The Week In Review: July 8


By Mark LaPedus Fab tool vendors this week will gather at the annual Semicon West trade show in San Francisco. The mood is expected to be both gloomy and upbeat, at least based on one new and mixed forecast. The semiconductor equipment market is projected to fall 7.4% in 2013, but it will grow 27.1% in 2014, according to VLSI Research. The forecast for semis is up 10% in 2013 and 8.3% growth i... » read more

The Increasing Challenge Of Reducing Latency


By Ed Sperling When the first mainframe computers were introduced the big challenge was to improve performance by decreasing the latency between spinning reels of tape and the processor—while also increasing the speed at which the processor could crunch ones and zeroes. Fast forward more than six decades and the two issues are now blurred and often confused. Latency is still a drag on per... » read more

The Age Of No-Spin Doctors


By Pallab Chatterjee Solid-state flash memory still isn’t cheap, but performance, reliability and power have transformed it from a niche market into a mainstream one. And it’s about to get even more popular. At the recent flash memory summit, the majority of the sessions focused on the further penetration of NAND flash into the consumer electronics product segment. NAND technology alrea... » read more

Newer posts →