Faster computers may use light instead of electricity

[babylonsister]

This is greek to me, but thought someone might want to read all about it.


Faster computers may use light instead of electricity
By Robert S. Boyd | McClatchy Newspapers

* Posted on Wednesday, April 2, 2008


TIBM / MCT
This tiny optical switch directs traffic on a computer chip by using light instead of electricity. First an electrical signal is converted into light particles called photons. Then devices on the switch (the black boxes above) route the message from the transmitter to the proper receiver. | View



WASHINGTON — Scientists and engineers are racing to develop ways to use light instead of electricity to avoid traffic jams inside computers.

Today's fastest computers employ miles of tiny copper wires to connect multiple data processors packed on silicon chips. Each little ``brain'' — in effect, a miniature adding machine — must exchange information with hundreds or thousands of partners on the same or connecting chips.

The data — symbolized as strings of zeroes and ones — ride the wires in the form of electrical signals, generating heat and wasting energy. Even so, the data can't move fast enough to keep up with the speed of the central processing units.

``The weakest link in the overall capability of the computer is the ability to move information from chip to chip,'' said John Stroman, a computer design strategist at Intel Corp., the big computer-chip maker based in Santa Clara, Calif. ``Moving information around is the biggest limitation on the performance of computers, and it becomes a greater limitation as CPUs become faster.''

Computer scientists think that the solution may be photons, the tiny packets of energy that make up a beam of light. Photons aren't the same as electrons, the fundamental particles of electricity.

more...

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/226/story/32446.html

[bamacrat]

1. Bad ass.

[Deja Q]

2. Seems a variant of fiber optic technology

And it's only between cores; not the technology itself. Electronics and electricity is still a core necessity, no pun intended...

[Buzz Clik]

3. My brother is a computer wizard, and he has told me about computer limitations...

... due to the use of electricity. Apparently, some claims about computer speed are misleading and meaningless because the flow of electrons through finite distances in wires is the limitation. It's a bit confusing to me, but if that's true, then using light will only help a little.

I guess.

I'd have my brother post the explanation here, but he's a conservative and, well, you know.

[napoleon_in_rags]

4. I've heard its somewhat about how little electricity/light you can use.

Faster means smaller, so littler electric signals. But you get small enough, things stop behaving classically (in ways that make sense) and start getting all quantum, which is where problems come in because they are not being predictable.

[Buzz Clik]

5. Yes, that's the kind of stuff he starts talking about. btw -- about your name...

Is that a Dylan reference?

[napoleon_in_rags]

8. Yeah.

You used to be so amused
At Napoleon in rags and the language that he used
Go to him now, he calls you, you can't refuse
When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose
You're invisible now, you got no secrets to conceal.

Form "Like a Rolling Stone"

[tridim]

6. After reading that article yesterday about programmable, man-made DNA

I'm thinking biological computers might not be far off.

LIVING computers. :scared: :shrug: ?

[Forkboy]

7. I need William Gibson to explain this to me.

[On the Road]

9. Over 20 Years Ago,

I read an article in Scientific American on work towards developing an optical semiconductor, one that would have the additional advantage of being to store more than a simple on or off per bit. In other words, rather than using binary, the machine could use base 3, base 10, or base 100. It would be a cliff-like change in speed and capability.

Been waiting twenty years to hear more about development.

ジャネエフｓリボフン

[crankychatter]

10. can gamers keep up?

just sayin'

[keroro gunsou]

11. 5 bucks says...

microsoft's latest OS for those machines still manages to fuck something up.