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Discussions of conventional and alternative energy production technologies.

Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby cipi604 » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 00:45:19

World chipmakers face most difficult time ever: Hynix
The global memory chip industry is facing the most difficult time ever and could experience a slump for two more years if consolidation is delayed, the head of South Korea's Hynix Semiconductor said Wednesday.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby outcast » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 00:54:10

So some of them are having financial problems, how is this related to Moore's law?
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby cipi604 » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 01:14:07

Some today, more tomorrow, Moore's law next year. Think Big!
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby outcast » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 01:19:28

I'm sure plenty of people said that after the tech bubble burst 8 years ago.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby cipi604 » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 01:34:05

Only if this was a tech bubble.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby Minvaren » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 02:15:38

Moore's law is about the number of transistors on a given die doubling every 18 months, IIRC. In 3-4 generations of chips we hit the limit on miniaturization and electrons start jumping paths if we go any smaller. After that... well, we've nearly maxed clock speed, we're multiplying cores as fast as people will buy them, even though noone's writing multi-core programs yet. For most people, everything except data storage has hit "good enough."
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby yesplease » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 02:55:09

Bingo! Granted, memory can influence overall production, but Moore's law doesn't say anything about the industry doubling every two years.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby bratticus » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 04:27:08

Who cares? Computers are already fast enough for me.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby IslandCrow » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 04:31:40

Like oil use and population, in a finite world exponential growth can only go on for a limited time before a physical limit is hit.
We should teach our children the 4-Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Rejoice.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby dissident » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 09:18:52

The memory makers are already producing some types of flash ram on a 35 nanometer process. Quantum tunneling effects will overwhelm existing IC transistor designs starting at just under 10 nm. So the chip makers are approaching a brick wall quickly. There are only two generations left 22.5 nm and 12.25 nm. Parasitic currents will make the 12.25 nm designs a royal pain.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby outcast » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 10:24:26

Minvaren wrote:Moore's law is about the number of transistors on a given die doubling every 18 months, IIRC. In 3-4 generations of chips we hit the limit on miniaturization and electrons start jumping paths if we go any smaller. After that... well, we've nearly maxed clock speed, we're multiplying cores as fast as people will buy them, even though noone's writing multi-core programs yet. For most people, everything except data storage has hit "good enough."



For many people, everything except data storage hit "good enough" 10 years ago.


There are still lots of people who will find a way to use all that extra power. I remember watching an early 90's episode of the "computer chronicles" when they were introducing the 486. The big question was "do we really need all this speed?"
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby mos6507 » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 10:53:45

Ever since CPUs hit 1Ghz it's been good enough for general computing. Some applications benefit from more speed. Games and content creation (audio recording, video editing, 3D animation) being the biggies. What's happened about 10 years ago, though, is CPUs kept getting hotter and requiring bigger and bigger heatsinks. I had an Athlon 700 back in the day that sounded like a jet plane. So now there is more emphasis on making CPUs run cooler on less power requiring less aggressive cooling. And of course there is a lot of work being done for mobile applications where battery life is key. I think it's time that there not be such a hard line between desktop and mobile hardware. There is a need for efficiency gains just in the motherboard chipsets themselves. Right now you can get boards with Atom CPUs on them where the board itself sucks down a lot more juice than the Atom. So the efficiency is lopsided. Graphics cards are also huge energy hogs.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby lowem » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 11:14:03

Here's my Asus Eee Box B202, mounted behind my LCD monitor :

Image

This PC takes up 20W total, and the Atom CPU itself takes up only 2W. It's great for typical Internet surfing and other light duty tasks like Office apps and such. This system actually takes up less power than the monitor it is mounted on (which is 38W).

But then again that's not my primary PC - that distinction belongs to the 64-bit 550W machine with the nVidia 3D card in the living room where it also serves the occasional gaming duty on the big-screen TV.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby bodigami » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 13:02:07

There is also the price of making CPU factories; it's becoming bigger and bigger. Probably there will be a time where only 2 or 3 CPU makers remain: Intel and everyone else; or Intel, generic x86 and "the other architecture (either Sparc or PPC).

It's getting too expensive to just produce current gen CPUs; computing can face a serious slowdown (and if that greatly reduces e-waste then I welcome this change).
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby yesplease » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 13:10:13

lowem wrote:Here's my Asus Eee Box B202, mounted behind my LCD monitor :
Yeesh, for an extra $50-100 someone could get a whole laptop. Not that I don't think low power computing is great, just that that little box is incredibly overpriced.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby lowem » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 21:32:07

yesplease wrote:
lowem wrote:Here's my Asus Eee Box B202, mounted behind my LCD monitor :
Yeesh, for an extra $50-100 someone could get a whole laptop. Not that I don't think low power computing is great, just that that little box is incredibly overpriced.


I think it's fine - the LCD and keyboard would have made up the extra $50-100 you mention. I have enough laptops around, one on that table right next to the Asus box, and my office one that I bring back sometimes. Just wanted something cheap and simple to setup that could make use of that spare 19" LCD monitor. A laptop with yet another smaller LCD would just have been in the way.

