Paint-on Laser Brings Optical Computing Closer 132
holy_calamity writes "New Scientist has a story about a laser made by painting a solution of semiconductor crystals onto glass. It could be used to break the interconnect barrier by having optical interconnects, the interconnect barrier threatens Moore's law unless a faster way of connecting chips is found."
Applications (Score:5, Funny)
Sincerely,
Dr Evil.
Was paint by numbers (Score:4, Interesting)
Optical interconnects could make for far more reliable connections between system components. Ribbon cables etc break easily, and are a real nightmare for assembly. OTOH, a few specks of dust in an optical connection could cause a lot of grief (reflection etc) making one wonder what the longterm prospects of shipping optically connected products are.
Re:Was paint by numbers (Score:2)
Laser Graffiti! (Score:2, Offtopic)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? Maxwell 101 (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? Maxwell 101 (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? Maxwell 101 (Score:3, Informative)
The travel itself, no. The wavefront of "pressure" moving along the path of the electrons, yes. The electrons themselves move at only (depending heavily on current and wire diameter) around 1-10cm per hour.
But the wave still only travels somewhere between
Does the difference there reall
Re:Whaaah? Maxwell 101 (Score:1)
It starts to at high frequencies (Score:4, Interesting)
It's not a problem yet, that I know of, but something that we have to think about in the future.
Re:It starts to at high frequencies (Score:2)
Re:Whaaah? Maxwell 101 (Score:1)
That is still a lot slower than the signal propagation velocity, which is comparable to the speed of light (0.7c or so), subject to reactive loading.
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2, Insightful)
Room temperature processors anyone? This would be great for eliminating the wear and tear and thermal breakdown caused by heating
Re:Whaaah? (Score:3, Informative)
What the hell do imperfections have to do with it? Nothing with mass can move at the speed of light. You seem to be suggesting that if the conductor was perfect, the electrons could move at the speed of light. What sort of crazy talk is that?
Anyway, the electrons have a net speed on the order of just millimeters pe
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2)
Actually it IS a problem. Getting the clock signal around a modern CPU is actually pretty tricky as I understand it. (Note Disclaimer.)
The problem is that electrons do flow significantly slower than light, and at close to 4,000,000,000 signals a second, it's absolutely v
Re:Whaaah? (Score:5, Informative)
yes. inductance slows electrons down and electrical traces can't touch each other so they have to be drawn around each other - laser light beans can pass through one another with no interference. So the traces can be more direct and hence faster. Finally, the scale of components in a processor has gotten small enough that individual traces are interfering with one another inductively and on a quantum level - these don't happen with light.
Re:Whaaah? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
More particularly electric signals are not propagated through the sea of free electrons like sound through a gas. The electrons are necessary to deliver actual current at the other end, but the information transfer in a high frequency circuit is virtually all electromagnetic. The electrons vibrate sympathetica
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:1)
Re:Whaaah? (Score:2)
Re:Huh? (Score:2)
Re:Huh? (Score:2)
Actually, it's probably saying that Moore's law will no longer be applicable unless they can manage to break that barrier, which this could help do.
Call Xzibit! (Score:1)
Interconnect barrier? (Score:2)
So can someone explain what it is... and what exactly the problem is?
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:4, Insightful)
take your standard Network. Incoming ISP network, Local Router, cables, computers.
Now take a Fiber optic version of that. Fiber from ISP, to Interconnect, to router, cables and computers. Sometimes they can even make the lines to the machines fiber as well but not always.
Basically in order to have fiber optics everytime you hit a junction you have to convert the signal to electrical, sort it, and then convert it back to light. That process slows down the overall data transfer rate considerably.
What they are trying to do is make it so that you can plug the fiber right into your computer and have the signal remain as light the entire distance it travels. This will increase bandwidth and speed of the networks signifcantly just be replacing routers.
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:2)
I think I'll trust Enigma_Man and this has something to do with the connections between chips.
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:1)
Obviously though, from the article yet again:
That s
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:1)
The process of recreating the signal would still be needed to remove unwanted noise which means a computer needs to identify each 1 and each 0 then send those back out again the same as if they were being converted to electrical signals.
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:1)
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:4, Funny)
Well in this case they have developed a way to create an infrared laser small enough to go inside a CPU.
Optical computers Here we come. BSOD's will really turn your computer Blue.
Re:Interconnect barrier? (Score:4, Funny)
But will we have... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:But will we have... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:But will we have... (Score:1, Redundant)
Re:But will we have... (Score:1)
Someone mod the OP up. It's a moral imperative.
