Intel came up with a new Quad core chip

[wayne bradbury]

I just read about this in the paper today and its rumoured to go into the new powermac towers or what ever they are now called. But there will be 2 quad core chips in the beast.

That will be fucking insane! Also the same article in the paper I read said they are pretty close to getting up to 32 cores on a single chip!

 

[Dr. Grinch]

Originally posted by wayne bradbury
I just read about this in the paper today and its rumoured to go into the new powermac towers or what ever they are now called. But there will be 2 quad core chips in the beast.

That will be fucking insane! Also the same article in the paper I read said they are pretty close to getting up to 32 cores on a single chip!

Welcome to the future of the processor. We've hit the theoretical speed limits of Silicon transistors (gates are too small, voltage bleed is too high) so we just start building cores onto single dies.
This will play a big role in virtualization in the future. Doesn't mean shit for today's consumer though.

 

[zoo]

^^ short term future

the long term future will first involve diamond semi conductors, and later on "real" quantum computers!

yay!

 

[xtcfreak]

Cant wait for time travel.

Jay

 

[Dr. Grinch]

Originally posted by zoo
^^ short term future

the long term future will first involve diamond semi conductors, and later on "real" quantum computers!

yay!

Short term being next 3-5 years, which in the terms of processor life span is a loooong time.
Unless a breakthrough on the silicon wafer front happens...

 

[deafplayer]

What about Optical Computers?? or have the Alpha Centuari Datalinks led me astray...

 

[zoo]

i dont' think a breakthrough is likely since intel is already pushing transistors in the double digit nm range, which is beyond tiny

although this was posted on slashdot recently and is very interesting:

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70190-0.html?tw=rss.index

magnetic logic circuits on the nanoscale level, already being developed + tested

 

[Dr. Grinch]

Originally posted by zoo
i dont' think a breakthrough is likely since intel is already pushing transistors in the double digit nm range, which is beyond tiny

although this was posted on slashdot recently and is very interesting:

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70190-0.html?tw=rss.index

magnetic logic circuits on the nanoscale level, already being developed + tested

Really neat, but definitely science fiction in the immediate future. While they are on their way to making a processor out of magnetic fields, the rest of the equation, ie: the parts required to interpret that information seems to be an unknown. You'd be talking about a seriously radical change in conventional PCs. You'd no longer have a chip and socket type setup from the sounds of things.

 

[zoo]

yeah, that (and the fact that it's still a developing field) also holds back the 'quantum* computer' from being anything but a pipedream in our lifetimes ..

* i attended a general quantum computing + cryptography lecture by this dude:
http://www.perimeterinstitute.ca/personal/dgottesman/

and it was super interesting ..



it's depressing that there's not much we can do but run our current technology in parallel ... if in another 10 years intel starts making transistors that approach the single digit nm scale ... they're no longer dealing with 'classical' physics, which basically means we hit a brick wall.

perhaps we -already- have enough raw computing power though? (never!)