Intel Corp (INTC)

[SemiconEng]

I think the habit of having only a couple of TDP bins
that all speed grades fall into will be the way of the
future. It is possible that yield lossage from defects
is now less important than yield loss from parametrics
being out of wack. That's why we no longer see a nice
curve fitting power and clock rate in data sheets.


Could be. Maybe defect reduction is "less important", as a result of "lower impact". In my experience, when a new process comes up to High Volume Manufacturing, the focus is all on "Ramp It", "Get It Stable", "Increase The Throughput", and screw the costs..... Then it evolves into, "Get The Costs Down". Defect Reduction use to be one of the biggest knobs I could turn in reducing costs, but in the last few process technologies, I'm seeing less, and less return from those techniques. I don't have data to support that, it's just my feel for things, and I'm not sure why defect reduction doesn't seem to have as big an impact as it use to. Maybe just things getting cleaner overall.....? Interesting......