Re:But will we have... (Score:2)
Re:But will we have... (Score:1)
Why am I the ONLY one who has that dream????
Re:But will we have... (Score:1)
Re:But will we have... (Score:2)
Re:But will we have... (Score:1)
(did i remember to check post as ac? oops)
Dang ! (Score:1)
Re:Dang ! (Score:3, Funny)
Actual Moore's Law (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Actual Moore's Law (Score:1)
Re:Actual Moore's Law (Score:1)
It has a second part about decreasing costs.
Not only will transistor size decrease, increasing transistor count exponentially,
but the cost to produce the second chip with 2x the transistors will be less than the original.
Here's my source: http://www.intel.com/technology/silicon/mooreslaw
"Faster" (Score:2)
Light would have the ability to be switched much more quickly, but if you're going to switch it with electricity based circuits.....
Speed increase (Score:5, Informative)
The article and summary seem to be a bit misleading and vauge about how the speed increase arrises. The great benefit of optical computing is that it allows the signals to get much much closer together than electronic circuits, and as such allow more compact circuits, which as we know generally means faster. Interestingly, electronic signals in wires and optical signals in fibers have roughly identical upper speed limits (light in free-space optical computers is faster, but also almost impossible to do anything useful with), so its the density which is the major factor.
Electrons are charged, so as you squeeze transistors closer together, the wires get thinner and closer together, and you get cross-talk and interference between them. Photons however hardly interact at all, so you can have many beams in the same space, and theres very little heat to be dissipated. Multiplw frequencies can also be used, resulting in massivly parallel computing (another GoodThing).
There are downsides with optical computing still, photons cannot be stopped and stored (easily), meaning any kind of useful computer in the near term is likely to be some sort of electro-optical hybrid, with photons carrying signals and electrons storing them
Re:Speed increase... electrifying... (Score:2)
But, can't they make "paint-on" CPUs? I mean, the CPUs and the interconnects are like hand and wrist, right? Well, can they make them of similar "DNA" and part? Or, are they trying not to "kill off" some sacred part of the CPU industry?
Nonsolution to Non-problem with Moore's "law" (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Nonsolution to Non-problem with Moore's "law" (Score:2)
Quantum.
How do you solve the diffraction problem?
Quantum.
How does light communication solve the Moore's law problem?
Quantum.
Moore's law may be peering out, but mainly due to leakage and noise issues.
Quantum. Also, Bell's inequality. Quantum.
Usually the denser a chip, the less need for wide paths (to cache, RAM).
Quantum!
Any questions? (Give ya one guess what my answer is...)
Re:Nonsolution to Non-problem with Moore's "law" (Score:2)
Ah, the dislogic of quantum-related midnight postings. Good thing I took that Tylenol an hour ago.
Re:Nonsolution to Non-problem with Moore's "law" (Score:1)
nm
Re:Nonsolution to Non-problem with Moore's "law" (Score:2)
Nobody said that it was superior, just easier to make.
>* Usually the denser a chip, the less need for wide paths (to cache, RAM).
You're awfully wrong here: if you look at the history of x86 CPU, the chip density has increased a lot and at the same time, the datapath have been improved (increased frequency) *and* widened.
The increased number of transistor and increased frequency allow the CPU to do more things, that's why it needs better
Bottleneck Slide (Score:3, Interesting)
Parallel dataflow and distributed control are long overdue to the mainstream. Compilable UML is a slow, crude path to it. When I can draw a flowchart of primitive objects, any of which are packaged procedures or other flowed objects, and watch it run, I'll have a much better shot at exploiting all the compute/storage/transmit capacity available at that time. When "compilers" can distribute my data among the resources according to topology and analytical prediction, I'll finally get full use of the machines I'm using. Until then, I'm doubling my HW capacity every year or two so it can use half the efficiency gain running inefficient software.
Re:Bottleneck Slide (Score:2)
You probably don't mean linear programming [wikipedia.org] but sequential programs.
Re:Bottleneck Slide (Score:2)
Re:Bottleneck Slide (Score:2)
a cpu is still a calculator at heart, numbers and actions in, results out.
to realy be able to do proper paralell prosessing you would need to go for cpu's like the ibm cell or similar i think. there you can give each SPU a diffrent part of the "flowchart" and then use the power based core as a general traffic cop.
flowchart programming on top of a cpu designed for proper paralell prosessing, now that would be interesting.
