Unpredictability in Future Microprocessors

prostoalex writes "A Business Week article says increase in chip speeds and number of transistors on a single microprocessor leads to varying degrees of unpredictability, which used to be a no-no word in the microprocessor world. However, according to scientists from Georgia Tech's Center for Research in Embedded Systems & Technology, unpredictability becomes a great asset leading to energy conservation and increased computation speeds."

Comments

TFA

[shirai]

It is an interesting idea but I think there would have to be a lot of research that goes into this and here's what I mean.

The article is right in that certain things don't need 100% accuracy and that small variations in the answers can yield very good results. This could be important when time is more important than 100% accuracy.

That said, how do we know if the variations are small? Only 1 bit can change a huge negative number into a huge positive number in a standard integer (Okay, I haven't looked at the bit layout of an integer lately but I think it's encoded like this. If not, you still get my point right?).

So perhaps then this idea sort of works when we are aggregating lots of small calculated numbers but then switch to a traditional chip to add them together.

You see what I'm getting at? Computers don't really know that the small variation at the most significant bit is actually a huge variation.

I think there would also have to be a lot of analysis based on understanding how the variations add up and their cumulative effect. For example, a well written app under this scenario means that the errors basically average out over time as opposed to errors that blow out of proportion.

Anyways, I can think of a few good uses for this. Probably the most notable being down the DSP path (which the article metions). Our eyes probably wouldn't see small errors in an HD display during processing or hear small errors in audio processing.

This is parallel to the fact that there is less error checking in audio CDs and video DVDs than their computer counterparts CD-ROM and DVD-ROM (or the R/RW/etc.etc. counterparts).

Re:TFA

[Epistax]

I think you're thinking of things to specifically. Think about the human mind. It's utterly insane in speed, yet completely analog. Digital systems cannot yet grasp anywhere near the computing power of the human brain, yet they can beat the brain in any single (non-fuzzy) pursuit (such as chess). The human brain accels at fuzzy (yes, fuzzy) calculations such as identifying faces. It's quite possible we'll never be able to make a computer faster at identifying faces than the human brain without directly stealing our algorithm because it's the single thing we're best at.

So, we can identify faces really, really well. So well that :) looks like a face despite the fact that it seriously shouldn't. Well, guess what? What if we change identifying faces into identifying something else? Perhaps a computer can identify things in data using fuzzy logic very easily--- what could we do with that? Now we'll always need the truly quasi-100% accurate side unless we're relying on a self-evaluating true AI, so I'm not arguing with that.

Looking back, this isn't really a response to what you wrote, but moreover it's a thing that I type after I drank alcohol, but I think it stands on its own merit. Anyway a lot of research is needed and I'm, sure we can agree on that. It'a certainly interesting.

Analog Processor

[10101001 10101001]

It sounds like this is just another implementation of an analog processor, which is far from a new idea. Really simple analog processors are just a bit of plastic foam used as a manifold. There's even the idea of having 0, 1, and 1/2 (where 1/2 is seen as uncertain) in something called a Lukasiewicz Logic Array. Anyways, I wish the guy good luck with it, though it might be a good idea if he did some more reading on ideas already presented on the subject.

Obvious google search link:
Google Search for "lukasiewicz analog"