The 16GByte 'chip' is actually 8 x 16GBit chips stacked on top of each other in a single package
- the 8GByte iPhone uses 4 of these chips stacked in a single package
The iPhone uses a single package, which limits its capacity to 16GBytes with current technology, whereas the Touch uses 2 such packages for a capacity of 32GBytes.
Stacking upto 8 chips in a single package seems to be the current limit in stacking technology.
Right, and going to 32GBit chips today would be very expensive.
It seems to me that it would still be too expensive in Nov (i.e. pre-Christmas). I'm hopeful the cost will have come down enough by Feb, when Apple usually has its post-Christmas/post-MWExpo sales booster shot.
I agree here that Apple is likely using multiple vendors for flash. The recent Samsung contract, if true, could've just been one of many.
And I thought ifixit said it found an Intel NAND flash inside its iPhone.
A few years ago Apple did invest $250M in each of five NAND flash companies.
It makes sense for Apple to use multiple vendors for the NAND flash, for continuity of supply & cost reasons.
The Intel Flash is a different chip
- the one they've labeled 'Nymonynx'
- which AFAIK is for code & scratchpad for the Baseband processor
BTW, according to the Toshiba web-site, they'll have their 32GBit part in production sometime this quarter, so it *may* be available for a fall-update for the iPhone/Touch
- I guess Apple would be very happy if they could get enough of it in time for Xmas...
The 16GByte 'chip' is actually 8 x 16GBit chips stacked on top of each other in a single package
- the 8GByte iPhone uses 4 of these chips stacked in a single package
The iPhone uses a single package, which limits its capacity to 16GBytes with current technology, whereas the Touch uses 2 such packages for a capacity of 32GBytes.
Stacking upto 8 chips in a single package seems to be the current limit in stacking technology.
The article clearly states 8GB, while it can be wrong I have no source that says otherwise. As for my idea of building unevenly with different chips and then using a controller to aggregate them as single drive in software is a possible.
The article clearly states 8GB, while it can be wrong I have no source that says otherwise. As for my idea of building unevenly with different chips and then using a controller to aggregate them as single drive in software is a possible.
I think the article is wrong about there being two main Flash packages
- if you look at the iFixit tear down, there's only one..
And yes, they could offer sizes like 24GBytes if they wanted.
They could, but I've not heard of anyone selling flash-based products that aren't simple powers of two, for example, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 is a series of doublings. Sizes in 3, 6, 12 and 24 GB are possible, but I've not seen it yet.
They could, but I've not heard of anyone selling flash-based products that aren't simple powers of two, for example, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 is a series of doublings. Sizes in 3, 6, 12 and 24 GB are possible, but I've not seen it yet.
Current mainstream NAND flash production is 16Gbit (2GB) and 8Gbit (1GB). They can be packaged either as a single, dual, or quad die package, but they must all be of the same density. Up to 2 packages of the same density can then be stacked on eachother. So with quad 16GBit dual package you can get a max of 16GB in one physical package. These packaging limitations are why you always see a doubling effect and why I can't see how one could get a 24GB in a single package.
As was stated earlier Apple uses a variety of vendors for NAND Flash since even Samsung can't easily supply all of the memory required. The Numonyx win for NOR is fairly big as most people thought that would either go to Spansion or Samsung.
I'm hoping, as the article stated, that this is just an incremental upgrade. Although, quite a good one. I still want a flip phone version.
The natural upgrade path is an iPhone with two cameras for video chat via iChat, but the 3G networks need to be available in more areas than they are now to support this feature. The AT&T network bandwidth upgrades were a start in this direction. I'm sure, if bandwidth were no issue Apple would have had iChat out with the first generation iPhone.
Current mainstream NAND flash production is 16Gbit (2GB) and 8Gbit (1GB). They can be packaged either as a single, dual, or quad die package, but they must all be of the same density. Up to 2 packages of the same density can then be stacked on eachother. So with quad 16GBit dual package you can get a max of 16GB in one physical package. These packaging limitations are why you always see a doubling effect and why I can't see how one could get a 24GB in a single package.
For the iPod touch, it then currently has two quad packages, either two 16 Gbit or two 8 Gbit. They could therefore offer a 24 GB version. And in future, when 32Gbit packages become available, they could offer a 48 GB version. But I don't think they will.
