30-09-2009, 07:58 AM
The terahertz transistor design -- a terahertz is a thousand gigahertz, or one trillion cycles a second an evolution of current designs, using new materials such as zirconium dioxide. Smaller transistors go faster but also leak more current when turned off and need a higher voltage to work, zirconium dioxide is a superior insulator that reduces this leakage and thus reduces power consumption while maintaining speed and low voltages. Intel says that the new design will work down to around 0.6v before long. According to Intel, the combined benefits of the TeraHertz transistor as the device will permit up to 25 times more transistors in processors than currently possible, each running at 10 times present speeds, with no overall increase in overall processor power requirements.
read from http://download.inteltechnology/silicon/...ossary.pdf
