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DARPA Targets Computing's Achilles Heel: Power
coondoggie writes "The power required to increase computing performance, especially in embedded or sensor systems has become a serious constraint and is restricting the potential of future systems. Technologists from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency are looking for an ambitious answer to the problem and will next month detail a new program it expects will develop power technologies that could bolster system power output from today's 1 GFLOPS/watt to 75 GFLOPS/watt."
Do the goverment know of an upcomming energy crysis?
The amount of computation done per unit energy, isn't really the issue. Instead the problem is the amount of _USEFUL_ computation done per unit energy.
The majority of power in a modern system goes into moving data around, and other tasks which are not the actual desired computation. Examples of this are incrementing the program counter, figuring out instruction dependancies, and moving data between levels of caches. The actual computation of the data is tiny in comparison.
Why do we do this then? Most of the power goes to what is informally called the "Turing Tax" - the extra things required to allow a given processor to be general purpose - ie. to compute anything. A single purpose piece of hardware can only do one thing, but is vastly more efficient, because all the power used figuring out which bits of data need to go where can all be left out. Consider it like the difference between a road network that lets you go anywhere and a road with no junctions in a straight line between your house and your work. One is general purpose (you can go anywhere), the other is only good for one thing, but much quicker and more efficient.
To get nearer our goal, computers are getting components that are less flexible. Less flexibility means less Turing Tax. For example video encoder cores can do massive amounts of computation, yet they can only encode video - nothing else. For comparison, an HD video camera can record 1080p video in real time with only a couple of Watts. A PC (without hardware encoder) would take 15 mins or so to encode each minute of HD video, using far more power along the way.
The future of low power computing is to find clever ways of making special purpose hardware to do the most computationally heavy stuff such that the power hungry general purpose processors have less stuff left to do.
So they're researching how to create computronium? Will we then turn the whole solar system into a Matrioshka brain and all live in a virtual world?
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
TI's line of MSP430 chips run using little solar cells. hell, they practically run on their own self-esteem. so scale that technology and bam, you got a super computer that runs on a couple AA batteries.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
If you want to talk about encoding, anime fan subbers are at the fore front. The latest is 10 bit encoding. It has a lot of benefits but what its main downside is that there is no hardware for it, you need to run it on the cpu. Someday hardware like a GPU might support it but that takes far to long to stay current.
That is the reason the general purpose CPU has won out so far, why mobile phones and tablet come with them as the main computing unit, because keeping up in hardware with the latest developments just is to slow.
You could in theory build a super computer that can run ONE task very fast. They existed, in fact the earliest computers WERE single task machines... and they lost out because the next task might be totally different and building a new machine for each task is slow and expensive.
The person below (Wierdy) talks about one bit of modern codecs... but this might change tomorrow, as indeed it has with 10bit encoding.
There is a reason DVD's suck donkey balls, open one up and look at what is inside and wonder why the fuck any of it was needed when any PC could easily have dealt with a better format (files max size, subtitle format etc)... because DVD players were purpose build devices and had to be designed ahead of current techonolgy to be widely supported. DVD players being purpose build single task hardware started out obsolete and couldn't change. Of course, the advantage was the they were relatively cheap and became cheaper BUT do you REALLY want your super computing to be this inflexible?
In many ways, the current GPU craze is nothing more then math co-processor of yesterday, or the windows chip on early video cards. They are useful but can't stay up with the rapid advances software can make.
The real money is in making generic hardware faster and more efficient because that is where the intresting stuff is happening. Profit wise as well. What would you rather be selling, DVD players or iPads?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
if this was applied to American companies and western manufacturing ONLY. Sadly, the neo-cons will push for the to be applied to everybody, esp. China.
Yeah, I hate it when those xenophobic racist neo-cons push to share our advances with China (who has the fastest-growing need for power and one of the dirtiest power sources, namely coal). Hell, a move like that just might reduce poverty AND pollution, and no one wants that!
Thank god we liberals know that the only way to make the world a better place is to reflexively oppose not just everything the conservatives do, but everything we imagine they might do!
the problem is finding a superconductor that will operate at room temperature
That insight, and $4.99, will get you a cup of coffee at starbucks.
Maybe if we had a bunch of high-power supercomputers (ideally with low power consumption), we could run more atomic- or quantum-level simulations, research, etc, and find such a room-temperature superconductor!
P.S. On a related note, I have a great idea for improving cities, reducing pollution, and eliminating commute times: just invent teleportation! It would be much more effective than wasting time with incremental side project like hybrids, smart traffic management, public transportation, etc.
Is there any sort of rule of thumb when measuring power consumption - ie, X amount of processing uses Y blocks of power? Is there a theoretical minimum requirement of energy to perform certain types of calculations?
Hope someone else bumps you.
Of course, I am not a liberal. But the problem is that China is cheating at WTO/IMF/FTAs. So, paying for tech like this and then allowing it to simply transfer to there because a bunch of neo-cons say to transfer.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The ones that have pushed to have tech transfered to China has NOT been dems. It has been neo-cons when W was in office. While the neo-cons are out of the admin, they point fingers to O/dems, but the truth is that much of America's self destructive industrial policies were put into place by W/neo-cons. The question is, when will O/dems roll it back. The only way that they can do this, is if they will finally balance the budget. At the least, get it below .5T.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The real concern is how to maintain the mission critical applications when the power grid fails. The only fallback outside of tons of fuel (And even this won't last for decades) is a sustainable solution.
