Comment by amelius
2 hours ago
But how can they patent this, as 3D chips have been built for decades already?
I mean, it is nice that they found out some properties (lower heat than expected), but you cannot patent that, I suppose.
2 hours ago
But how can they patent this, as 3D chips have been built for decades already?
I mean, it is nice that they found out some properties (lower heat than expected), but you cannot patent that, I suppose.
It is probably like a lot of patents, some very specific details on design and the technology of interconnects between layers.
Chips have been multiple layers since the beginning practically but it was also laid out in a somewhat 2D fashion of ALU here, FPU there, cache somewhere else, but now they are stacking functionality so that is isn't so discrete, in a 2D space it would get a little fuzzy.
It isn't mind blowing ground breaking stuff but it is very cool. Evolutionary not revolutionary.