/article-new/2013/09/apple_a7.jpg?lossy)
Semiconductor companies Amkor Technology and STATS ChipPAC will each handle 40% of the packaging orders placed by Apple for its upcoming A8 processor, while Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) will obtain the remaining 20% of the orders, according to a new report from DigiTimes.
Apple's A8 chip will be a package-on-package (PoP) SoC solution comprising processors and mobile DRAM in a single package, said the sources.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is also believed to have secured wafer-bumping orders for the processor, and will reportedly start ramping up production of the A8 chip using 20nm process technology in the second quarter of 2014, with the processor widely expected to be used in Apple's next-generation iPhone.
According to a report in September, it is also expected that Samsung will assist with production of A8 chip, with the Korean company expected to handle 20% to 30% of the manufacturing load.
Overall, production plans for the iPhone 6 seem to be gearing up, with a report earlier this month stating that TSMC would be producing fingerprint sensors for the next-generation iPhone using a larger 12-inch fab from the current 8-inch fab to increase production efficiency. It was also stated that TSMC would handle the packaging process for the sensors itself rather than contracting out to other firms in order to centralize control over the component.
Top Rated Comments
(View all)Will this be a quad core chip ?
who cares?
----------
how about Apple :apple: to invest in a company working on batteries researches, in order to get rid of the battery cases which are almost indispensable with the iPhone :eek:
i've never had one, nor see them in the wild. i think this is a issue for a small percentage of users.
who cares?
----------
i've never had one, nor see them in the wild. i think this is a issue for a small percentage of users.
My battery case begs to differ.
Will this be a quad core chip ?
Good question!
I suspect that Apple will focus on GPU integration, they have hired many AMD engineers with the A series being the only obvious use for their talents. As such I wouldn't be surprise to see support for HSA.
The really question is what is the best use of chip real estate if you double that area. I can see the GPU being real important along with added features and support for that GPU. Support could be a real large L2 cache or dedicated frame buffer memory. As for the CPUs Apple could just double clock rate for another big performance jump. Quad CPUs while nice aren't required.