A number of system concepts in which the integrity of substrate surface and film interfaces are preserved are discussed. This includes stand‐alone tools with internal clean air or nitrogen facilities with wafer transfer between such tools in clean containers (‘‘minienvironments’’) and single‐wafer and batch‐type cluster systems in which the processing and wafer transfer modules are physically connected. Depending on the cleanliness requirements, wafer transfer and processing are done in pure atmospheric nitrogen, low‐pressure nitrogen, or vacuum. An analysis is given in which the ambient requirements are related to surface reactivity, wafer transfer time, and acceptable surface contamination level. Trade‐offs in terms of capital cost, throughput, flexibility, and film quality are analyzed. A number of different system concepts combining wafer preclean, thin oxide growth, and poly‐Si deposition processes are analyzed in terms of their economical performance. It appears that single‐wafer systems have a logistic advantage in terms of short cycle time and wafer inventory; however, the cost per wafer of batch‐type systems is considerably lower than single‐wafer ones. It is shown that the optimum choice between (fast, high‐temperature) single‐wafer and (slow, low‐temperature) batch‐type systems in terms of process performance depends on physical parameters such as activation energy and the occurrence of undesired, competing, processes.