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Plastic Valley?
An Anonymous Coward writes: "Welcome to Plastic Valley -
Will the next chip revolution use plastic?" We've run several other stories about making electronics out of plastic - this one suggests that it is 5-15 years away, which I think means approximately the same as "We have no idea if this will ever be feasible".
Up until 10 years ago, electronics hobbyists would get circuit diagrams from magazines and 'transcribe' them onto breadboards. In the last 10 years, PCB layouts have started showing up more often in magazines and websites that would be printed to a transparency to make a professional looking PCB to plug components into.
10 years from now, perhaps circuits will be downloadable and printable straight to paper, without needing any components! Think about it, using primer coats in between, you could potentially print 10+ layers on a single piece of paper. If this is what the hobbyists will be doing, imagine what the rest of electronics will look like?
Perhaps solid state will mean exactly that, dense bricks of integrated electronics.
'No user servicable parts' will be more then a casual discouragement to warranty breakers, it'll be a way of life.
Ooooh, now THERE'S a design conundrum...make a cooling fan with enough airflow to keep the CPU from overheating, but not so much that you have to chase it across the room every time you boot...
Sorry, it was there, I had to use it before it went bad.
All the world's an analog stage, and digital circuits play only bit parts.
Philips Research Labs in Eindhoven, the Netherlands (aka "Natlab") is working on it for quite some time now. And it's looking quite promicing. They have a working prototypes now. But it lags on allmost every point: Computational speed, minituralization, and (for the moment) cost. The problem is getting it to market. It will NEVER compete with silicon on the computational speed bit (the conductance of plastic just isn't high enough) so they are aiming on the cost bit(cheaper than 0.05 euro a pice) which is theoretically possible. Result: Disposable computer chips... Mmm. I'll have a side order of PolyLED screens they're making.