It's something tangible that proves that Intel can overcome some of the obstacles inherent at that technology level. So far, AMD has offered nothing comparable. While you can always make *one* 15nm transistor, it's far more of a technology feat at this point to make a billion 30nm transistors, and solve a lot of the issues that go along with it. With no plan for fully depleted SOI, AMD has not shown how they will reach this level of technology. Of course, they also have 3 more years to work on it, but the fact is that Intel is already far ahead.
You're probably going to have to find another reason to prove that AMD is going to take over the world, because process technology is not going to be it, Dan.
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