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Comment by Tiktaalik | Hacker News Reader

Seems like a signal that they see the trade consequences of invading Taiwan, and they're going to put things in motion such that they'll be prepared to be able to handle them.

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It seems like an obvious response to sanctions and denying access to lithography equipment. Let's return back to the reality where China isn't presently invading Taiwan, but is a target of containment attempts.

That’s a hilarious directive since their homegrown CPU is 900 MHz. They are on something like a 30nm die. There is just no way they can transition to those chips in modern devices. This sounds like exactly the sort of order that would come from Xi. He’s living in his information bubble and is excited to go to war.

No, they are not that far behind. You're thinking of Longsoon I guess, but they have a 7nm process at SMIC and Hisilicon designing ARM-based server processors on it[1]. Sure, ARM is western, but guess what, they have the IP anyway, as they required ARM to do business through a subsidiary in China.

China is serious about semiconductors. Hisilicon is competitive in many markets.

[1]https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/cpus/huaweis-new-...

It's also a "so what" situation. If China's economy is severed from the rest of the world's, competitors can't take its market share. Being five or even ten years behind on chips is irrelevant when your consumers can't go elsewhere. What did people use their smartphones for ten years ago? Recording themselves and watching cat videos. What do they do now? You don't need 2nm chips to do anything except take market share from the company using 3nm chips. The F-22 Raptor uses an i960 processor from 1988.

yes but AI, simulations and supercomputer warfare

China already has competing AI products that are used domestically.

As if China needs to worry about IP rights anyway.

> Meanwhile, SMIC has increased its current 7 nm production capacity to make more Kirin chips and AI GPUs, said two people familiar with the matter.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/china-close-to-shipp...

They're down to 7nm albeit with low yield and questionable legalities [1].

[1] https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3256321/chinese-c...

> questionable legalities

"Questionable" is an interesting euphemism for massive IP theft over many years.

Doing technology transfers and then crying about it is really bad manners.

If you read Sun Tzu, theft of info is warranted and morally right to do so. Read the spycraft section of Sun Tzu. US did the same with Sputnik. They path and legitimize the act decades ago.

Nope. Loongson is building on 14/12nm nodes and competing on performance with first-gen Ryzen and Coffee Lake. Zhaoxin is still on 16nm AFAIK, but they're matching modern architectures on IPC. CXMT is making LPDDR5 dies in meaningful quantities. Underestimate Chinese industry at your peril, particularly when they've got a blank cheque from the Party.

Do checkout Dxomark which smartphone has best camera. Do checkout how well Kunlun vs Gorrilla best. Do check the number of Mate 60 (hint iPhone sales dropped 20%). And maybe also check the cpu size. They have already rumours seeing actual 2-3nm in used in Huawei engineering sample unit. Even AI GPUs ES sample now floating if you have connections to get it (definitely better than Intel Arcs). I think you truly live in Joe info bubble. I have friends directly in Chinese semicon. You will see 4-5 years down the road, TSMC become irrelevant. Did you know now 90% worldwide mid tier and low tier chip dominated by Chinese made? Used to be TI and EU foundry during Obama time. You can do the research. Helps a lot if you are strong in read Chinese simplified characters sources.

China is old [1] and broke [2]. It won't be able to afford to attack Taiwan - for reference, 1930s Japan and Germany had way more young people. Japan was also rich from its empire, while Germany transitioned away from gold standard to afford its wars. 2022 Russia thought the war would end in 3 days.

Also, as we see from Russia's invasion of Ukraine, drones and missiles are effective at taking out the world's second largest navy. Taiwan has very accurate and effective homegrown missiles [3]. China would need to amass a ton of ships which would be easily detected, staff them with only sons from families, and try to move them across a 100 mile straits while under the barrage of US/Japan/Taiwan missiles and drones.

Lastly, China is quickly transitioning to state run economy much like Soviet Union [3], which means innovations and growth will be gone forever, especially in tech industries.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd....

[2] https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/international/global/frugal... https://www.scmp.com/economy/economic-indicators/article/325...

[3] https://www.eurasiantimes.com/taiwan-smashes-chinese-warship...

[4] https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Markets/China-s-favored-sta...

There's no way they invade Taiwan in a controlled manner, it's too easy to sink a navy over that distance. Sure they could do a long range bombardment but then there's nothing left to take.

Sure they could do a long range bombardment but then there's nothing left to take.

This is irrelevant. Not because you're wrong, but because you're thinking of terms of what a rational, reasonable person would do. Taking Taiwan has about as much to do with helping China as the Iraq War had to do with avenging 9/11: nothing whatsoever. If China attacks Taiwan it will be for the sole reason that Xi Jinping has and is using it as a political tool to amass power. For that purpose it doesn't matter if Taiwan is a smoking crater by the end.

Taking Taiwan would be useful as a naval base. And to deny the US the ability to blockade the pacific ocean.

Seriously. There's a reason US has military bases on islands down the whole east coast of China.

Taiwan is the only thing essentially protecting Japan.

Are you an expert on naval warfare?

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