Chips Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Reality Absorption Field: What happens in Vegas

by Ross Rubin (Jan 16th, 2013)

A few years ago, a senior Apple executive was once told that, even though Apple did not exhibit at the annual Las Vegas spectacle that is the International Consumer Electronics Show, its presence seemed to linger in the arid air and in the clouded minds of many attendees. "We love that," he ...

Apple hiring former Texas Instruments chip designers for Israeli R&D center

by Randy Nelson (Dec 4th, 2012)

Texas Instruments' loss is looking to be Apple's gain. In its efforts to shrink its global workforce by some 1,700 jobs, TI recently let go 250 of its employees in Israel previously tasked with designing chips for mobile devices. According to The Next Web, Apple has snapped up "dozens" of them to ...

Samsung denies rumor of increased cost of chip production

by Mike Schramm (Nov 14th, 2012)

Word's been going around that due to the recent friction between Apple and Samsung on the end product front, Samsung has decided to charge Apple even more for another one of its businesses: The chip assembly line. Apple depends on Samsung to make a few different components for its devices, and ...

Mansfield may lead Apple away from Intel chips in Macs

by Randy Nelson (Nov 5th, 2012)

Bloomberg is reporting that Apple's Technologies group, headed by senior vice president Bob Mansfield, is exploring advanced versions of the chipsets used in the iPhone and iPad lines for use in the company's future desktops and MacBooks. The outlet cites three people familiar with Apple's ...

Intel hints at option of custom chip foundry for big customers

by Michael Grothaus (May 26th, 2011)

Reuters is reporting that Intel "wouldn't blink" if given the chance to make custom chips for Apple's devices, like the iPhone and iPad. At an investor event in London on Thursday, Chief Financial Officer Stacy Smith told journalists that "there are certain customers that would be interesting ...

Apple selects Taiwan's TSMC to produce its A5 chip

by Chris Ward (Mar 9th, 2011)

Apple is reported to have inked a deal with Taiwanese chip manufacturer TSMC to produce the A5 dual-core chip for the iPad 2, in a substantial blow to former producer Samsung. TSMC was apparently chosen over Samsung because tests showed it was consistently producing the chips more efficiently ...

Intel recalls Sandy Bridge, may affect future Macs

by Kelly Hodgkins (Feb 1st, 2011)

Intel announced on Monday that it was recalling its Intel 6 series chipset. This chipset is utilized in computers powered by the next generation Core i5 and Core i7 processor. These Sandy Bridge processors are expected to debut in the next refresh of the MacBook Pro and possibly the iMac. The flaw ...

Google buys firm of former Apple employees

by Mike Schramm (Apr 22nd, 2010)

Google's purchase of a firm staffed with former Apple employees is surrounded by mystery, according to AppleInsider. Agnilux is a small San Jose startup founded by a few former Apple employees, most of whom left the mothership right around the time of the P.A. Semi acquisition. Other than that, ...

iPad component cost re-estimated

by Mike Schramm (Apr 8th, 2010)

Now that the iPad is actually out and we know what's in it, iSuppli has adjusted its guesstimate for the actual price of the hardware to US$259.60. That's significantly more than the original estimate that was made a while back; iSuppli says that the iPad uses more silicon chips than expected, ...

First Look: Game Table for the iPad

by Mike Schramm (Mar 30th, 2010)

Here's some screenshots for another upcoming iPad app called Game Table. The app brings Checkers, Chess, and various card games onto Apple's tablet with detailed graphics and an "intuitive" interface -- the developers claim it's like carrying full board games around with you, but without all the ...

Apple making its own chips starting with the A4

by Mike Schramm (Jan 27th, 2010)

Even though this morning's presentation had Apple calling themselves the "largest mobile device company" in the world, apparently they're in the processor business now, too. The just-announced iPad doesn't carry any special Intel or Nvidia CPU -- it's a homecooked 1GHz chip called the Apple A4. ...

New MacBook Pro benchmarked within Boot Camp

by Mike Schramm (Nov 19th, 2008)

Finally, someone with more money that I have (I want a new MacBook Pro, but haven't yet convinced myself to shell out the dough to replace my old yet trusty G4 12" Powerbook) has put the new MBP and those shiny graphics chips to the test, and drummed up some real benchmarking numbers in Boot Camp. ...

ARM holdings confirms iPhone chips

by Erica Sadun (Feb 7th, 2007)

InformationWeek reports that Warren East, president and CEO of ARM Holdings, confirmed that the iPhone will use at least three ARM processors. The main CPU will reportedly be a PXA320. So does this tell us anything new and important about the iPhone internals? Er, probably not much. But for those ...

Samsung executive fixed pricing for chips in Apple computers

by Erica Sadun (Dec 21st, 2006)

A Samsung executive will pay a quarter-million dollar fine and serve almost a year in prison after pleading guilty to memory chip price fixing. He violated the Sherman Antitrust Act when Samsung colluded with other companies to fix DRAM chip prices. Four other memory makers have been charged as ...

AMD CEO: AMD + Apple inevitable

by David Chartier (Sep 21st, 2006)

During an Intel-bashing session at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, The CEO of AMD, Hector Ruiz, whined remarked that an AMD + Apple partnership is in their cards: "Knowing Apple, why would they want to be held hostage like everyone else has been?" Of course, Apple wasn't available to comment ...