Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore International, passed away this week. His isn't the household name it should be. His influence on legions of coders and gamers deserves more. Indeed, in the mid-1980s, Commodore computers dominated the market in a way that few remember today.
Jack's life story, from Holocaust survivor to personal computer pioneer, is amazing, but I was particularly affected by the news because the first two computers I got my hands on were both Commodores.
Personal mobile devices like smartphones, tablets and laptop PCs are rapidly evolving, becoming faster, smaller and functionally more sophisticated. To maintain this dramatic progress in device capability, the semiconductor industry is now at a new inflection point – the era of 3D chip packaging.
In this video, Applied’s Sesh Ramaswami discusses the fundamentals of advanced packaging and the revolutionary impact this technology is having on the gadgets we buy and the cloud infrastructure that makes mobility work.
Not entirely coincidentally, the opening of the new Center of Excellence in Advanced Packaging in Singapore was announced today. Applied Materials and Singapore’s Institute of Microelectronics (IME), opened this first of its kind R&D facility to accelerate the development of 3D chip packaging.
In the same way that various prophets of doom foretell the imminent demise of Moore’s Law, we often hear that conventional memory technologies are going to run out of steam soon.
However, the semiconductor industry is highly-skilled at extending its existing architectures rather than making the leap to shiny new ones with apparently compelling advantages. Thus, incremental advances in conventional technology have delayed the introduction of a raft of exciting new memory technologies.
When will the tipping point be reached that pushes one or more into the mainstream? Read what the some of the best-informed minds in the business have to say after the jump.
It's not just movies, televisions and video games that are going three-dimensional these days. Microchips are doing it, too.
Semiconductors aren't shifting into the third dimension because it’s fashionable, though. This shift is about continuing Moore’s Law, the relentless drive for higher performance that has driven the industry for four decades.
Some world-changing events happen with a shot heard around the world. Others are only accompanied by a quiet click. This is one of those.
On December 1st, 1975, the first digital camera took its first picture. It was, quite literally, a Kodak moment.
In this 2008 video, Steve Sasson, the camera’s inventor, leads us through the genesis and development of his camera at Kodak’s research labs in Rochester, New York. It’s a great story in itself, but Steve also shares a number of insights into the forces that conspire to turn laboratory demonstrations into ubiquitous, world-changing devices.
We’ll take a closer look at the technology and explore how we got from there to here after the jump.
Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore International, passed away this week. His isn't the household name it should be. His influence on legions of coders and gamers deserves more. Indeed, in the mid-1980s, Commodore computers dominated the market in a way that few remember today.
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