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Intel Predicts Ubiquitous, Almost-Zero-Energy Computing By 2020
MrSeb writes "Intel often uses the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) as a platform to discuss its long-term vision for computing as well as more practical business initiatives. This year, the company has discussed the shrinking energy cost of computation as well as a point when it believes the energy required for 'meaningful computing' will approach zero and become ubiquitous by the year 2020. The idea that we could push the energy cost of computing down to nearly immeasurable levels is exciting. It's the type of innovation that's needed to drive products like Google Glass or VR headsets like the Oculus Rift. Unfortunately, Intel's slide neatly sidesteps the greatest problems facing such innovations — the cost of computing already accounts for less than half the total energy expenditure of a smartphone or other handheld device. Yes, meaningful compute might approach zero energy — but touchscreens, displays, radios, speakers, cameras, audio processors, and other parts of the equation are all a long way away from being as advanced as Intel's semiconductor processes."
I can't wait to overclock those chips so high that I need liquid cooling! Sounds like a fun project.
"Almost" ?? As in "I almost saw one camel today"?
My Psion Series 3a computed "meaningfully" on a couple of AA batteries for days.
touchscreens, displays, radios, speakers, cameras, audio processors, and other parts of the equation are all a long way away from being as advanced as Intel's semiconductor processes
It may not be possible at all to lower the power consuption of certain devices below a certain absolute threshold. No matter how advanced, a WiFi device has got to consume at least the power needed to reach other devices. A backlit screen will use at the very least the power it emits in light, etc... It is not simply a matter of technological advances.
That said: amazing prospect. Hope it's not just bold claims no substance. It would really be fantastic.
I wouldn't say that Intel is sidestepping those problems because they're not THEIR problems to address.
Yes, meaningful compute might approach zero energy — but touchscreens, displays, radios, speakers, cameras, audio processors, and other parts of the equation are all a long way away from being as advanced as Intel's semiconductor processes.
I think the author misunderstood what "ubiquitous" means. It means you can put serious computing power anywhere, including in places that don't have displays, cameras, etc. He's just thinking, "How far can they reduce the power use of my existing smartphone?" The real question is, "What completely new types of devices become practical when computing requires hardly any power at all?"
Also, the situation is better than he suggests. Bright, super high resolution LED or LCD displays take a lot of power, but eInk displays use hardly any power at all. That's why battery life is measured in hours for an iPad and in weeks for a Kindle. LTE radios use a lot of power, but 3G is fine for most applications, and even 2G is more than sufficient in many cases (not for web browsing, but for a device that just needs to exchange limited data with the outside world).
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
When people think of the limits of strong AI (if they do at all) they generally focus on how complex it must be to create.
Complexity, however, is not the limiting factor. It is the fact that existing computers, compared to the brain, are energy hogs of epic proportions. The brain's energy use is on the order of millions of times more efficient than even the most power stingy CPU. Even of we knew how to accomplish strong AI we couldn't power the computer capable of supporting it.
That is, however, unless Intel reaches it's goals.
Regarding energy requirements for a display and touchscreen, those are both greatly reduced with glasses (which, owing to their small size, are also the devices for which low power consumption is most important). Glasses are much closer to the eye, and ideally can direct the light directly to the eye. Modern displays are designed for maximum angle of visibility - they spew light over 180 degrees, on purpose, so they can be viewed from almost any angle. They are inefficient by design. So glasses can use much, much less power for display because they can be optimized in a number of ways.
Obviously glasses cannot make use touchscreens either, but instead use voice input, accelerometers, etc, which are hardware that require very little power.
Better known as 318230.
Aren't there some fundamental physical limits on how low your energy usage can be for a given amount of information based on thermodynamics? Is it just the case that they're way, way less than what we're using now?
For any sort of data storage the energy barrier between the two states needs to be large enough that the system doesn't thermodynamically fluctuate between them very often. In practice, this means that the barrier needs to be several times larger than kb*T where kb is the boltzman constant. For computation there's not any hard and fast rule about the energy required, but there's lots of practical ones...
Although for trivial operations, the energy requirements are absurdly tiny fractions of a joule, I might suggest that for modern complex computing that we perform today, those minimum energy requirements aren't going to be anywhere as near to zero as they expect.
The only way it will really "approach" zero, is if we start demanding less from computing devices. This may be happening in some areas already, but I wouldn't say it's a ubiquitous phenomenon.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
You don't really mean zero. There is a fundamental minimum amount of energy it takes to do a calculation. When Intel says "almost zero energy computing" how far over this limit are they actually talking about? 101% of the Landauer limit? 200%? 1000%?
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this may cause an increase in energy used for computations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
Smaller. Smaller. Smaller.
Smart Dust, is what we're talking about - or at least the early iterations.
Weather sensors that flutter in the breeze and scavenge enough energy to remain active and transmitting at most times - and the swarm *always* transmits.
Flow control sensors that oil companies continually release into their pipelines to ensure that if there's a leak they'll know where it is in milliseconds - there's transmitting sensors outside the approved geometric area.
Microscopic "Sniffers" released into the wind, measuring and reporting the amounts of cannabis, cocaine, explosives, dangerous chemicals...
Sensors to detect fire. Sensors to find out if the gas tank in that burning building is leaking at all. Just point into an air current (strong fan or wind) and let them fly from your hands.
*True* microsatellites, measured in single-digit centimetres or even smaller. (I think there's a minimum useful size for a satellite, but it's greatly related to how many of them there are, also... You could have a continual swarm reaching through the low-energy planetary transfer network keeping in contact with quite small satellites in a mesh radio network).
Making Smart Dust *safe* might turn out to be more of a challenge, though... :-)
But "really-really-low-power computing"... Alongside bio/nano-tech convergence it's the beginning of the real microbots:
Invisible cameras, as a perfect 3D image of your head emerges from the small swarm of the tiniest insects you've seen hover around your head.
Robots navigating through your bloodstream, tiny as hell - yet you've somehow ended up with the processing equivalent of your (2012) mobile phone coursing through your veins and working on any health problems you have (mostly by monitoring, at least at first).
I'm sure you guys can come up with more stuff. Please reply if you've got any ideas :-)
I'm a dreamer, the world is my playpen. But hey, I'm a serious person, I can't dream all the time.
You should probably patent that.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
For any sort of data storage the energy barrier between the two states needs to be large enough that the system doesn't thermodynamically fluctuate between them very often. In practice, this means that the barrier needs to be several times larger than kb*T where kb is the boltzman constant. For computation there's not any hard and fast rule about the energy required, but there's lots of practical ones...
Actually, there is a very similar limit for computation. In most of our computing, we destroy a lot of information, and thus entropy is created. For example, adding two 64-bit numbers to produce a third one -- you've just lost 64 bits of information. For each bit lost, you generate about kb*T of heat.
The general idea to counter this problem is called reversible computing, but I'm not sure how it would work in practice, as you'd have to store a lot of useless information.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.