While Intel and the rest of the industry have been in a state of shock since Apple unveiled its M1 laptop chip last month, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is not standing still. According to a leaker, the Santa Clara, California-headquartered semiconductor company has two Apple M1 competitor chips in prototype stages that are apparently “almost ready”.
Semiconductors
TSMC may build A15 chips for 2021 iPhones, Macs using its next-gen 5nm+ and 4nm process
Apple is reportedly planning to manufacture next year's iPhone, iPad and Mac chips on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company's (TSMC) 5nm+ and 4nm process technologies. By comparison, the current A14 chips in the latest iPhones and the M1 chips in the new MacBook Air, Mac mini and 13-inch MacBook Pro are being fabbed on TSMC's five-nanometer process.
Here’s why the baseline $999 MacBook Air comes with seven GPU cores instead of eight
The baseline $999 model of Apple's refreshed MacBook Air notebook, powered by its new M1 laptop chip, comes with seven graphics cores instead of eight. That's because Apple is salvaging some weaker chips by disabling one core, a process known as binning.
Apple is reportedly already developing A15 chips for iPhone 13, iMacs, MacBooks & more
Tucked away as a side-note in today’s report by The China Times newspaper outlining the first Apple Silicon products is a mention of Apple’s next-generation A15 system-on-a-chip.
Apple seeks tax breaks from the US government to support domestic chip production
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) has been churning out Apple's custom chips in its facilities in Taiwan, but Apple may be looking to boost domestic chip production.
Bad quality assurance of Skylake reportedly accelerated Apple’s plans to ditch Intel
According to an ex-Intel engineer, bad quality assurance of Intel's Skylake chips has reinforced the notion within Apple that the company should hasten its long-expected switch to its own in-house designed desktop chips based on its custom sic lion in iOS devices.
5nm A14 chips for this year’s iPhones will reportedly enter production in the second quarter
Apple's next-generation mobile processor that will power this year's iPhone and iPad models, tentatively named "A14 Bionic", will reportedly enter mass production in the second quarter of this year, in time for new iPhones in September.
Intel’s new 10nm Ice Lake chips may significantly speed up video compression, encoding and decoding on 2020 Mac notebooks
Intel yesterday unveiled its tenth-generation processors code-named "Ice Lake" that while bringing only modest compute improvements accelerate tasks such as machine learning, encryption, video compression, encoding and decoding by a large margin.
Kuo: Apple could complete 5G modem development by 2022 or 2023
Apple could do without Qualcomm's wireless modems in iPhones as soon as 2022.
Chipmaker Broadcom extends its supply deal with Apple for another two years
Broadcom today announced a renewal of its supply deal with Apple for another two years.
A unique look at how Apple is testing its own iPhone processors against hacking
Apple under Tim Cook's leadership has turned protecting user privacy into one of its missions. The company takes a holistic approach to security and privacy that starts at the semiconductor level. British publication Independent today published a rare insight into a secretive facility on Apple's campus in which expensive machines are abusing in-house designed chips to see whether they can withstand hacking and whatever other types of assault anyone might try on them when they make their way into new iPhones.
An in-depth look into Apple’s frustrations with Intel’s modems
The Information today ran a lengthy story with some interesting insider's perspective on how Apple has become frustrated with Intel's iPhone modems during its legal spat with Qualcomm.