Will this be the future of computing?

Site Admin Joined: 17 May 2003 Posts: 0

Technology is great isn't it? It's something that we all use for our sources of information, entertainment, and business practices throughout the course of our lives. But there's always been a problem of speed, everyone wants the fastest thing in the world, and at an affordable price! Problems come not with the technology we have to create such a circut of amazing speed, but with the heat that circut would output. They've actually created circuts that blow our current stuff away, but why don't we see them on the market? Because in those test environments, they melted the silicon the circut was printed on. That's right, the speed of that chip caused so much heat it melted the silicon it was pressed on! That's some intense amount of power there, and I don't even think our fancy water coolers could handle something like that.

Well, that might all be changing with the advent of a new process which is capable of creating Gem Quality Diamonds in a matter of days! That's right, they're claiming to be able to create a 3-karat diamond every 3 days! That's quite a bit faster than the earths timeframe for doing the smae thing. This quick reproduction of Diamonds opens them up for all sorts of applications, such as the creation of microchips, which could lead into some seriously fast processors being put out.

Check out the whole article here for more details.

Guess this is kindof like a mid-week speakup, what do you think of this technology? Do you think it could change the computing industry? Or do you think it will flop? Discuss!

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2003 7:07 pm

"too good to be true" "let's wait and see" "yeah right and I'm a flying pig with the king of Iceland in my ass"

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2003 8:49 pm

I would put more faith into this technology than to pour money into bio or even optical processing. I read this last night so I won't read it again, but I believe it said within 10 years it will be very feasible. Somehow it will have to happen to maintain Moores law. Wouldn't it be nice to never worry about your heat ever again, and especially ridding computers of fans. I'm all for it. In fact I'd be willing to pay 10 times the amount for a diamond wafer than silicon.

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2003 8:56 pm

laptops would be the future

UO Staff Joined: 19 May 2003 Posts: 129 Location: UK

I’ll believe it when I go down the shops to buy one. I like the idea of no fans. Smile

Concerning laptops: Since they were invented doomsayers were heralding the end of the desktop. But the end never came, and I do not think that it ever will. They both serve totally different markets.

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2003 9:22 pm

well if we don't need any fans then the heating problem with laptops is gone so that will at least take down the price alot and then more space etc. well maybe not the end of desktop PCs but I think laptops will becaome more popular and of course no-one want's laptop server Wink

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 5:20 pm

Actually, you would still need some extreme cooling for a laptop, as things are so closely packed that if you used a diamond microchip (which would still produce quite a bit of heat) you would run the risk of having either the plastic caseing melt, or your lap be burned by your laptop.

Either way, not good outcomes.

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 5:25 pm

I don't know, my personal thoughts and calculations show it could be implimented a lot faster (atleast on the crystal end of things)

As per the articles math:

3-karat diamond per machine

the "warehouse" will house 250 machines

3*250 = 750 karats per turnover cycle

turnover cycle = 3 days for yellow diamond

assume average of 30 days per month

(30/3) * 750 = 7500 karats per MONTH

And that's just ONE of the 2 facilities they're talking about.... Sounds as though 10 years might be quite the conservative guesstament.

Though hey, I was mainly posting about it as a future article, though I do believe it will happen, it's just a matter of time.

Oh, and Lalli, since when did you have the king up your rump? Wink

UO Staff Joined: 19 May 2003 Posts: 129 Location: UK

Then have a nice diamond laptop case. Wink

If this works out, I don’t think heat will be a particularly huge issue for diamond semiconductors. Silicon has the thermal tolerance of a snow-flake in comparison. Running a diamond CPU at 100°C would be nothing, and you get a portable kettle into the bargain. Smile

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 6:45 pm

well of course a small wift would be needed