You Must Stare Into the Heart of the $400 Million Machine

The mysterious ASML machine is worth $400 million, and companies making GPUs cannot operate without the machine. There is no AI without GPUs, and currently no economy without the concept of an AI that absorbs investors’ money and uses it to create and expand companies and run all the questionably ethical and even more questionably useful economic activities that we may not all like, but which sustain us. for the time being.

A new 55-minute YouTube video is the most thorough and clear explanation yet of ASML’s massive EUV lithography system—a $400 machine—how and why the technology was conceived, and roughly how it works. It’s created by Veritasium, the YouTube channel of science influencer Derek Muller, which only has 20 million subscribers, which sounds like a lot until you compare it to MisterBeast’s 458 million. It’s a powerful, but relatively niche channel, prominent enough to get access to the ASML clean room, but still probably pretty close to the popularity ceiling for a channel about hard science.

At the time of this writing, the video is doing impressive business and has reached ten million views, even though it is about ultraviolet lithography. Luckily it bypasses most of the common corn syrup that spoils your average bizarre epic science video. It doesn’t treat its audience like children. This doesn’t involve a mix of “that just happened” jokes. The feeling is that the creators of the videos respect their viewers and genuinely want them to be more knowledgeable than when they started.

Will you actually be more knowledgeable than you were before watching the video? Speaking for myself, I’m not sure I deserve Veritasium’s respect. A man named Caspar Mebius stands in the audience, and he replies to an ASML man who is talking about the red laser’s wavelength being 650 nanometers, “Something like that, yes.” I can’t relate to that at all. I say “If you say so.” Maybe I deserved a Miss Rachel version of this video.

But you, like me, still want to look into the heart of a $400 machine. You must see the uncanny ease of the mirrors. You should hear in detail how tin drops drip and are blasted by lasers, and how they emit supernova light. You have to really try, and fail, to wrap your head around thought experiments about laser accuracy involving aiming dimes at the moon. Most important: You should see the comparatively crude, jerky dance of GPU wafers getting lithography-ed inside the machine.

At one time it was very important to those in power in the US that China never harness the full power of the GPU. But keeping China out of cutting-edge chips is becoming less of a priority lately. A few weeks ago, it emerged that a Chinese team in Shenzhen had built a prototype of a $400 million machine, defrauding ASML employees. It’s scary to think what all this portends.

The $400 machine will one day no longer be the crown jewel of the tech economy. Moore’s Law will advance, processor power will continue to increase, and the $400 million machine will become e-waste like everything else. A $1 billion machine isn’t far away. Consider this while it still means something.