AMD’s 65nm processors aren’t capable of running too fast yet. They aren’t the only ones with a problem.
TGDaily reports that plans to shift the XBox360 from 90nm to 65nm SOI chips have been pushed back at least a quarter.
Perhaps not coincidentally, this is around the time AMD plans on having its second-generation K8L chips.
It’s hard not to notice that every generation of SOI chip has had considerable delays due to a single problem. The problem hasn’t been getting them to work; they always have consumed less power than Intel chips at low to medium speed. The recurrent problem has been getting them to work at high speeds.
True, Intel didn’t go to SOI thinking it could finesse the solution, and proceded to eventually run the PIV into the ground, but now they’ve seemed to have gotten their power problems under control without SOI, plus can get their products out the door.
You have to start wondering whether or not SOI is a technology whose time has come . . . and gone. Really, now that Intel has its act together on leaky transistors, these delays are not going to be acceptable, and its going to start hurting both companies.
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