cavehoark - Slashdot User

Submission + - Intel Aims For 1000-Petaflop Supercomputer By 2018 (itproportal.com)

Submitted by siliconbits on Monday June 20, 2011 @11:43AM

siliconbits writes: Intel has laid down its roadmap in terms of computing performance for the next seven years in a press release; in addition, it revealed its expectations until 2027 in one deck of slides shown last week. The semiconductor wants a supercomputer capable of reaching 1000 Petaflops (or one Exaflop) to be unveiled by the end of 2018 (just in time for the company's 50th anniversary) with four Exaflops being the upper end target by the end of the decade.The slide that was shared with us also shows that Intel wants to smash the ZettaFlop barrier — that's one million Petaflops or one billion Teraflops — sometimes before 2030. This, Intel expects, will allow for significant strides in the field of Genomics research, as well as much more accurate weather prediction (assuming Skynet or the Matrix hasn't taken over the world).

Submission + - US nuke regulators weaken safety rules (yahoo.com)

Submitted by Raenex on Monday June 20, 2011 @11:03AM

Raenex writes: An investigation by the Associated Press has found a pattern of safety regulations being relaxed in order to keep aging nuclear power plants running. From the article: "Reactor parts or systems fall out of compliance with the rules. Studies are conducted by the industry and government, and all agree that existing standards are 'unnecessarily conservative.' Regulations are loosened, and the reactors are back in compliance."

Submission + - Skype Execs Purged On Eve Of MS Takeover (itworld.com)

Submitted by

jfruhlinger

on Monday June 20, 2011 @10:47AM

jfruhlinger writes: "You might think that the executive team that engineered a lucrative buyout for their company would be rewarded. But eight execs from Skype instead found themselves fired just before their company was formally taken over by Microsoft. It appears that this move isn't meddling from Redmond; rather, the private equity firm that owns a 70 percent stake in Skype wanted to cut back on the payout to company execs that would normally accompany this kind of transaction."

Comment National Solar Thermal Test Facility (Score 4, Informative) 361

by cavehoark on Sunday October 23, 2005 @01:49PM (#13858521) Attached to: Archimedes Death Ray in San Francisco

When completed in 1978, the National Solar Thermal Test Facility cost just over $21 million. The NSTTF is an array of 222 focusable mirrors, or heliostats, covering 8 acres (7 football fields), located on the grounds of Sandia National Laboratory at the edge of Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The mirrors (facets) are focused onto a receiver or target mounted on a tower. The NSTTF tower is 200 feet tall, and its 8-foot-thick foundation is 50 feet below ground. The mirrors can direct up to 5 megawatts of solar radiation onto the receiver or other experimental objects. An uncooled object placed in the beam can be quickly raised to temperatures of over 4000 degrees F.

The mirrors are mounted on individual frames that are tipped up and down and rotated east to west by small motors much like those used in electric clocks. The motors are controlled by a computer which determines how to position each heliostat so that its reflection hits the receiver at any time of the day and any day of the year. The mirrors are made of two layers of glass with reflective silver between the glass layers. The quality of the glass is like that in your windows at home. The silver in one heliostat (25 mirrors-in one frame) weighs only about 1 ounce. Rain, snow, and other natural forms of moisture actually help keep the mirrors clean by washing away accumulated dust. Hail and dust storms have not harmed the mirrors. Only hail over 1 inch in diameter is likely to break the mirrors.

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