I happen to know a bit about chip fabrication since I used to hang around on a forum largely devoted to it. My own interest at the time was gaming computers, which you can read about here:
https://www.guru3d.com/
Moore's Law is still alive and well AFAIK, but we are approaching the limit of how mush smaller the etchings on silicon can get. Soon be down to individual atoms and that is the limit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore's_law
There are only a few major chip fabricators worldwide, say, Global Foundries in Singapore, TSMC in Taiwan and I think Intel own their fab.
I used to run this little 100W AMD Athlon II X4 630 processor around 2010 on 45nm process and it's still fine for surfing the web:
300 Million transistors sounds a lot, and if just one of them goes wrong, the whoie CPU is a write-off unless you disable some cores.
These days, the whole thing is INSANE! 64 cores! 350W power consumption. Meet the $4,999 AMD 7980X on 5nm process:
What does it look like?
And here's the cooling required:
I think it's really designed as a web server, but the really keen gamers buy it too along with monstrous graphics cards and huge 8K screens.
And, of course, integrating high level software on the silicon has sped things up with each generation.
Now I must get back to the Quantum Computer video. I like to be well-informed.
Best, Steve.
https://www.guru3d.com/
Moore's Law is still alive and well AFAIK, but we are approaching the limit of how mush smaller the etchings on silicon can get. Soon be down to individual atoms and that is the limit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore's_law
There are only a few major chip fabricators worldwide, say, Global Foundries in Singapore, TSMC in Taiwan and I think Intel own their fab.
I used to run this little 100W AMD Athlon II X4 630 processor around 2010 on 45nm process and it's still fine for surfing the web:
300 Million transistors sounds a lot, and if just one of them goes wrong, the whoie CPU is a write-off unless you disable some cores.
These days, the whole thing is INSANE! 64 cores! 350W power consumption. Meet the $4,999 AMD 7980X on 5nm process:
What does it look like?
And here's the cooling required:
I think it's really designed as a web server, but the really keen gamers buy it too along with monstrous graphics cards and huge 8K screens.
And, of course, integrating high level software on the silicon has sped things up with each generation.
Now I must get back to the Quantum Computer video. I like to be well-informed.
Best, Steve.
Sometimes I wonder they purposefully delay the advancement. To sell more of the junk they produce.
I came across a comment from the investor end of things. They feel the end will be reached in the 2020's. It wouldn't surprise me if that is correct.
One of the intriguing aspects is the software end especially in respect to desktops. They seem to be very good at using up performance as more becomes available. LOL So called Object Orientated software design has also had an interesting effect on what I run. Linux using KDE.
One of the intriguing aspects is the software end especially in respect to desktops. They seem to be very good at using up performance as more becomes available. LOL So called Object Orientated software design has also had an interesting effect on what I run. Linux using KDE.
I think they do. What they also do is something called market segmentation. Quite often the silicon in CPUs is exactly the same in the cheap slow model as the fast expensive one the gamers want.
To enforce this, often the bios overclockable one is charged at a premium. When I was at an overclocking forum, we found an interesting loophole in Intel's cheapie 2.4Ghz E1600 Celeron. To get it running at 3.6Ghz, all you had to do was solder a connector between two pins. That was it! Naturally I did this. Born hacker... 😀
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...or-e1600-512k-cache-2-40-ghz-800-mhz-fsb.html
@AjohnL. You are right. Each operating system gets slower than its predecessor. Eating up all the gains from faster hardware. I must install free KDE Linux as it goes. You only want to pay for Windows if you re a gamer. Gnome is getting huge and bloated and actually rather bug-ridden, the latest Ubuntu 22.04 LTS won't even fit on a 4.7GB DVD, which is utter pain, and the USB stick install doesn't work in most people's experience. 🙁
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I've had no problems installing from USB 😉 so far. I've run several Ununtu versions in demo mode this way and also installed. I didn't have much luck installing several so that I could choose which to boot It just offered the last one to be installed. My favourite was OpenSuse but the infected years seem to have held back dev on their stable version and many apps I use aren't stable. LOL But when I installed that I could choose which Ubuntu to run. It spotted all of them.
I'm changing to Ubuntu Studio. It runs KDE and has a few apps available that aren't on others. It's aimed at people who are interested in sound and photographers.
Gnome as it comes - a lot of people seem to try and run it with a start button and menu. It's getting more tricky to do. Or change the way of choosing which application to run. Some may be ok with the panels it uses. I tried rearranging their content and it didn't work out.
Both KDE an Gnome are more complex than they used to be. There are other desktops available. Also Mint was popular for an easy life. It did find what ever a particular machine needed.
It's easy enough to download any Linux iso an use an application to write that into a USB stick. Most if not all will run in demo mode.
Printers can be a pain - best to have one that does support Linux.
I always thought KDE was prettier, and I liked the horizontal taskbar....and Kubuntu is a sensible DVD burnable 4GB!
I have finished the @gpauk Quantum Computing video. Have YOU? 😎
Pretty heavy going, and it is 5 years old, as it goes. But good. It covered a lot of ground, like why hidden variable theories are wrong. How encryption schemes like RSA potentially can be decoded one day.
