Report: Apple To Switch From Samsung to TSMC For ARM CPU Production 178
another random user writes "Apple is planning to shift production of its ARM-based microprocessors from Samsung to the Taiwanese chip-baking giant TSMC as early as next year, according to a report by the China Economic News Service (CENS). The report cites CitiGroup Global Markets analyst J.T. Hsu as saying that TSMC will be Apple's sole supplier of 20nm quad-core processors, with volume production to begin in the fourth quarter of 2013. He also noted that Apple began its 20nm chip-verfication process at TSMC in August of this year. Hsu told CENS that the future quad-core chips were intended for Apple's 'iPad, iTV and even Macbook,' turning up the heat on two rumors that have been simmering for months: that Apple is planning a move into the television market, and that an ARM-based MacBook is in the works."
Or they'll go Intel: Haswell processors from 10W (Score:4, Informative)
According to Anandtech, Intel Core 2013 ULV processors will start from 10W
See http://www.anandtech.com/show/6355/intels-haswell-architecture/4 [anandtech.com]
" Finally, at IDF Intel showed a demo of Haswell running the Unigen Heaven benchmark at under 8W.
The chain of events tells us two things: 1) Intel likes to play its cards close to its chest, and 2) the sub-10W space won't be serviced by Atom exclusively.
Intel said Haswell can scale below 10W, but it didn't provide a lower bound. It's too much to assume Haswell would go into a phone, but once you get to the 8W point and look south you open yourself up to fitting into things the size of a third generation iPad. Move to 14nm, 10nm and beyond then it becomes more feasible that you could fit this class of architecture into something even more portable."
Re:A lesson learned (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Cheaper Alternatives (Score:5, Informative)
Don't hold your breath.. The TV business already has thin margins, and the display manufacturers partly make it up on smaller screens.
Re:Well if they want ... (Score:5, Informative)
"Competing" or even running at a loss for a while, trying to break into a market, isn't "attacking", What Apple is doing, meanwhile, IS attacking.
And you're wrong about Android. Google is making plenty of money, and NOT from advertising. While Android proper is free, anybody who wants-in on Google's Apps (Gmail, maps, navigation, etc) and the Market / Play Store, has to get a license from Google. They're making good money from it.
What's more, Google has no reason to use patents to attack Apple or Microsoft. Google doesn't have any lock-in on Android that would make that profitable from an advertising perspective. Anybody (see: Amazon) can change out the Google apps, and not use Google search... Some handset makers change everything to Bing, because the Microsoft money is better (though their service is unreliable), and I personally changed my Android phone to use DDG. Meanwhile, Google *does* have ample reason to aquire patents for defensive purposes, since there are concerted attacks by Apple, which Google needs to defend against to ensure the survival of Android.
Re:Mac Pro (Score:5, Informative)
Apple doesn't want you to use desktop computers any more because you're likely to do something besides shop.
Re:Or they'll go Intel: Haswell processors from 10 (Score:4, Informative)
That's not really relevant, to be honest: it's still at least double the power consumption compared with Cortex-A15 SoCs (and you can be sure as hell the Intel figure is processor only, not memory, chipset, interfaces, etc.), and they idle at an order magnitude less, which is important for mobile devices.
Re:Or they'll go Intel: Haswell processors from 10 (Score:4, Informative)
8W is way too much for an iPad... The current iPad uses 1.5W for the processor and 2W for the screen... 8W on the processor is not gonna happen.
Re:Well if they want ... (Score:4, Informative)
FYI, apps on iOS are more crash prone [forbes.com] than Android apps.