20nm ARM-based chips to hit 3 GHz in 2014http://liliputing.com/2013/07/20nm-arm-based-chips-to-hit-3-ghz-in-2014.htmlNobody responds to Intel's vaporware introductions very much any more, so after a week of a very few PC pundits saying that Intel is staging a come back with their 2ghz quad core 22nm chipsets and all that sort of stuff the two top dog ARM chip producers co-released a very simple statement.
Lithography size is now 18-20nm. Processor speed per core to start at 2.8 ghz and to go up to 3.x (they haven't pushed it yet). Energy use to drop 25% from where it is are now. "Sea of cores" technology is built into the designs. 64 and 32 bit support is built in now (either per core, and you can do both at the same time on separate cores). Linaro has released the supporting changes to the Linux kernel, implemented in 3.7 and updated twice already.
They also backed it with individual personal verbal statements that the new line's run offs have been completed and the production samples are in the hands of the various vendors since 1-2 months ago.
ARM is referred to as being happy that "the speeds achieved slightly exceeded their predictions". TSMC is suspected to be the culprit for that advance at a 18nm production size, which logically should do better than Global's 20nm production samples. Both production lines are real and have been sampled and it is suspected are in production for somebody's top secret Christmas timeline surprise at this point in time.
As you read this, remember it refers to the A-53 and A-57 and the AMD 64 bit server chipset series which will all be the first things produced on these lines at 18-20nm. These are the very first of the 64 bit ARM chipset designs. The new 64bits will demand a premium price, while the old 28nm lines keep churning out existing designs at an ever lower cost.
================
So, what will really happen? Progress shall come along in little waves interspersed with much bigger waves. Mobile and battery powered devices will continue to get replaced as they roll through upgrade periods and software based obsolescences.
My old white box will continue to run its old (and now very obsolete) Linux Mint 9.0 with no updates until either the monitor dies or the CPU box dies.
NEXT ITEM OF NOTE: ARM will soon release the designs of what comes after A-53 and A-57. Look for more of a generic sea of cores approach with more attention paid to a VERY FAST, energy tight & physically very small littles -- with much less push on the bulky powerful energy sucking bigs that nobody seems to be actually using for very much right now.
Look for the bigs to start to become a "compilation on die" of 4-8 littles with a much better on-die GPU chip. Hard Macro designs will come out much more frequent and will be closely aimed at known niche needs in the current cell phone space. Remember, ARM very much wants to keep Intel out at the sidelines where they can go play with Microsoft until they both become pretty much irrelevant. If they leave holes or unmet needs -- Intel will get in.
Intel will get faster off the bat and more nimble, they have to.
Why mostly littles? Sea of cores technology at 64 bit can substitute in the little cores at will for the same processing power as could be supplied by some fewer number of big cores (but the much lower wafer yield rates and much greater complexity make the bigs too much more expensive to make, so more & more littles will start to rule completely).