I think the Infeon chips they use are "upgradable" to HSUPA, but as a practical matter it's not going to be possible to implement HSUPA on the phone as an upgrade. More likely similar chips with that feature implemented will find its way into the next version of the iPhone, probably in June next year.
I am curious to see if Apple will be able to do single, once-a-year upgrades to iPhone hardware. The cell phone market seems to be on a brutal upgrade cycle and the iPhone's camera already suffers in comparison to many of its would-be competitors. I think that the fact that software can be easily updated buys Apple some extra time between hardware upgrades but think they may need to release new iPhones on something closer to a 6 month schedule.
I am curious to see if Apple will be able to do single, once-a-year upgrades to iPhone hardware. The cell phone market seems to be on a brutal upgrade cycle and the iPhone's camera already suffers in comparison to many of its would-be competitors. I think that the fact that software can be easily updated buys Apple some extra time between hardware upgrades but think they may need to release new iPhones on something closer to a 6 month schedule.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.
Memory upgrades are suitable for 6 month intervals, as long as memory is dropping in price, increasing in density, and using less power GB to GB.
Cpu's are also suitable for this, if Apple cares to go that route at all.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.)
i think we'll see a tick-tock release, as Anand calls it, like we have seen over the past year. There was a capacity increase about 6 months after the original release, then 6 months later the iPhone 3G arrives. I think we can expect the same thing this year.
i think we'll see a tick-tock release, as Anand calls it, like we have seen over the past year. There was a capacity increase about 6 months after the original release, then 6 months later the iPhone 3G arrives. I think we can expect the same thing this year.
Comments
The 16GByte 'chip' is actually 8 x 16GBit chips stacked on top of each other in a single package
- the 8GByte iPhone uses 4 of these chips stacked in a single package
The iPhone uses a single package, which limits its capacity to 16GBytes with current technology, whereas the Touch uses 2 such packages for a capacity of 32GBytes.
Stacking upto 8 chips in a single package seems to be the current limit in stacking technology.
Right, and going to 32GBit chips today would be very expensive.
It seems to me that it would still be too expensive in Nov (i.e. pre-Christmas). I'm hopeful the cost will have come down enough by Feb, when Apple usually has its post-Christmas/post-MWExpo sales booster shot.
I agree here that Apple is likely using multiple vendors for flash. The recent Samsung contract, if true, could've just been one of many.
And I thought ifixit said it found an Intel NAND flash inside its iPhone.
A few years ago Apple did invest $250M in each of five NAND flash companies.
It makes sense for Apple to use multiple vendors for the NAND flash, for continuity of supply & cost reasons.
The Intel Flash is a different chip
- the one they've labeled 'Nymonynx'
- which AFAIK is for code & scratchpad for the Baseband processor
BTW, according to the Toshiba web-site, they'll have their 32GBit part in production sometime this quarter, so it *may* be available for a fall-update for the iPhone/Touch
- I guess Apple would be very happy if they could get enough of it in time for Xmas...
The 16GByte 'chip' is actually 8 x 16GBit chips stacked on top of each other in a single package
- the 8GByte iPhone uses 4 of these chips stacked in a single package
The iPhone uses a single package, which limits its capacity to 16GBytes with current technology, whereas the Touch uses 2 such packages for a capacity of 32GBytes.
Stacking upto 8 chips in a single package seems to be the current limit in stacking technology.
The article clearly states 8GB, while it can be wrong I have no source that says otherwise. As for my idea of building unevenly with different chips and then using a controller to aggregate them as single drive in software is a possible.
The article clearly states 8GB, while it can be wrong I have no source that says otherwise. As for my idea of building unevenly with different chips and then using a controller to aggregate them as single drive in software is a possible.
I think the article is wrong about there being two main Flash packages
- if you look at the iFixit tear down, there's only one..
http://live.ifixit.com/Guide/First-Look/iPhone3G
- the iPhone 2G certainly just has the one Flash package
- and the Touch two
- which is why the Touch can offer twice the capacity
Apple obviously decided that the iPhone was ok with less
- maybe for space reasons (i.e. it has a lot more to pack in)
- or for other marketing reasons.
