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MRAM in 2004?
amberspry writes "As previously reported here and here. Wired has yet another update on MRAM here. They give hope by mid-2004 we will see devices with faster boot up times and using less power as a 'vastly accelerated timetable is being implemented.' Gotta love joint ventures."
I'm sure there probably isn't anything to worry about, but isn't there a chance of problems if you put magnetic things near storage media?
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
"...simply reach out and touch an on/off button to turn off Windows in lieu of going through a ritualized shut-down procedure."
who says we will be running windows by then?
I hope not....
I can't wait to be called out to degaus someone's ram after their system crashes.
I can't wait till this technology can permanantly remember data. AND it gets cheap enough to replace the spinning hard drive. Speeding up the memory read/write times and reducing the memory bottleneck could effect your pc much more than upgrading from a 1.8 ghz to a 2.0 ghz processor.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
A little more indepth view of MRAM can be read here.
Does anyone know if MRAM will be sensative to external magnets? Aka if I bump my portable mp3/ogg player into a giant fridge mag will I lost my data?
Apple free since 1990!
Most people will just grab a beverage or something during the minute (or less) it takes most PCs to startup. I would think most of the people who keep their PCs on 24/7 do it for P2P or [Seti|Folding]@home or possibly to prevent wear and tear on the hard drive (spinning up the hard drive wears it down faster than anything).
Slashdotter are stupid and biased.
Does this mean that when my cell phone rings, my speakers AND my RAM are going to go nuts?
Will my pc run faster if it is facing polar north?
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Clearly, my computer will startup no faster than it does when coming out of Standby mode (which stores the state of my computer in RAM, but requires that the PC remain plugged in). So, what do I gain? Basically, we get Standby mode that works even when you unplug the computer. And, that's still no improvement to the "startup time".
So, who needs their cell phone or PDA to startup faster? Most of these devices are pulling straight from some flavor of RAM during startup, already.
How often do you reset your iPaq? Just when it crashes, and it only takes 5 seconds, anyhow.
What about that annoying startup time on your cell phone? Let's see, only when the battery falls out do I ever exercise that feature.
If MRAM is really 6 times faster than today's static RAM, that's wonderful, but it will have little impact on startup times (see Hard Drive I/O-blocking).
Here's a better link for more info on MRAM. Pretty graphic of an MRAM cell.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced. - Geek's corollary to Clarke's law
I don't want to sound too cynical here, but I just can't seem to get so excited about Motorola working on new innovative technology and continuing on with it. I remember when Motorola phones were the way to go. Even more dramatic an example though is the whole PPC chip. There was once a time the chips they produced for the Macs were just slightly slower than Intel's chips (in terms of MHz...but we all know that doesn't really matter for true performance). But then they seemed to take naps that lasted for years while AMD and Intel kept improving chip speed and performance. Sure...Motorola may be working on this now, but from what we've seen in the past, I wouldn't be surprised to see them resting on their laurels and letting the world pass them by yet again.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
With power supplies averaging, oh, 300 or so watts, that can mean decent savings when you figure it running 24x7.
Arggh.. Someone else who doesn't know how a switching power supply works. 300Watts means thats the maximum amount of power it can deliver before it melts down. It doesn't mean your computer is using 300watts constantly.
And DRAM's power usage is miniscule compared to CPU or disk drive motors. But then, since the CPU is mostly idle (unless you run seti@home or something like that) and drives spin down when not in use, most of juice is being used by the CRT.
I dont know exactly what they're trying to pitch here, except something else to compete with flashram.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The story is almost worthless marketing drivel. How about answers to some very basic questions like:
What is the capacity?
What is "extremely dense" in quantitative terms, and how do they achieve it?
If it's really going to be a "universal RAM replacement", how does it compare with the 512 Mb DRAMs recently announced?
There are many more similar questions, but answers to these three would be a start.
I'm struck by how much the HowStuffWorks picture of MRAM memory (*) looks like the donut-on-a-wire ferrite core memory. All that's missing are the 150-ohm terminating resistors.
I like the idea of a HD-less instant-on PC. One of the great things about my Palm Pilot is that the kids can turn it on and off without any "shutdown" process... although all my kids have known how to shut down Windows properly since they could understand the "To turn off press Start" concept.
On the other hand, it's already hard enough to restart a locked-up PC when the so-called power switch doesn't have anything to do with the power. How will I fix a PC when pulling the plug doesn't even reboot the OS?
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.