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Intel is quite literally about to flip the modern CPU upside down next year

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they're going to be introducing a dramatic sounding piece of technology called Power via to their new processor

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lineups and it looks like the wave of the future not just for Intel CPUs but

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products from other chip makers as well okay Riley you've got my attention tell

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me what's so great about it is what you just said probably power via or backside

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power delivery to use a less Intel specific term is all about the tiny

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wires connected to your CPU's transistors the parts that allow your

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CPU to think currency views have separate wires for power and data that

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both Point downwards towards the socket however this method of CPU fabrication

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presents a few problems one is that having power and Signal wires so close

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to each other results in interference and therefore degraded performance

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another is that the wires used for power delivery have a natural resistance to

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them and as we've put more and more transistors on our chip tips we've had

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to make these wires smaller and smaller which creates even more resistance with

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the result being undesirable voltage drops that also limit performance trying

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to pack in so many small wires also increases cost and Manufacturing

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complexity as chip makers have to use very expensive lithography in order to

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meet their goals so instead of just continuing to fight this problem more

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and more as transistors keep getting smaller backside power delivery Works

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smarter not harder and further separates power and Signal wires we'll tell you

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exactly what this looks like as well as the pros and cons of this approach right

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after we thank the sponsor of this video SolidWorks SolidWorks has an inexpensive

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giving our audience 20 off so check them out at the link below a chip built with

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backside power delivery has the signal wires coming out of the front side of

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the wafer the transistor sit on with the power wires coming out of the bottom or

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backside now in the previous method we discussed all wires come out of the

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front side though confusingly usually the chip is flipped the other way so the

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front side extends towards the CPU socket with the transistors back near

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the heat spreader so they could be cooled down it's all a little wacky

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chip Engineers like to have fun you know with backside power delivery although

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you do have a few signal wires still coming off the back side to allow the

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CPU to communicate with the rest of the system the large majority of those

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signal wires are internal CPU transistor to transistor connections which are

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placed on the front side Intel has to polish the wafer down very thin in order

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to expose power connections to build out backside power delivery meaning a dummy

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carrier wafer is bonded to the front side to give the whole stack structural

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support it's like a really solid sandwich you should not eat this

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mitigates the issues of interference and voltage drop we discussed earlier Intel

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claims this results in a little over five percent higher core frequency on

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e-cores than would otherwise be possible and gains on the higher performance P

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cores should be similar another big Advantage is because you're not trying

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to fit as many wires as you can into a certain space manufacturing is cheaper

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and easier of course since backside power delivery is a new fabrication

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method there's an associated lost with rolling it out but Intel says that the

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savings that come as a result of the overall easier manufacturing will more

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than offset this throw in the fact that power via means you can fill more of the

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dye with actual Library cells groups of transistors that process data rather

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than blank space and it isn't hard to see why Samsung and tsmc are also

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working to get their own chips featuring backside power delivery to Market I mean

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this all sounds pretty great but are there any downsides for the consumer the

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one that has stuck out to some enthusiasts is that there are now quite

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a few layers of front side wiring separating the transistors from where a

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CPU Cooler would sit Intel claims that there's enough thermal conductivity

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through these layers to make cooling CPUs with power via no more difficult

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than more traditional chips but that remains to be seen we should expect the

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first Intel chips with power via to hit the market in mid-2024 with chips

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featuring backside power delivery from other manufacturers coming at least a

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couple years later comment down below if there are more topics in chip making

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you'd like us to tackle but for now all this talk about chips and Wafers is

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really making me want some snacks it's snack time for Riley it's also time to

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thank you for watching this video hey like it if you liked it dislike it if

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you disliked it that's okay but you know if you do do that you might as well

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check out our other videos comment below the video suggestions and don't forget to subscribe and follow I mean it's the

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least you could do