Granted, it's a rather niche application (light duty, micro desktop form), hence I'm not surprised that they didn't sell as many as earlier hoped.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby yesplease » Thu 11 Dec 2008, 23:32:14

Even then, someone could throw something together that's roughly as efficient for hundreds less. For instance a 64 bit AMD or Intel system could be thrown together for ~$150 that only uses ~20-30W. Granted, I ain't saying that paying for the fit and finish is bad, just that it can easily done for way less cash.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby lowem » Fri 12 Dec 2008, 02:15:21

yesplease wrote:Even then, someone could throw something together that's roughly as efficient for hundreds less. For instance a 64 bit AMD or Intel system could be thrown together for ~$150 that only uses ~20-30W. Granted, I ain't saying that paying for the fit and finish is bad, just that it can easily done for way less cash.


While I kinda doubt your 20-30W claim for a full-sized desktop PC system, it is true that I could have trawled the local eBay for a replacement Socket 939 motherboard, the local stores for a replacement desktop casing, and spent a day or two tinkering, I just didn't have the time to mess around with the system.

Not sure what currency you're talking about (USD I'd guess?), but in my SGD terms and context, this box cost me S$439.

If I wanted to overhaul my old rusting PC to a C2D configuration, the CPU, motherboard and RAM combination would have cost me way over S$439. Then there's the casing and DVD drive. Typical C2D desktops are going for S$800-1000 over here, and they come with at least 400-500W power supplies.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby yesplease » Fri 12 Dec 2008, 04:40:45

lowem wrote:While I kinda doubt your 20-30W claim for a full-sized desktop PC system
Shoot, 20-30W is cake. I have a C7-D system that uses ~34+W w/ a 500gb HD, an 80 PLUS power supply, and an extra sound card. If I pull the extra sound card it only uses ~28-29+W and I imagine using a PicoPSU (probably what's in the Asus you have) instead of the current power supply would cut off another ~5-10W, and I suppose I could go balls out and use a notebook hard drive to get it around 20W if I really wanted to. I've also tried shoving all that stuff plus an AGP video card (~7-9W) and a TV card (~2W most of the time) into my S764 64 bit AMD system from 2004(?), then undervolting/underclocking it as much as I could and it used ~45W, so w/ just onboard video/sound, something newer (64nm) I could undervolt/underclock more, a PicoPSU, and no TV card I'm sure I could get it around 20W. Here's someone who already has a Phenom running at ~20W. What's great is that the faster processors running at slower speeds can use the same amount of power (give or take a few watts) as the stuff like the C7/Atom/Geode, and at the same time spank them in benchmarks. And, if ya really need it, then just setup the governor options how ya like for more processing power during whatever task.

Granted, not all of the upgrades make sense. The PicoPSU definitely does since it's solid state (probably will last a while) and can cut out ~10-15W, but spending extra for a laptop HD to save two watts, probably isn't worthwhile financially.
lowem wrote:it is true that I could have trawled the local eBay for a replacement Socket 939 motherboard, the local stores for a replacement desktop casing, and spent a day or two tinkering, I just didn't have the time to mess around with the system.
I can't fault you for convenience, but low power computing is definitely cheap and can pack all the punch of a typical rig.
lowem wrote:Not sure what currency you're talking about (USD I'd guess?), but in my SGD terms and context, this box cost me S$439.
So that's what, ~$290USD? A 500gb HD is $50, 2GB of ram for ~$20-30, a PicoPSU/brick for ~$50-60, a case for $20, and a LE1150 combo for another ~$60, so that's ~$200+ for something that'll use the same amount of power and spank an Atom/C7/Geode. More ram, disk space, and speed, probably when it's at it's lower power state too, for the same price, or less if you're thrifty and wait for sales. If you have any used parts around that'd only reduce the cost.
lowem wrote:If I wanted to overhaul my old rusting PC to a C2D configuration, the CPU, motherboard and RAM combination would have cost me way over S$439. Then there's the casing and DVD drive. Typical C2D desktops are going for S$800-1000 over here, and they come with at least 400-500W power supplies.
You may be able to undervolt it quite a bit in order to avoid upgrading. Why not try that, then yank the PicoPSU out of your other computer and drop it in the C2D (provided it's rated high enough) in order to see what the consumption is? The power supply is crucial since even an 80 PLUS version can be at ~50% efficiency at really low loads, ~20-30W.

That said, whether it's worthwhile financially depends on what your electricity cost is and how much the computer is on. There's no point in upgrading a P4-2.8E w/ a high end AGP video card that sucks down 150W if it's only on 20 hours a month.
Last edited by yesplease on Fri 12 Dec 2008, 05:16:52, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Moore's law comes to a halt?

Unread postby outcast » Fri 12 Dec 2008, 05:08:54

Processing power will never be "good enough" for quite a few people. It isn't just the gamers and graphics artists who want more, it is also the engineers and scientists. Take for example the LHC, in order to process all the data they had to design a special, ultra high speed network to feed the thousands of processors needed to processes the enormous amount of data coming in.

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The Worldwide LHC Computing Grid relies on dedicated optical fibre networks to distribute data from CERN2 to eleven major computer centres in Europe, North America and Asia. From these, data is dispatched to more than 140 centres around the world. Together, these distributed computers provide the power to manage the LHC’s data.

“We can routinely process 250,000 jobs a day,” said Bird, “and we can achieve peaks of 500,000 jobs without problems.” A single job can be a calculation lasting several hours or even several days on a single high performance processor. An estimated 100,000 processors are needed to handle all jobs from the LHC experiments.


The sensors on the LHC will put out 15 million gigabytes per year. Mind boggling numbers.....
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