OK, maybe china's cheating (by giving us goods/services at below cost - those bastards!)
But how did "neo-cons" get involved? I didn't see them (or any mention of politics at all) anywhere in this story until you conjured them up out of thin air. Let me guess: the reason you're not a liberal is because the liberals are way too far to the right - correct?
Besides, the last time I looked, the neo-cons had been out of power for several years, so I don't think you have anything to worry about.
P.S. Neo-cons have been "neo-cons" for 10+ years now, so that's not very new - does the "neo" prefix ever expire?
Sensors and the like are pretty awesome to have.
Indeed.
- BIG BROTHER
Haha. Look up Clinton selling the Chinese our missile guidance technology. It enabled the Chinese to build a space program, and provide cheaper launch services, and also gave them the essentials to build accurate ICBMs. Some folks considered it treasonous.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
The machines already solved this problem in the fictional world.
Korma: Good
First off, the neo-cons are VERY much alive and doing well. They control the republican party. Neo-cons was originally applied to dems that switched to the republican party. reagan was the head of that. The big difference is that the group that adapted reagan's beliefs (changing republican party's core beliefs dramatically) called themselves neo-cons. IOW, they declared themselves a group by doing that. That includes not just reagan, but those that follow him such as W., Cheney, Rove, Rumsfeld, Boehner, Cantor, etc. (though not republicans like Poppa Bush, Nixon, Ford, etc; basically, republicans from before reagan). Even to this day, those ppl remain in control of the republican party.
Secondly, I am a registered Libertarian and support it. HOWEVER, I am also not so stupid as to ignore TANSTAAFL. Why would China offer us up a goods/services below costs esp. since the vast majority of Chinese leaders are opposed to the west, and pour more money into their military than does America?
China IS cheating. And it is designed to destroy America by denying us the industry that allowed America to maintain a solid economical foundation. According to WTO, IMF, and even our FTA with them, says that neither side will cheat the way that China has. And yet, we allow it. Worse, the neo-cons CONTINUE to push it. They fight against any punishment against China. Likewise, when we do the 2009 'investment', it was originally about buying American goods. Why? Because Germany and China made their investments all about THEIR nation. It has been over and over the neo-cons that fight to keep offshoring more to CHina with a coming disaster to America (and the west).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
everyone who checks in at a hospital should have their electrical energy harvested! that way we can pay for healthcare. and all the fancy computers, electronic medical records,etc that are needed in hospitals these days. Even though mortality has not been reduced by any of these measures.
You mean magnequench? The technology that allows us to fly missiles without using GPS and relatively accurately? The tech that China wanted and the DOD and Clinton would NOT allow it to be transferred. But then W/neo-cons got into office, the DOD approved it. You mean that technology transfer?
Or are you talking about Hughes and Loral who ILLEGALLY transferred tech to China and was CONVICTED of such?
There IS treason, but it sure as heck was not Clinton. Sadly, the treason continues to this day.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
A few quotes:
Some guy with an axe to grind about Obama doing the same thing:
In 1996, President Bill Clinton personally signed an executive order transferring control of satellite technology to the Department of Commerce; thus releasing restraints on a wide variety of sophisticated space and missile technology which were then exported to China.
CNN, 1998/05/22,
WASHINGTON (May 22) -- President Bill Clinton on Friday defended a controversial satellite deal with China, even as White House officials delivered documents to the House International Relations Committee about the arrangement.
The president said the deal to launch U.S. satellites on rockets owned by other nations was "correct" and "based on what I thought was in the national interest and supportive of our national security."
Newsmax, 2003/9/29 :
Newly declassified documents show that President Bill Clinton personally approved the transfer to China of advanced space technology that can be used for nuclear combat.
The documents show that in 1996 Clinton approved the export of radiation hardened chip sets to China. The specialized chips are necessary for fighting a nuclear war.
"Waivers may be granted upon a national interest determination," states a Commerce Department document titled "U.S. Sanctions on China."
"The President has approved a series of satellite related waivers in recent months, most recently in November, 1996 for export of radiation hardened chip sets for a Chinese meteorological satellite," noted the Commerce Department documents.
These special computer chips are designed to function while being bombarded by intense radiation. Radiation hardened chips are considered critical for atomic warfare and are required by advanced nuclear tipped missiles.
Judicial Watch obtained the documents through the Freedom of Information Act, a Washington-based political watchdog group.
As I recall from the time, a lot of folks in the military and intelligence communities who were 'in the loop' were really vocal about this. It's been a long time so I don't recall too many details, so this will have to do.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
Sorry but the natural assumption that power consumption decreases with decreasing transistor sizes went out the window pretty much right around the 90nm node. That was the inflection point where leakage went from being a minor nuisance to a major contributor comparable to switching power. Leakage goes up with decreasing transistor size, and so now it's a struggle to make sure that the new generation of part uses merely the same amount of power as the previous generation.
Lowering the power of devices today is more about driving your design with reducing power in mind, rather than counting on process technology to do it for you.
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