Intel Picking on Little Chips

[Particle]

haha

This stuff is funny.  I do reply eventually, but you may have to wait a few months.

[Darwin]

Intel just made a breakthrough:

Slashdot:


"According to the New York Times (free reg. req.), Intel has demonstrated a research breakthrough, making silicon chips that can switch light like electricity. The article explains:''This opens up whole new areas for Intel,' said Mario Paniccia, a an Intel physicist, who started the previously secret Intel research program to explore the possibility of using standard semiconductor parts to build optical networks. 'We're trying to siliconize photonics.' The invention demonstrates for the first time, Intel researchers said, that ultrahigh-speed fiberoptic equipment can be produced at personal computer industry prices. As the costs of communicating between computers and chips falls, the barrier to building fundamentally new kinds of computers not limited by physical distance should become a reality, experts say.'"


*edit*
I was wondering, will this spell the end of the heatsink?

[Lidge Farkley]

experts say

whoops...

[Lidge Farkley]

On a more relevant note... it is not likely that will eliminate heat sinks for good.  The equipment used to encode and send and recieve and decode fiber optic data is still resistor based.  To have the two media interract there would still need to be an interface to channel the fiber optic chips to electric data so that the periferals of the computer can interract with out damage.  The problem with fiber optic devices is the vulnerability to damage from movement.  If they were to produce all computers as fiber optic based machines they would need a lot of shock dampening technology implemented and the units would need to be relatively stable at all times.  Not many Californians would own these devices... as earthquakes can be troublesome, as well as trucks downshifting on the highway. ;-)

All joking aside it is indeed an interesting new device now that it has finally been constructed by a civilian company.  Allegedy it was developed by the military years a go but was abandonded due to the lack of resistance to environmental factors (such as physical shock of sudden movement.)  Of course, back then the encoding and transmitting devices were much simpler being that they only transmitted text type or compressed/encoded audio messages.

//ramble...