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IBM Unveils the 'World's Smallest Computer' (mashable.com)
On the first day of IBM Think 2018, the company's flagship conference, IBM has unveiled what it claims is the world's smallest computer. It's smaller than a grain of salt and features the computer power of the x86 chip from 1990. Mashable first spotted this gem: The computer will cost less than ten cents to manufacture, and will also pack "several hundred thousand transistors," according to the company. These will allow it to "monitor, analyze, communicate, and even act on data." It works with blockchain. Specifically, this computer will be a data source for blockchain applications. It's intended to help track the shipment of goods and detect theft, fraud, and non-compliance. It can also do basic AI tasks, such as sorting the data it's given. According to IBM, this is only the beginning. "Within the next five years, cryptographic anchors -- such as ink dots or tiny computers smaller than a grain of salt -- will be embedded in everyday objects and devices," says IBM head of research Arvind Krishna. If he's correct, we'll see way more of these tiny systems in objects and devices in the years to come. It's not clear yet when this thing will be released -- IBM researchers are currently testing its first prototype.
...any day now.
So they added some memory to an existing SoC?
It can also do basic AI tasks, such as sorting the data it's given
So it's a bunch of integer calculators. uint8 or uint16. Like the old FPU less machines of yester year.
Blockchain and AI in one press release? I Best Buy some IBM stock.
Computers once filled an entire room. Now they are smaller than a grain of salt and more powerful. This means that all things are now possible. AI and trips to Mars. Quantum Computing. We just need to sit back and wait for it all to happen.
It can also do basic AI tasks, such as sorting the data it's given.
Basic AI tasks .... sorting. Riiiiiight.
It's just an x86 microcontroller, but we'll throw in exciting buzzwords like AI, blockchain and cryptographic anchors to see if our stock goes up. Since when is "sorting" a "basic AI task"?
"Within the next five years, cryptographic anchors -- such as ink dots or tiny computers smaller than a grain of salt -- will be embedded in everyday objects and devices,"
How can anyone read this without getting chills on their backs? The current situation is already a living nightmare of surveillance, but this... makes it impossible to keep existing in this world.
Drop hundreds of billions of these from airplane over city, they will connect into encrypted wireless net, and you have "street view", but streaming live from everywhere, even from interiors of houses. If you think your privacy is violated by Facebook, hold on for this!
839*929
A Beowulf cluster that can sit on the tip of my finger.
1. Does it run Linux?
2. Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!
Building a Beowulf Cluster in just 13 steps
How many cluster nodes per cm^3?
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
1/2 tsp processors
Add Linux distro to taste
Have gnu, will travel.
Now the TSA will want to download data from my underwear along with my laptop and phone.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
see sig.
to something, for I/O. I/O. It's HUUUUGGGEEEE!, she said.
Until she said it had blockchain
Blockchain and AI in one press release? I Best Buy some IBM CRYPTOstock.
If I'm reading it right, it has some kind of LED attached and a micro solar panel. Like it can flash or something and run from power from the sun?
I didn't get the impression you can plug anything in to it like a keyboard or even connect wirelessly, unless the article is missing something?
I know, I know, we don't read the article. And this one was crap too. Buzzword noise.
But the block diagram was included, at least, and that's fascinating. Unlike Intel and their little chip, IBM has actually thought about the practicality of using the thing. It comes with an integrated solar cell and an integrated photo-diode communications array for both transmission and receipt of data. It also includes some SRAM. No mention of how many bytes, no mention of data throughput from the array, no mention of actual power consumption (and accompanying heat dissipation).
All coverage appears to be essentially content-free crap designed to pump IBM's stock price.
Maybe somebody can figure out what to do with it. It's going to be difficult since all I/O requires line of sight.
Big deal. Don't modern GPUs have thousands of processor cores? For that matter, aren't there microcontrollers that have been on the market for years now that are a complete SoC, with peripherals like ethernet, wifi, and bluetooth?
..will it run Crysis?
The headline said "IBM has created a computer smaller than a grain of salt" but they compare it to Kosher Salt (Or another variety with the grain size if bigger).
If you want to use an headline like this at least make sure it's smaller than the most popular type of salt. I mean, I've worked in a salt mine where I could find salt rock bigger than your house.
Elok
This comment, among others, makes me laugh. It's not the most common coarseness of salt? Why is a theme of this comment section that slashdotters, technologists, want to deny the legitimacy of technological advancement?
If you look for this pattern on here, you'll start to see it everywhere.
AC because I don't want a bunch of people telling me how Moore's Law is broken, daggamit.
Great, now can we attach batteries and motors to a small swarm of these and program them to harvest plaque from artery walls?
Please?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
And they relate to the subject because they are as small as a grain of salt?
Or just because they taste like salt?
Yes, but can it run Crysis?
A biohacker can't inject a rock bigger than my house into his junk and claim to be 'thinking with the other head' while doing his taxes on his dick-puter. Via the wikfi.
