Intel Delays its 10nm Chips Again

[Archiee]

Intel is really struggling to make the shift from a 14nm to 10nm process for chip production. We originally expected 10nm Intel chips back in 2016, but here we are in 2018 and they still haven't arrived. Instead we've seen three refinements of the 14nm process, with the latest being Coffee Lake processors. Now we've been asked to wait again.

As Engadget reports, Intel quietly confirmed there is another delay before we get 10nm Cannon Lake chips. The news was buried in Intel's Q1 2018 earnings report (PDF) with the line, "Intel is currently shipping low-volume 10 nm product and now expects 10 nm volume production to shift to 2019."

That's not to say Intel's processors have stopped improving, far from it. The 14nm refinements brought with them extra performance and power saving. We've also seen the introduction of Core i9 chips with additional cores and the ongoing development of Optane memory to help speed up our computers.

Even so, a near three year delay will be raising eyebrows and concerns at the company while rival AMD is surely watching on as it sees a positive reception for its expanding line of Ryzen processors. At the same time, both Samsung and TSMC are already using a 10nm process, albeit for less complex chips. Qualcomm and MediaTek were also talking 10nm at MWC last year!

The disappointment of no 10nm chips didn't actually hurt Intel in terms of revenue. In fact, the Q1 revenue reached $16.1 billion with $4.5 billion in profit. That's actually 50 percent higher than the same period last year.

While we know Intel will continue to push its Core desktop range and server chips hard in the coming months, it's unclear exactly when Cannon Lake is going to appear now. We've gone from "by the end of 2018" to "2019," giving Intel up to an additional 12 months to deliver or delay once again. The only positive is Cannon Lake chips are shipping in low volume, so hopefully it's early 2019 when they finally arrive.

Watch: 18-Core and 16-Core Intel Core i9 CPUs Get Tested: Random Access