They are. It's all in binning. At the beginning of a new design or new process, generally, the trouble is getting enough parts that qualify for the top speed bins. Chips that fail the top grade are generally re-rested at all bins the manufacturer has, going into the appropriate bin that it qualifies for.
As a process matures, however, the opposite is generally true. A large number of chips off the line qualify for the top bin, but the manufacturer only need so many of those. Therefore, the lower bins are filled with parts that in fact qualify for higher bins. Overclockability generally gets better as the production run lengthens--though variability in the source materials and the process itself does sometimes favor specific production weeks. Greg > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- > [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden > Sent: Thursday, November 08, 2007 3:46 PM > To: The Hardware List > Subject: Re: [H] RE:Dual core or Quad core? > > On 11/8/07, Winterlight <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > no.... it is the same process. Using a highly engineered device > > beyond it's specifications with the potential of negative > consequences. > > > Like I said in my post a couple messages ago, assuming that the CPU is > designed to run at the speed it is sold is wrong. Odds are that the > $200 part and the $300 part which differ only in clock speed are in > fact identical. > > -- > Brian Weeden
