Hidden arts inside micro chips

[kl0012]

Developers of integrated circuits have fun... Amazing things have been discovered by National High Magnetic Field Laboratory.

Runaway Train (LeCroy MVV 200 chip)



The Shepherd (Intel 8207, a dual-port RAM controller chip )



The Slide Trombone (AMD 7990 Ethernet controller integrated circuit)



Big Mac Attack (Excalibur) (Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 microprocessor)



This Bird's For You (Hewlett-Packard PA-RISC 7000-series microprocessor wafer)



R12000 California License Plate ( MIPS R12000 )



Cyrix 5x86 Chili Pepper (Cyrix 5x86 microprocessor)



Milhouse Van Houten (Silicon Image Sil154CT64 digital transmitter integrated circuit)



More of this is here:
http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/index.html

Enjoy!

[phelan1777]

That is neat, their "signature" of sorts?

[[XC] Synthetickiller]

Xtreme art? I think so!

Simply cool stuff. If anyone has more of this, post it!

[Sn0wm@n]

so thats millhouse who stole my transistor ....

[Particle]

What I'd like is to see new art on new chips. That doesn't appear to happen much these days.

[[XC] Oj101]

This is awesome, yet somehow not surprising. It's like an invisible trademark

[Olivon]

Nice ! Funny link, thanks

[Chumbucket843]

Xtreme art? I think so!

Simply cool stuff. If anyone has more of this, post it!

http://smithsonianchips.si.edu/chipfun/graff.htm

http://www.chipworks.com/gallery1.aspx

[Caparroz]

Wow, talk about a stroll down the memory lane!

I remember a thread in a brazilian forum about this with these very same pics about 10 years ago. Xtremesystems never fails to remember how old you are.

Thanks for posting, kl0012.

[JF-AMD]

Back in the 80's/90's at CPQ all of the PCB layouts included an image of the code name silkscreened on the board (it was part of the layout design).

You could always tell the best designs because the images were always pulled from the final board spin. If you had a good design you went to market with a beta level board because it was so stable and the icon remained. Pretty sure the original prosignia was code named "grand slam" and there was a tennis racket on the board.

[RAMdHERsoftware]

thats so bad ass

[donitsi]

Thanks for the links!

[ElSel10]

Wait, this is real? A lot of those seem very unbelievable. Cool if true.

[Aerwidh]

Awesome stuff! Thank you for posting this thread, kl0012!

[Armitage]

I go to that school and pass that building every day Neat stuff! Where did you find these? Or how is a better question!

[kl0012]

I go to that school and pass that building every day Neat stuff! Where did you find these? Or how is a better question!

It is not that hard when you know what to look for ... One guy told me that he wrote his name in the chip developed by his firm, using metallic layers (not sure if that true). Then I decided to do a little research in Google ... as it turned out the stuff is pretty old.

[Chruschef]

semi-related, and brilliant: http://gizmodo.com/5547483/circuit-b...s-card-endgame

[BossBorot]

they missed my favorite one

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creature...s/mistert.html

[V0id]

Haha very cool!

[Dr.FuzzyBallz]

Cool i wonder if the newer processors have this.

[saaya]

awesome! thanks

[LordEC911]

Cool i wonder if the newer processors have this.

Thats what I was thinking...

Also, the Ascari A10 is a work of art itself.

[saaya]

so how about mainstream chips? is there nothing on our intel amd ati and nvidia chips like this? if no, then why not?
would be cool!

actually i think its a shame that chips from these 4 major companies dont have images edged onto the lid or packaging... just numbers and letters...

[>HyperlogiK<]

Wait, this is real? A lot of those seem very unbelievable. Cool if true.

Yeah, in some cases people have actually been fired because of it.

[Chumbucket843]

so how about mainstream chips? is there nothing on our intel amd ati and nvidia chips like this? if no, then why not?
would be cool!

actually i think its a shame that chips from these 4 major companies dont have images edged onto the lid or packaging... just numbers and letters...

they dont do it anymore for the most part because automatic wafer inspection tools think that the art is a dust particle and and mark every die as defective. you can go through some steps to get past it but its a waste of time.