Texas Instruments is delivering fully functional wireless digital baseband devices from its advanced 65-nanometer (nm) CMOS process technology.
TI said the 65-nm process and techniques effectively shrink the 90-nm design area by half, leveraging strained-silicon to boost transistor performance by 40 percent, and reducing leakage power from idle transistors by a factor of 1000. TI is among the first semiconductor manufacturers to deliver working 65-nm products.
To achieve the power gains, the device uses TI’s SmartReflex dynamic power management technology to automatically scale power supply voltage based on user performance demands and help control power consumption in devices like TI’s OMAPVox processors. By closely monitoring circuit speed, SmartReflex can dynamically adjust voltages to meet the exact performance requirements without sacrificing overall system performance. As a result, minimum power is used for each operating frequency, extending battery life and reducing the amount of heat produced by the device.
TI applies other techniques at 65-nm to reduce the power consumed by transistors when they are idle, including the time when a mobile phone is in standby mode waiting to receive a call. These innovations include back- biasing of SRAM memory blocks and retention flip-flop circuitry that allows voltages to drop extremely low without requiring a rewrite of logic or memory content. TI said that together these advancements can deliver up to a 1000 times reduction in power leakage.
TI’s 65-nm process is planned for both 200mm and 300mm production, with fully qualified production expected in late 2005.
http://www.ti.com
