News.blog: IBM shrinks PS3's Cell chip

IBM is producing the Cell microprocessor at 65-nanometers, shrinking it down from the previous generation, the company said on Monday.

Cell is the chip inside the PlayStation 3, and it was jointly developed by IBM, Sony and Toshiba. IBM didn't provide any details about the new 65-nanometer chip, other than to note it was now in production.

Moving to smaller transistors gives chip makers a few options to improve performance. Basically, they can now fit more transistors on the same size chip, or reduce the size of the chip with the same number of transistors. This helps increase performance, reduce costs, or both.

IBM also plans to introduce Power 6 server chips on its 65-nanometer manufacturing technology later this year. Intel has been making 65-nanometer chips since 2005, while AMD started cranking out chips at that generation late last year.