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IBM shrinks Cell processor

Tom Krazit Former Staff writer, CNET News
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Google, as the most prominent company on the Internet defends its search juggernaut while expanding into nearly anything it thinks possible. He has previously written about Apple, the traditional PC industry, and chip companies. E-mail Tom.
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Tom Krazit

IBM is producing the Cell microprocessor at 65-nanometers, shrinking it down from the previous generation, the company said Monday.

Cell is the chip inside the Playstation 3, and it was jointly developed by IBM, Sony and Toshiba. IBM didn't provide any details about the new 65-nanometer chip, other than to note it was now in production.

Moving to smaller tranistors gives chip makers a few options to improve performance. Basically, they can now fit more transistors on the same size chip, or reduce the size of the chip with the same number of transistors. This helps increase performance, reduce costs, or both.

IBM also plans to introduce Power 6 server chips on its 65nm manufacturing technology later this year. Intel has been making 65nm chips since 2005, while AMD started cranking out chips at that generation late last year.