No way can a person grasp all the operations in an hour and a half. But I was convinced there is something in it. Noise is the big problem apparently, and a lot of Qubits get used up as error correction..
I really liked the unit circle representation, where the terms with root 2 in them are superpositions, and with 1 and 0 are classical bits, though apparently the real thing including complex numbers on the Bloch sphere.
And the lecturer ran a real test online with the Liquid Helium cooled 5 Qubit IBM machine which is linked online for anyone to try.
It gave the right answer with a bit of noise on some other digits.
I have finished the @gpauk Quantum Computing video. Have YOU? 😎
Pretty heavy going, and it is 5 years old, as it goes. But good. It covered a lot of ground, like why hidden variable theories are wrong. How encryption schemes like RSA potentially can be decoded one day.
No way can a person grasp all the operations in an hour and a half. But I was convinced there is something in it. Noise is the big problem apparently, and a lot of Qubits get used up as error correction..
I really liked the unit circle representation, where the terms with root 2 in them are superpositions, and with 1 and 0 are classical bits, though apparently the real thing including complex numbers on the Bloch sphere.
And the lecturer ran a real test online with the Liquid Helium cooled 5 Qubit IBM machine which is linked online for anyone to try.
It gave the right answer with a bit of noise on some other digits.
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I'd suggest you turn off the disk crawling and activity searching that KDE has built into it. Gnome has it too. LOL There has been 2 independent facilities like this in it for some time. Maybe one has gone. For searching I use an ap called catfish. It uses the kernels search directly. That uses a database that needs updating when new files are added. Usually not a problem.
There are a number of Linux desktops
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-e&q=linux+desktops
One I should look at as KDE like is LxQT. Many distro's offer it, a good sign. However the same applies to all. Find out if the applications you want can be run on it. Best way to do that is run in demo mode via USB. There will be free apps to write iso's to usb even for windows.
Modern machines boot using EFI. It's been used for a long time now. I installed on a win7 laptop that should have been using EFI but wasn't. The install did the correct thing. Later I installed with an EFI partition.
If some one wants to dual boot with win there will be instructions around. Space is created first with win and win's fast boot must be turned off.
Best get more info from the web.
I’m surprised there isn’t more discussion around this topic. Is there a potential link to gravity?
Perhaps there is a link via the gravitons which are said to comprise gravitational waves in the same way that photons comprise light waves?
However, there the wavelengths involved are enormous.
Look up 'Graviton' on Wikipedia and be as bewildered as wot I am!
A graviton could have a Compton wavelength of around 1.6 light years.
Now look up 'Compton wavelength'!
However, there the wavelengths involved are enormous.
Look up 'Graviton' on Wikipedia and be as bewildered as wot I am!
A graviton could have a Compton wavelength of around 1.6 light years.
Now look up 'Compton wavelength'!
Cathode ray tubes have electron guns, focusing and deflection. Both done via magnetism or an electrostatic field.
Mine’s bigger. You didn’t remember the one where Keiko gets possessed by demons and forces O’Brien and Rom to turn DS9 into one big graviton gun? “Why are we trying to kill the Wormhole Aliens?”. That was the first thing that came to mind after 3233 but I bit my tongue….
why do particle physicists always think there has to be a particle for everything? If spacetime around an object is warped, why should it involve a particle? Similarly, for the same reason why does the propagation of a photon through a vacuum require 'ephemeral fermions'?
Why this is interesting is because, before Michaelson-Morely, the thinking was light propagated through the 'luminiferous aether'. That got debunked, but it seems we've replaced it with the same idea but conveniently renamed it. In other words, as humans, we refuse to accept that something can propagate through a vacuum unless it does so through some medium. There is no medium. Light and gravity propagate through a vacuum.
Deeply confused.
And the lecturer ran a real test online with the Liquid Helium cooled 5 Qubit IBM machine which is linked online for anyone to try.’
OMG, I am pretty sure this 5 Qubit IBM machine is a simulation on a conventionnal computer.
Whatever developpement on a new machine, you do make à simulated one, awaiting the actual hardware to be prepared with software when the new hardware will be available.
In classical electromagnetism, the concept of the 'field' is introduced to help visualise the mysterious 'action at a distance' forces that act between charged particles. For example, 'lines of force' allow us to visualise the attractive or repulsive forces between two current carrying wires.
In modern quantum field theory, 'action at a distance' forces are explained by the exchange of particles. For example, the gluon is the particle responsible for carrying the strong force between two quarks. Just as two little boys can be 'bound' together by exchanging a ball between themselves.
These are currently our only ways of attempting to explain how action at a distance forces work.
We don't actually know how 'action at a distance' works, but we must have something to work with!
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Really
https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/05/how-ibms-new-five-qubit-universal-quantum-computer-works/
Afraid it isn't a simulation. 😉 IBM is a company that in an odd sort of way has a lot to answer for.
Eg The IBM PC technical manual allowing anyone to build one that at the time used a rather dated architecture.
Also "pointing devices" Called something else eventually.
Oh, well ! I had to work with ( sort of ) IBM guys, I have my own and pour opinion about IBM ways.