Semiconductor manufacturer TSMC started pushing out the first 40 nanometer chips in early 2009 when AMD announced its new mobile GPUs. AMD was also first to announce a desktop graphics card based on the process, but Radeon HD 4770 was very hard to actually get a hold of. TSMC has now confirmed that it has once again run into yield problems the 40 nanometer technology.
In Q2 TSMC had yields as low as 20-30% with 40nm technology, but this was improved to around 60% in July. TSMC has once again run into problems and after both AMD and NVIDIA launched new 40nm GPUs this could contribute to a shortage of chips.
Because of “chamber matching issues” the manufacturing yields have dropped down to 40%. At the same time TSMC VP Morris Chang promised that it will have a solution before the end of the year, something that could play in NVIDIA’s favor, which is still waiting to launch its upcoming graphics circuit architecture Fermi.
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