Honestly, I expect facebook to come out with Jewelry that lets you rate the reputation of your meal with this. Then you'll finally be living in one of the Black Mirror episodes. The Nosedive episode, not the San Junipero episode (where the civilization ends by everyone become uploads living life in a retirement village that looks like American TV from the 60s, 70s and 80s until the first major power outage.)
Can one fit a bluetooth adapter and some of that motion power tech? If your can get dental implants with this thing you'd have a Beowulf cluster of teeth powered by blab. With Bluteeth(tm), you could move your datacenter into the sales people's mouths and never pay a power bill again. Rent might be a big pricey if they demand a commission on their oral real estate. But then you could actually get something done in a meeting like serve web pages through your molars as you chew on the free donuts.
"You cannot have a General Will unless you have shared experiences. You cannot be fair to people you don't know."
awww, beat me to it !
How long before marketing realizes their precious buzzwords are now toxic jokes?
This comment, among others, makes me laugh. It's not the most common coarseness of salt? Why is a theme of this comment section that slashdotters, technologists, want to deny the legitimacy of technological advancement?
If you look for this pattern on here, you'll start to see it everywhere.
AC because I don't want a bunch of people telling me how Moore's Law is broken, daggamit.
Let's be clear,
It's an amazing technological advancements, there's no denying it. But I can't stand sensationalism.
They could have said ""IBM has created a computer smaller than a pea" and it would have been equally impressive.
Elok
Should we notify the authorities? Don't go all Kasinski on us bro...
Can it run Crysis?
THE real question: does it still works once it's inside a baby !!?
I believe you meant Morton's law.
It can also do basic AI tasks, such as sorting the data it's given. ...
Ah ha
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
I don't recall a chip named 'x86', who the fuck writes this shit?
I imagined a pollen collector and pollinator shaped like the Planter's Peanuts hot-air balloon but drifting in the wind with a little squid-like airjet engine.
I'm having trouble understanding this analogy. Can someone explain the equivalent processing power in Librarians of Congress per Svedberg?
I am currently playing crysis on a gtx1080 with an i7 6700k and 32 GB memory and it seems to work. I am not sure if a grain of sand can do the same
I can only imagine what billions of these things will so to the environment. We already have to worry about frigging sparkles killing wildlife and now we’ll have animals dying from investing these things...
I print, therefore I am.
No 3.5 mm headphone jack? Then forget it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Have a Beowulf on the end of your cock!
People here react badly to overhyped stats because we're inundated with them and frankly sick of having to sort out what's real and what was dreamed up by someone in sales.
The memory chip on the motherboard is 1/4 the size of the logic unit. To say that it can perform like an IBM AT computer of 1990 running OS2 is a bit of an overstatement.
Meh, my toaster does blockchain.
Where do I plug in the power cord?
... sound card.
Why is everyone here so cynical? Is this thing super useful and revolutionary? No... But it is pretty damn neat to see a full SoC at 1 mm^2, is it that hard to admit something is cool?
It makes people feel superior to crap on the achievements of others.
Five stars, would mod funny
On a computer that small, it would be virtually impossible to see the screen. The keyboard is probably a bit cramped as well.
Ya, exactly what I was thinking, varies with the size of salt...
They specifically say grain, which is obviously untrue, or at least misleading as people think of a grain of table salt. That isn't even course sea salt, or even kosher salt. The picture looks like "Rock Salt" of a particularly lumpy variety. Most of the stuff I use on my driveway is finer than that stuff. I mean "Salt" can come in just about any dimensions you want, but I am not sure I would call it a "grain". We just bout a Salt Lamp for a friends housewarming gift and that "grain" probably weighed 40-50lb...
Given all that, I'm not sure why they even used the grain of salt analogy at all given it's size. Sure it is small, but it isn't that much smaller than a lot of embedded chips.
EETech1 wins the internet today.
It's intended to help track the shipment of goods and detect theft, fraud, and non-compliance. If he's correct, we'll see way more of these tiny systems in objects and devices in the years to come.
Non-compliance? Way more?
Your socks and underwear (Lightspeed Briefs?) were not able to verify compliance and cannot be worn today.
To make this discussion more meaningful, there has to be a way to simulate it's instruction set and architecture to get a true feel of what it can do. Is it truly an 8086 instruction set? Then we need to know available addresses of memory, what registers it has including the status register, what instructions are missing, what interrupt vectors are available? Is it nothing more than an embedded processor with no operating system? What address does it turn to when it turns on? All that and more needed for a decent simulation. Then we can tell if IBM is just looking for publicity, like they did with their 3D memory stunts, or whether they actually intend to manufacture it.
The illustration shows only RAM, and no ROM, so it has to have at least two states: program load, and program execution. Do you have to burn the program onto the chip? Or what feeds the program load? Judging by the example, it looks like you have to burn your own program, meaning that you need special equipment to do that. All the more need for a simulator to debug your program before you burn it in and do something useful with it.