And yes, they could offer sizes like 24GBytes if they wanted.
And yes, they could offer sizes like 24GBytes if they wanted.
They could, but I've not heard of anyone selling flash-based products that aren't simple powers of two, for example, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 is a series of doublings. Sizes in 3, 6, 12 and 24 GB are possible, but I've not seen it yet.
They could, but I've not heard of anyone selling flash-based products that aren't simple powers of two, for example, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 is a series of doublings. Sizes in 3, 6, 12 and 24 GB are possible, but I've not seen it yet.
Current mainstream NAND flash production is 16Gbit (2GB) and 8Gbit (1GB). They can be packaged either as a single, dual, or quad die package, but they must all be of the same density. Up to 2 packages of the same density can then be stacked on eachother. So with quad 16GBit dual package you can get a max of 16GB in one physical package. These packaging limitations are why you always see a doubling effect and why I can't see how one could get a 24GB in a single package.
As was stated earlier Apple uses a variety of vendors for NAND Flash since even Samsung can't easily supply all of the memory required. The Numonyx win for NOR is fairly big as most people thought that would either go to Spansion or Samsung.
These packaging limitations are why you always see a doubling effect and why I can't see how one could get a 24GB in a single package.
My original point was to not use a single package, but two, to allow for more frequent incremental capacity updates.
The natural upgrade path is an iPhone with two cameras for video chat via iChat, but the 3G networks need to be available in more areas than they are now to support this feature. The AT&T network bandwidth upgrades were a start in this direction. I'm sure, if bandwidth were no issue Apple would have had iChat out with the first generation iPhone.
Oh and a 32Gb and 64Gb iPhone would be nice.
Current mainstream NAND flash production is 16Gbit (2GB) and 8Gbit (1GB). They can be packaged either as a single, dual, or quad die package, but they must all be of the same density. Up to 2 packages of the same density can then be stacked on eachother. So with quad 16GBit dual package you can get a max of 16GB in one physical package. These packaging limitations are why you always see a doubling effect and why I can't see how one could get a 24GB in a single package.
For the iPod touch, it then currently has two quad packages, either two 16 Gbit or two 8 Gbit. They could therefore offer a 24 GB version. And in future, when 32Gbit packages become available, they could offer a 48 GB version. But I don't think they will.
I think the Infeon chips they use are "upgradable" to HSUPA, but as a practical matter it's not going to be possible to implement HSUPA on the phone as an upgrade. More likely similar chips with that feature implemented will find its way into the next version of the iPhone, probably in June next year.
I am curious to see if Apple will be able to do single, once-a-year upgrades to iPhone hardware. The cell phone market seems to be on a brutal upgrade cycle and the iPhone's camera already suffers in comparison to many of its would-be competitors. I think that the fact that software can be easily updated buys Apple some extra time between hardware upgrades but think they may need to release new iPhones on something closer to a 6 month schedule.
I am curious to see if Apple will be able to do single, once-a-year upgrades to iPhone hardware. The cell phone market seems to be on a brutal upgrade cycle and the iPhone's camera already suffers in comparison to many of its would-be competitors. I think that the fact that software can be easily updated buys Apple some extra time between hardware upgrades but think they may need to release new iPhones on something closer to a 6 month schedule.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.
Memory upgrades are suitable for 6 month intervals, as long as memory is dropping in price, increasing in density, and using less power GB to GB.
Cpu's are also suitable for this, if Apple cares to go that route at all.
Really. I think then everyone are gonna hate Apple for doing that. I think once a year is perfect. It makes a great hype and excitement for new customers. Apple doesn't have to follow the Mobile Industry rules, remember; it makes rules for it.)
i think we'll see a tick-tock release, as Anand calls it, like we have seen over the past year. There was a capacity increase about 6 months after the original release, then 6 months later the iPhone 3G arrives. I think we can expect the same thing this year.
edit: Pipped by Melgross.
i think we'll see a tick-tock release, as Anand calls it, like we have seen over the past year. There was a capacity increase about 6 months after the original release, then 6 months later the iPhone 3G arrives. I think we can expect the same thing this year.
edit: Pipped by Melgross.
(Hee hee!)