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No More Rebooting?
blankmange writes: "This headline caught my eye: 'The End of Computer Rebooting.' Seems that there has been some new developments in memory technology: The new thin-film technology that could give rebooting the boot is based on resistor logic rather than the traditional transistor logic used in most PCs and other memory-enabled devices. It also is considerably faster than current memory systems and holds the promise of reducing the time required to transfer and download multimedia content and other massive files. This is great news, but what am I going to do with the extra hour or so a day?"
So I guess this puts a big damper on Microsoft Tech Support. "I don't know what to do, please restart your computer."
Like your computer, you need downtime (sleep, walking the dog, eating, etc).
If you are an avid computer user, you may only get your downtime when your computer is rebooting. This is especially true in workplaces where people are "chained" to their computers trying to finish a project, etc.
Those ergonomics posters on the wall do very little to get an average 'puter user to take care of themselves.. reboots served some of this purpose.
(Maybe that is why windows crashes so much - it's Bill Gates' gift to the employee!)
In any case, perhaps all offices should institute a staggered mandatory 15 minute inactivity period every couple of hours for each active computer.
Goat sex free since 2001
It just talks about memory that doesn't lose state when you hit the power button on your PC.
We've got to invent perfect software that can run forever without needing to be restarted, first.
Well, rebooting is MUCH more that just recovering the memory content!!
We could easily dump the memory contents onto the hard drive straigh away and we are not doing it (except in laptops, but even there it doesn't always work) This is because rebooting reinitializes various devices and takes care of the time jump (i.e. crons, anacrons, etc). The more complicated your system is the less likely it is that you are going to survive without booting.
Also, computers are now 1000 times faster than 10 years ago and they take much more time to boot (DOS did it in seconds on 286).
The press release doesn't really go into detail, so I don't know how similar (or disparate) the respective IBM and Samsung solutions are. They do both have the same net effect for users: non-volatile main memory.
This is cool stuff, but what hasn't been said is that as long as operating systems and applications leak memory, there will be a need for reboots.
Ciao.
Last time I checked, downloading speed depended on your connection, not how fast your RAM goes. I'm sure my memory can handle more than 1.5 Mb/s but that's as fast an I can download, because that is the limit of my DSL line.
"Da ist ein Technölüst in mein Unterpanten!"
People: Read the frelling article. This isn't 'an end to rebooting', it's highspeed nonvolatile memory that could theoretically be used to replace mass storage and RAM simultaneously. Although this would speed up booting a bit, it would not obviate rebooting entirely.
In fact, on some OSen (cough, Windows, cough) it could be very dangerous - if there's only one copy of the OS code in this combination memory, you can't reboot and reload a fresh copy from disk - meaning bugs have a significantly greater probability of rendering your system unusable.
Sounds like fun, right?
--
Damn the Emperor!
So, when you turn off/on your PC, you don't need to reboot, it can just put you right back where you were instantly. Unfortunately, in the context of a crash/instability, this would put you right back in an inoperable/unstable environment.
Bad writeup.
I found that Watt numbers on the power supply are quite a bit more than the real consumption. The number is the maximum allowed, and is reached only during start-up, if ever.
To make an example, I admin a small Linux cluster with 6 PCs. Each of them is a 1.3 Ghz Thunderbird, with 1.5 gigs of PC133 RAM, an average HD, and a 300W power supply. Most of the time the processors are at 100% load.
All 6 machines are powered with a 2000 VA UPS. An UPS like that is capable of delivering around 1600 Watts, but the load indicator never surpassed the mid level. So I would say that 150 Watts are more than enough for an average PC to operate. The 300-400 watts are for booting the things and spinning the drives up.
This is an appalling summary - and the article is no better.
"The technology is highly suitable for broadband Internet connections, Hsu said, noting that it combines the features of low voltage, high speed and low power consumption."
Yes, fantastic. That's great for those broadband internet connections. Faster memory is always good, but choosing this as an application is just a moronic use of buzz words.
"Ignatiev said the new technology is about 1,000 times faster than flash, which is nonmechanical and currently the speediest memory on the market. "
Flash memory is the fastest type of memory on the market? No, it is a form of non-volatile memory, which is very slow by RAM standards.
"is based on resistor logic rather than the traditional transistor logic"
Actually, you'll find that DRAM in most modern computers are capacitative devices - the techniques to make them are the same as MOS transistors, but they do not use switching to store values, IIRC.
I wish people would not spout such rubbish.
I see the reboot issue as minor, compared to the other potential advantages of this technology. I will expect to be rebooting, for one reason or another, for years to come and am not too bothered.
The article glosses over what I consider the important advantages:
- [assumedly] great power savings. Great for portables and remote embedded systems.
- No moving parts! If this tech can really replace and even surpass in speed, Hard Disk Drives, reliability and performance should make a gain of at least an order of magnitude.
I've been waiting for years for computers to become eletronic-only devices. I've harped before that CRT's (vaccum tubes, for God's sake!) and HDD's need to join the Dodo in oblivion. This new tech, in the common mass storage area (HDD's, CD'c, floppies), along with flat panel technology, would put us right on the verge of that ideal. The last hurdle would be cooling without moving parts.
This is great news, but what am I going to do with the extra hour or so a day?
Find a better operating system.