> The process name doesn’t have anything to do with the physical dimensions of the transistor. It’s a marketing term, a lower number implying a newer node.
It seems I'm definitely in grumpy old man territory these days when things like the process node name which used to actually mean something specific, don't anymore.
It still means something specific. It's an extrapolation of the transistor density. The design rules on state of the art processes are too complex to summarize with a simple single number like in days past, so this is a reasonable way to describe things. The argument that they're purely meaningless marketing numbers is just tired empty smugness. When we talk about TSMC 7nm everyone knows what that means and that it is indeed a significant advance over the prior nodes. The numbers capture the advantage in rough terms, as best you can.
Yeah, I’m with you having worked in a fab for a short time.
But... it assumed all other things related to structure and configuration etc remained the same. That hasn’t been true for a while and so now it’s “10nm equivalent” shortened to 10n. Can’t remember when that started to change... maybe at 280?
I dont blame them. Some company made the first claim, others try to resist. Then customers demand a new node for their marketing.... and that is how we end up with these numbers.
