DailyTech - Intel Announces Fourth 45nm Fab

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Hardware Intel Announces Fourth 45nm Fab
Anh Tuan Huynh (Blog) - February 27, 2007 3:06 PM

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22 comment(s) - last by cheetah2k.. on Feb 28 at 8:46 PM

Intel's Fab 11X

Fab 11X in Rio Rancho, New Mexico will be retooled for upcoming 45nm production

Intel today announced plans to retool its Fab 11X for 45nm production. Fab 11X is located in Rio Rancho, New Mexico and is the fourth factory capable of 45nm production. Intel expects to invest between $1-billion to $1.5-billion into Fab 11X. The retooled factory will begin 45-nm production in 2H’2008, if everything goes as scheduled.

Intel’s upcoming Penryn will be the first processor to take advantage of 45nm manufacturing technologies later this year. The new 45nm manufacturing process includes a new lithography process that uses high-k dielectrics and metal gate transistors to reduce transistor leakage. Intel’s Xeon-family will receive 45nm upgrades later this year as well.

"Our new 45 nanometer process represents one of the most significant manufacturing breakthroughs in decades and we believe that putting it in our factory in New Mexico will help us deliver the best possible products for our customers," said Intel’s president and chief executive officer, Paul Otellini.

Initial 45nm products will begin production at Intel’s D1D fab in Oregon. Intel is also in the process of building two other 45nm production-capable factories in Chandler, Arizona and Kiryat Gat, Israel, which will begin production in 1H’2008.

Intel’s Fab 11X manufactures 90nm Pentium 4-family processors on 300mm wafers. The factory began producing 90nm products in October 2002. Fab 11X is also Intel’s first factory capable of producing 300mm wafers in a fully automated process.

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Brint it on... again.

By AntiV6 on 2/27/2007 4:22:48 PM , Rating: 2

Bring on Penryn! My Northwood is killing me!

RE: Brint it on... again.

By nomagic on 2/27/2007 4:28:29 PM , Rating: 2

My northwood, which was OCed from 2.8 to 3.6, still serves me well today. But I will be upgrading this summer. I am sure I will like the extra power of dual core.

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RE: Brint it on... again.

By gramboh on 2/27/2007 5:08:40 PM , Rating: 2

2.6C Northwood @ 3.2 here for going on 4 years. I think I will upgrade when the Bearlake/DDR3 mainboards are out. ATI should have R600 out by then to drive down 8800 prices and possibly 45nm C2D, if not 60 is fine. Been a long wait hehe.

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RE: Brint it on... again.

By AntiV6 on 2/27/2007 5:35:35 PM , Rating: 2

I have a 2.4Ghz Northwood stuck at 2.557. I can bring it a lot higher with no problems in orthos, but my onboard sound goes out.

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RE: Brint it on... again.

By Mojo the Monkey on 2/27/2007 6:19:09 PM , Rating: 2

If you're waiting for DDR3 mobos/chips, start setting up a camp....

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RE: Brint it on... again.

By Jedi2155 on 2/28/2007 1:58:50 AM , Rating: 2

I had a 2.4B Northwood @ 3.2 GHz for about 3 years up until I finally got my E6600 in december :O. I <3 it. Already OCed it to 3.6. Although i'd wait till the quad core drops to $5xx at the end of the 2nd quarter cuz Surpreme Commander seems to already be taking advantage of Quadcore.

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In other news...

By phaxmohdem on 2/27/2007 3:24:39 PM , Rating: 5

AMD's Hector Ruiz was quoted as saying 'Crap.'

RE: In other news...

By bamacre on 2/27/2007 5:58:41 PM , Rating: 2

LOL!

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RE: In other news...

By dnd728 on 2/27/07, Rating: 0

RE: In other news...

By meatbites on 2/28/2007 3:24:27 AM , Rating: 2

... we're ambidextrous!

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RE: In other news...

By lplatypus on 2/27/2007 6:24:43 PM , Rating: 2

This is not pleasant for AMD, but I doubt it is a surprise. They can't expect Intel to keep churning out parts from a 90nm fab for much longer. Even chipsets are moving to 65nm now.

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Purchasing ATi screwed AMD's die shrinkage plans

By cheetah2k on 2/28/2007 1:40:13 AM , Rating: 2

While this is mere speculation, and in light of various articles floating around about AMD's current position, its my feeling that AMD's buyout of ATi has put AMD in such a financial pot hole, that they are without funding to move to 65nm or even 45nm quickly enough to stall Intels manufacturing moves.

I would say that they (AMD) will be trying to "milk" 90nm for as long as they feasibly can before pressing the accelerator on die shrinkages...

I just hope that AMD can recover with "true" Quad and with Fusion, while incorporating new memory tech recently developed by IBM......

RE: Purchasing ATi screwed AMD's die shrinkage plans

By zsdersw on 2/28/2007 9:06:41 AM , Rating: 3

The acquisition of some sort of GPU design and/or GPU company was necessary for AMD to survive. The future merging of CPUs and GPUs would've eventually left AMD out in the cold if they didn't have access to the IP to make their own CPU-GPU combo.

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RE: Purchasing ATi screwed AMD's die shrinkage plans

By cheetah2k on 2/28/2007 8:46:31 PM , Rating: 2

Yes, but merging 2 companies that base their products on old technology isnt a real good move (in the short term) development wise...

While i didnt specifically say the merge was a bad thing, the financial capital draw-down AMD had to make to buy into ATi would have greatly impacted on the capital expenditure AMD may have planned to use for any future die shrinkages - Re-tooling and development of 65nm & 45nm isnt exactly cheap. Intel's example of re-tooling Fab is estimated at US$1.5B

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That's a lot of capacity...

By JackPack on 2/27/2007 8:24:07 PM , Rating: 2

Four 45nm fabs? Price war! Quad-core Celerons!

RE: That's a lot of capacity...

By Samus on 2/27/2007 8:43:47 PM , Rating: 2

That's what I'm worried about, they're going to drive AMD out of business with their pricing. AMD is already at razer thin margins, so thin their CPU division is barely breaking even.

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RE: That's a lot of capacity...

By TomZ on 2/27/2007 9:41:33 PM , Rating: 2

So what? AMD is in need of a good whooping to get them motivated again. They've released nothing outstading for a couple of years now, all the while Intel is pounding them with great products at low prices.

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90nm in 2002?

By TechLuster on 2/27/2007 5:23:27 PM , Rating: 2

quote:
The factory began producing 90nm products in October 2002.

Intel's first 90nm product (Prescott) didn't ship until the beginning of 2004. Are you sure you don't mean October 2003?

RE: 90nm in 2002?

By KristopherKubicki

(blog) on 2/27/2007 8:02:26 PM , Rating: 2

Fab 11X did a lot of the first test shuttles and initial 90nm research back in October 2002. It was completely bleeding edge for some time.

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another american plant!

By RamarC on 2/27/2007 9:29:18 PM , Rating: 4

i applaud intel for not moving all of its fabs outside of the us. intel demonstrates that an american company can be global and still have a significant american presence.

another american plant!

By RamarC on 2/27/2007 9:29:16 PM , Rating: 2

i applaud intel for not moving all of its fabs outside of the us. intel demonstrates that an american company can be global and still have a significant american presence.