chips

Intel is pledging to spend between $6 billion and $8 billion to build a new chip manufacturing plant and upgrade its existing fabrication plants in Arizona and Oregon.

The influx of cash will allow Intel's new and current fab plants to put more muscle behind building the chipmaker's next-generation, 22-nanometer microprocessors, which could eventually power sleeker devices that deliver higher performance and longer battery life at a cheaper cost.

Intel's first microprocessors built on the 22-nanometer process, codenamed "Ivy Bridge," will be in production in late 2011, the chipmaker said today.

Besides kicking in money … Read more

Advanced Micro Devices showcased its upcoming Llano chip today, a highly integrated design targeted at sleek computers.

At the AMD Technical Forum & Exhibition in Taipei, Taiwan, the chip supplier held the first public demonstration of its future AMD Fusion Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) codenamed "Llano." Due in the first half of next year, Llano integrates the main processor and graphics function onto a single piece of silicon and is targeted at ultrathin and mainstream laptops, among other designs.

Llano will use 32-nanometer technology, feature up to four CPU processor cores, and integrate AMD's 5000 series graphics … Read more

Broadcom announced today that it plans to acquire 4G chip maker Beceem Communications for $316 million in cash as it tries to get a leg up on supplying the next generation of wireless technology to companies making wireless infrastructure products as well as those making cell phones, computers, and other consumer electronics.

Broadcom said that the acquisition would accelerate its "time-to-market in 4G by adding a talented team" of engineers. Broadcom already offers chips that enable several types of network connectivity technology, including 2G/3G cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and Ethernet switching. Adding Beceem's 4G technology will … Read more

Research firm iSuppli today lowered its forecast for semiconductor sales in 2010.

Chip sales around the world are now expected to hit $302 billion this year, a gain of 32 percent from $228 billion in 2009. That's down from iSuppli's prior forecast of 35.1 percent growth for the year, a change it attributed to weaker consumer demand for certain electronic devices and higher industry inventory.

Revenue in the fourth quarter is expected to drop by 0.3 percent from the third quarter, the first sequential drop since the market took a spill in the fourth quarter of … Read more

Oracle has sued Micron Technology, alleging the chipmaker overcharged Sun Microsystems for memory chips, according to a report.

Micron and other manufacturers of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) "artificially inflated" the price of chips, according to an Oracle complaint filed Friday in federal court in San Jose, Calif., Bloomberg reported.

The Oracle suit is based on DRAM sales made to Sun. Oracle acquired Sun in January.

While other companies, such as Hynix Semiconductor and Samsung Electronics, are cited as "co-conspirators," they're not named as defendants.

The origin of the case goes back to a 2002 … Read more

Humans may have naturally occurring nanotechnology to thank for partially cleaning up the oil spill from BP's Deepwater Horizon rig.

Researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have found that previously undiscovered ocean floor microbes have literally risen to the occasion and begun degrading the giant underwater oil plume in the Gulf of Mexico.

While there was belief that some ocean microbes might aid in the degradation of the oil spill, the process has happened more aggressively than anyone predicted it would, according to a report from environmental biotechnologists at the Berkeley Lab.

One of the giant oil plumes that formed … Read more

I know that the Green Goosesteppers mean well.

I know that they are saving the world from itself and preserving it for those who currently need to chew gum and smoke pot simultaneously in order to pass from one hour to the next.

However, I am a little concerned that, as we are all increasingly placed under surveillance, we will soon be called out for our supposed moral, as well as legal, deficiencies.

Please, for example, look at Cleveland. I don't know whether the city has decided to climb the Mount of Moral High Ground because of the departure … Read more

Now that news related to the iPhone 4 launch has cooled down, iPad rumors are heating up. The latest suggest a speedier and possibly smaller-screened tablet device from Apple as early as January.

Digitimes claims to have the drop on Apple's first revision to the wildly successful iPad. According to the report, Apple will beef up the speed of the iPad by swapping the Apple-built A4 processor with a Cortex-A9 and replacing the 256MB of RAM with the same 512MB currently found in the iPhone 4.

Interestingly, the report also claims that Apple will release a 7-inch version of … Read more

In early 2010, a research project found a simple swipe of a diagnostic biochip to be 93 percent "specific" in detecting which of 52 patients being studied had malignant oral cancer lesions.

Now, the international research team announces that it has been awarded $2 million from the National Institutes of Health to develop the test, which involves removing cells with a brush, placing them on a chip, and inserting that chip much like a credit card into an analyzer, with results ready in 8 to 10 minutes.

Such a fast turnaround should result in shorter waiting times, fewer … Read more