AMD shows 45nm processors

Playing catch-up with Intel – but better late than never

AMD has demonstrated its first chips built to 45nm-scale, which will bring it on a par with the miniaturisation on the latest Intel chips.

The quad-core processors were made at the company's Dresden plant using a process co-developed with IBM. They should enable AMD to erode some of the technological edge Intel has enjoyed over the past few years.

But Intel is scheduled to start moving to 32nm scale next year and AMD's first 45nm will not appear until later this year.

The demonstrations at the giant Cebit show in Hanover, Germany, were of a server chip codenamed Shanghai and a desktop chip codenamed Deneb.

Highly miniaturised chips are cheaper to make as more can fit onto the standard 300mm wafer used to manufacture them. They also tend to draw less power for a given performance.

AMD also announced a new graphics processor design, the 780 Series, design to go on motherboards. The company says that when paired with its Phenom 9000 series quad-core or Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processor, the 780 Series "delivers significant enhancements in gaming and high-definition experiences for mainstream PC customers."

Motherboards using the AMD 780 should be available within the next few weeks. They will be suitable for use with the new ATI hybrid technology which allows a discreet graphics card to pair up with on-board graphics processing to boost performance.