Intel heeft een site in elkaar geknutseld met uitleg over hoe onze chippies gebakken worden:
It comes from one of the most common elements on earth: sand. Just as steel and coal powered our past, silicon made from sand has become the foundation of our future. After undergoing an extraordinary transformation, this simple element, mined from the earth, eventually becomes the silicon wafers from which microchips are built.Beginning deep in the earth, quartz, which is believed to make up 28 percent of the earth's crust, is mined in quarries and then shipped to one of the few companies that specializes in processing this element into purified silicon. One of these companies is Wacker Siltronic in Germany, where electric arc furnaces transform the quartz to metallurgical-grade silicon. In a process designed to further weed out impurities, the silicon is converted to a liquid, distilled, and then redeposited in the form of semiconductor grade rods, which are, at that point, 99.999999 percent pure. These rods are then mechanically broken into chunks and packed into quartz crucibles, where they are melted at 2,593 degrees Fahrenheit.
Voor het complete verhaaltje, inclusief een paar leuke plaatjes, kun je hier terecht.
