Cell Microprocessor for PS3 Performing Poorly?

The Inquirer was able to dig up some dirt that might just give you a heart attack. I suggest you sit down before reading. The Inquirer’s source claims that yields of the Cell microprocessor for the Playstation 3 are not good. The super chip which was designed by IBM and Sony for some very aggressive process technologies turned out to be a big disappointment when tests showed that yields were so bad that “the amounts of good dyes off the test wafers are “horrible”. In testing chips, a machine marks the bad chips with a drop of dye.

Is this bad? Well, the yield is the proportion of devices on the wafer (a semiconducting material upon which microcircuits are constructed) found to perform properly. For most of us who are uninitiated to the ways of electronics, a good chip design made by a good process will have more than 90% yield. Somewhere between 0% and 70% yield is not a good number.

If the source is to be believed, Sony could be in trouble and it should start increasing those yields fast! Nobody wants to hear another PS3 delay announcement.

The Inquirer was able to dig up some dirt that might just give you a heart attack. I suggest you sit down before reading. The Inquirer’s source claims that yields of the Cell microprocessor for the Playstation 3 are not good. The super chip which was designed by IBM and Sony for some very aggressive process technologies turned out to be a big disappointment when tests showed that yields were so bad that “the amounts of good dyes off the test wafers are “horrible”. In testing chips, a machine marks the bad chips with a drop of dye.

Is this bad? Well, the yield is the proportion of devices on the wafer (a semiconducting material upon which microcircuits are constructed) found to perform properly. For most of us who are uninitiated to the ways of electronics, a good chip design made by a good process will have more than 90% yield. Somewhere between 0% and 70% yield is not a good number.

If the source is to be believed, Sony could be in trouble and it should start increasing those yields fast! Nobody wants to hear another PS3 delay announcement.