Hacker News Reader

Honest question. Does silicon wear out due to high temperatures, or is it more like lightbulbs where it wears out from thermal cycles? Does it really wear out at all?

View on HN

It’s mostly due to higher temps resulting in faster ion migration, which can cause a breakdown in the structure of transistors, as well as increased wear on the conductors (though this is rarely a dominating factor). Thermal cycling can also cause cracking, which is also a problem. Though there are lots of reason chips fail due to heat, from the wire bonds on pads getting too hot to increased leakage current at high temps.

For a long time it was assumed it wouldn't wear out and tbh if you look how long it takes, how rare it is, its not a real issue...

besides what intel did with Raptor Lake. This series had massive issues with oxidiation. Was the first time ever i became aware of this issue on scale.

Nontheless there are papers out there that silicon can degenerate and does.

https://research.google/pubs/cores-that-dont-count/

Reply on news.ycombinator.com