Rumor: Intel would shift Xe GPU production towards TSMC at 6nm

It has been silent around Intel Xe for Desktop. The new news is that Intel might have its Xe graphics cards manufactured by TSMC, fabricated at 6nm. This is a report that must be viewed with skepticism.

According to a rumor from Chinese, MyDrivers sources claim that future graphic chips will be produced by TSMC. Mentioned is the use of TSMCs 6nm and 3nm lithographs. 6nm however is not ready yet, Intel would start using these in 2021 and 2022. Intel was planning to release Xe on the 7nm node and an improved future version of Xe in 2021 and 2022, both with 7nm EUV.

TSMCs 6nm could perform slightly opposed to the 7nm node of the. Let's just hope this doesn't turn out to be another '10nm debacle' for Intel (if true). It will be some time before Xe desktop products are ready for the market and on the market. Xe low end and Xe high end might thus not even appear until 2022. The GPGPU for data centers is scheduled to start in 2021.

Earlier this year intel showed a developer's card, the DG1. That one is manufactured using a 10nm process. It has 96 EU execution units with a total of 768 cores, a base frequency of 1GHz, a boost frequency of 1.5GHz, and 1MB. Level cache and 3GB video memory, TDP is 25W. The performance of DG1 is expected to be comparable to a GeForce GTX 1050. After DG1, there will be DG2, which is a high-performance CPU. It was previously reported that DG2 will use TSMC's 7nm process. Now it should be a 7nm modified version of the 6nm process. However, Intel's own 7nm process will also be mass-produced in 2021. Officials have already announced that Ponte Vecchio acceleration cards for data centers will use their own 7nm EUV process.

Sources: My Drivers , Twitter