Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[bobs10]

know it seems like it just gets more complicated, but it just got somewhat easier about now. They were juggling 90 nm K8's, 130 nm K8's and 130 nm bulk K7's. Now everything is 90nm K8's. I don't know how many dies there are, but it could be as few as 2 (one for dual core and one for single core), or it could be 7 (512K and 1M dual core, 256K, 512K and 1M single core and maybe a couple of Mobile dies (with lower power transistors)).

Me...

Good points. One of the nice things about having a one size fits all product is that you can make changes a lot further down the manufacturing line to get the products you need. I would like to know just how differentiated all the various flavors of k8 really are. Your list is probably pretty close.

I've had some experience with a large manufacturing process and while it didn't have anything to do with silicon I'm sure the problems are similar. These revolve around unexpected problems, deferred maintenance issues and a whole slew of little things you don't expect. Not to mention changing demands from sales. As you get closer to max capacity any buffer you had disappears and small problems quickly develop into big problems. This is where the plant manager can shine. How he handles the inevitable problems can make a big difference. That extra last 5%/10% of manufacturing capacity can make a huge difference in revenue. The more fixed the manufacturing costs, the more the difference.