In November and December I upgraded three devices and share my opinions on the utility of each:
- Samsung Galaxy Note (aka Phablet = Phone + Tablet)
- Kindle Paperwhite (e-reader)
- Google Nexus 7 (Tablet)
Phablet, e-reader, Nexus
TSMC’s AI Design Kit: Bringing Agentic AI Into Chip DesignTSMC is introducing an AI Design Kit, or…Read More
OpenAI and Synopsys Announce GPT-Synopsys: Why AI-Powered Chip Design MattersWow, OpenAI and Synopsys just announced a multiyear…Read More
Why the energy sector must plan for post-quantum cyber security nowIn a September 2026 World Economic Forum article,…Read More
TSMC OIP Ecosystem Forum 2026: Broadcom’s View of ASICs and EcosystemsI spent a significant part of my career…Read More
The Pivotal Moments That Gave Rise to Silicon ValleyThe little-known decisions and breakthroughs—and the remarkable role…Read More
Cadence 3D Methodology
A couple of weeks ago was the 3D Architectures for Semiconductor Integration and Packagingconference in Redwood City. Cadence presented the changes that they have been making to their tool flow to enabled 2.5D (interposer-based) and true 3D TSV-based designs. You know what TSV stands for by now right? Through-silicon-via, … Read More
Intel 22nm SoC Process Exposed!
The biggest surprise embedded in the Intel 22nm SoC disclosure is that they still do NOT use Double Patterning which is a big fat hairy deal if you are serious about the SoC foundry business. The other NOT so surprising thing I noticed in reviewing the blogosphere response is that the industry term FinFET was dominant while the Intel… Read More
Equipment Down 16% in 2012, Flat to Down in 2013
Shipments of semiconductor manufacturing equipment have been trending downward since June 2012, based on combined data from SEMI for North American and European manufacturers and from SEAJ for Japanese manufacturers. The market bounced back strongly in late 2009 and in 2010 after the 2008 downturn to return to the $3 billion… Read More
Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!
I have no idea if chicken was actually on the menu, but on December 12, Calibre RealTime picked up its thirdindustry award, this time the 2012 Elektra Award for Design Tools and Development Software from the European Electronics Industry. Calibre RealTime came out on top in a group full of prestigious finalists, including ByteSnap,… Read More
Apply within: four embedded instrumentation approaches
Anyone who has been around technology consortia or standards bodies will tell you that the timeline from inception to mainstream adoption of a new embedded technology is about 5 years, give or take a couple dream cycles. You can always tell the early stage, where very different concepts try to latch on to the same, simple term.
Such… Read More
Formal Verification at ARM
There are two primary microprocessor companies in the world these days: Intel and ARM. Of course there are many others but Intel is dominant on the PC desktop (including Macs) and ARM is dominant in mobile (including tablets).
One of the keynotes at last month’s Jasper User Group (JUG, not the greatest of acronyms) was by Bob… Read More
IP Scoring Using TSMC DFM Kits
Design For Manufacturing (DFM) is the art and science of making an IC design yield better in order to receive a higher ROI. Ian Smith, an AE from Mentor in the Calibre group presented a pertinent webinar, IP Scoring Using TSMC DFM Kits. I’ll provide an overview of what I learned at this webinar.… Read More
Intel’s New Tablet Strategy Brings Ivy Bridge to the Forefront
In an article published this week in microprocessor report and highlighted in Barron’s, Linley Gwennap makes the argument that Intel should stay the course and fix the PC instead of trying to offset its declines with sales into the Smartphone and Tablet space. He cites that lower PC sales growth was due to a dramatic slowdown in processor… Read More
Cortex-A9 speed limits and PPA optimization
We know by now that clock speeds aren’t everything when it comes to measuring the goodness of a processor. Performance has direct ties to pipeline and interconnect details, power factors into considerations of usability, and the unspoken terms of yield drive cost.
My curiosity kicked in when I looked at the recent press release… Read More
Intel Foundry: AI performance now depends on the whole system