Re:Bottleneck Slide (Score:2)
Threatens Moore's Law? (Score:2)
Moore's Law is only an observation, not a performance goal. Of course it'll go away at some point. Maybe the slowing of density increases points to a maturing of one part of the industry.
Re:Threatens Moore's Law? (Score:2)
It will go away once we stop using transistors.
Re:Threatens Moore's Law? (Score:2)
It will go away once we stop using transistors.
Or when we no longer double the density every 18 months or so.
Re:Threatens Moore's Law? (Score:2)
But then we'll stop using transistors
Future tech indeed (Score:1)
fluff fluff fluff fluff... (Score:2)
Threats to moore's law. (Score:3, Insightful)
Terribly sorry to rain on your parade, but the fact that we live in a 3D world with a speedlimit limits computing speed eventually.
Electrical signals in wires travel (according to rough measurements I did about two decades ago) at about 0.3c (a third of the lightspeed). Light travels at 0.6c (in glass).
So you win about a factor of two by moving to light, provided you use fibreglass to channel the communications to the right place.
If you Aim lasers through normal air, you can win a factor of three. Wow. That might extend Moore another 2 years, but it does not solve the fact that physics limits Moore eventually.
In theory, "computing nodes" can be connected using for example hypercubes. 4 nodes form a square with max communications distance of 2, 8 nodes form a cube, with max distance of 3. And so on.
Wether these "computing nodes" are complete computers, elements of a parallel system, or just elements of a CPU, doesn't matter.
As the dimension of the hypercube increases, the physical placement of the nodes in 3D-space means that the communications links between the nodes starts to increase. The Lightspeed limits theoretical computation speed to what you might expect of a 3D structure.
Re:Threats to moore's law. (Score:1)
The fact that the bits would get were they are going in an optical processor twice as fast as in a conventional processor (latency) is beside the point when you realize that photonic bits can be fit MUCH closer together than conventional electronic bits (more gigahertz) because photonic bits as opposed to conventional bits are hardl
Re:Threats to moore's law. (Score:2)
We still live in a 3D space. Moore predicts exponential growth. We'll hit the limit that 3D space imposes within the next century or so.
Visible light can handle a bandwidth of up to about 600 thousand gigagherz. If you can handle that optically, fine. However currently we need to generate the informatio
Re:Threats to moore's law. (Score:1)
True
"Can you point me to an optical computer having more than 10^3 gates? 10^4? 10^5? Sure, Optical routers exist. But that's just switching. Not really computing."
Granted
"So, for something that's optical already, having a couple of optical gates comes in handy. But for computing it has yet to become useful."
Yes, "yet to become useful", my point exa
Another piece to my Iron Man Armor (Score:1)
Paint-on Lasers! (Score:1)
http://www.legalwarfare.com/index.cfm?attributes.
Warning - link contains strong language =)
Re:How long until... (Score:1)
Mod parent PWNED (Score:1)
Quantum computers complement digital ones (Score:5, Informative)
Shor's algorithm for factoring numbers could be used to rapidly crack RSA encryption. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor's_algorithm [wikipedia.org]
Grover's algorithm can be used to search an unsorted database in O(n?2) time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover's_algorithm [wikipedia.org]
Re:Quantum computers complement digital ones (Score:1)
Re:Quantum computers complement digital ones (Score:2, Informative)
However, a famous physicist/mathematician (whose name escapes me right now) proved that to emulate a quantum computer on a digital one will always require exponential complexity. So the benefit of speed is lost, but for the sake of curiosity and development, implementa
Re:Quantum computers complement digital ones (Score:1, Informative)
His name was Richard Feynman. He sorta founded the subject of quantum computing since he was interested in modelling quantum physics on a computer but found this too be computationally expensive on a classical computer. Thus he invented the notion of a qunatum computer.
Re:Good News (Score:3, Interesting)
Didn't the Russians try this at one point? If I remember right, they had trouble distinguishing between the on state, and the not on/not off state, and wound up abandoning the idea because it was too unreliable.
Re:Good News (Score:1)
quantam computer power (Score:2)
Two processors in one (Score:1)
Re:Good News (Score:2, Insightful)
You know, your post was good until you ruined it at the end. I have always wondered, but never bothered to ask until now (irritation level reached its limit?)... What the HELL is the obsession with "first post"? Does it make your dick grow longer if you get it or something? A real, tangible benefit?
Re:Good News (Score:1)
Re:What is the energy source? (Score:1)