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Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

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Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#41

Post by wtallis »

komali2 wrote: post #30
pkaye wrote: post #7

I'm guessing these yearly conferences will fade away as Moore's Law falls apart and Intel and others will have a harder time coming up with something new to showcase every year. No longer can you rely on process shrinks to innovate.

People always talk about Moore's Law falling apart, and it seems like people didn't see it coming. I mean, I didn't, I'm just a guy that reads a lot of scifi. But I always assumed whiz-bang mathematicians had already figured out, I dunno, the threshold at which a processor can be nanosized, or like how big a processor could become before the distances became too great that due to the speed of light further computatio…

> "But I always assumed whiz-bang mathematicians had already figured out, I dunno, the threshold at which a processor can be nanosized, or like how big a processor could become before the distances became too great that due to the speed of light further computational advancement wasn't possible."

We're nowhere near the absolute limits imposed by the fundamentals of thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, etc. Those are relatively straightforward bounds to calculate but are completely useless for anything but extremely long-term projections.

What we wish we could compute is what the limits are on current manufacturing techniques and incremental advances from that. But we don't know precisely how many incremental improvements we have left to discover before we need to abandon silicon entirely.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#42

Post by Animats »

akuma73 wrote: post #38
komali2 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People always talk about Moore's Law falling apart, and it seems like people didn't see it coming. I mean, I didn't, I'm just a guy that reads a lot of scifi. But I always assumed whiz-bang mathematicians had already figured out, I dunno, the threshold at which a processor can be nanosized, or like how big a processor could become before the distances became too great that due to the speed of light further computatio…

Have a look at this photo: http://m.eet.com/media/1169843/120906_intel_22_3.jpg That's a fin of a modern transistor (Intel 22nm). The dots in the photo are atoms . It's fair to say that Moore's law is nearing an end or has already ended.

Atoms are too big, photons are too big, electrons are too big, and the speed of light is too slow. There's no longer plenty of room at the bottom.

Still, it's not like the physical size of semiconductors is the problem. A CPU today is maybe 100mm^2 of silicon. 4U of rack space can easily hold tens of thousands of CPUs, if you can power them, cool them, and connect them up in a useful way.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#43

Post by snovv_crash »

alayne wrote: post #36
my123 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the Naples 32 cores/64 threads powerhouse is what's dangerous to Intel, especially at its performance level. (datacenter is where Intel probably makes most of its profits, and Naples is eating right into that market)

According to articles on Forbes and Extremetech, Intel currently has 99% of the server market. This is a new product that may affect Intel, but it hasn't done anything yet. So far this is just speculation then.

It hasn't done anything yet because it hasn't been released yet. So of course it is speculation. However, based on the downclocked Ryzen benchmarks I have seen, it should significantly outperform anything Intel has in Perf/W at the 5W/core level. And Perf/W is what datacenters care about.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#44

Post by [deleted] »

gumby wrote: post #31
CalChris wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

custom asic processor Is that like La Brea Tarpit ? Just say ASIC. An ASIC is an Application Specific Integrated Circuit . In particular, a GPU is not an ASIC. Saying Custom Application Specific Integrated Circuit Processor is doubly redundant. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application-specific_integrate... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_processing_unit

I don't think so: a GPU is application-specific, (not GPGPU if such a thing really exists), as are other ones. Lisp Machine chips were application-specific. Various application-specific accelerator chips have been designed for FP, video decoding, security etc. Where you're right is that Nirvana was a chip company founded for this ASIC and I think the term "custom" is misnomer. You could argue that Google isn't a chip…

[deleted]

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#45

Post by alayne »

snovv_crash wrote: post #43
alayne wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to articles on Forbes and Extremetech, Intel currently has 99% of the server market. This is a new product that may affect Intel, but it hasn't done anything yet. So far this is just speculation then.

It hasn't done anything yet because it hasn't been released yet. So of course it is speculation. However, based on the downclocked Ryzen benchmarks I have seen, it should significantly outperform anything Intel has in Perf/W at the 5W/core level. And Perf/W is what datacenters care about.

I'm just trying to relate OP's comment to changes in the conference or even claims about a market effect. It seems like wishful thinking.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#46

Post by dep_b »

pkaye wrote: post #7

I'm guessing these yearly conferences will fade away as Moore's Law falls apart and Intel and others will have a harder time coming up with something new to showcase every year. No longer can you rely on process shrinks to innovate.

I see Intel falling apart, ARM-based chipmakers are still ramping up the curve as usual.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#48

Post by CalChris »

Animats wrote: post #40

Independent developers have fulfilled their function and are no longer needed.

Dunno if you've been to an IDF, but I'd say that IDFs have fulfilled their function and are no longer needed. I went to the Skylake IDF and after a very predictable presentation there was an opportunity to ask questions. It went roughly like this:

What time is it?

The question was what time is it. Intel is an industry leading leader committed to developing customer solutions. We are not disclosing what time it is now. We may be making announcements related to time in the future.

This cost me a day. On the plus side of the ledger, I like Intel documentation, especially their Optimization Reference Manual. But I don't need to go to IDFs anymore and now I don't have to.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#49

Post by ansible »

wtallis wrote: post #41
komali2 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People always talk about Moore's Law falling apart, and it seems like people didn't see it coming. I mean, I didn't, I'm just a guy that reads a lot of scifi. But I always assumed whiz-bang mathematicians had already figured out, I dunno, the threshold at which a processor can be nanosized, or like how big a processor could become before the distances became too great that due to the speed of light further computatio…

> " But I always assumed whiz-bang mathematicians had already figured out, I dunno, the threshold at which a processor can be nanosized, or like how big a processor could become before the distances became too great that due to the speed of light further computational advancement wasn't possible. " We're nowhere near the absolute limits imposed by the fundamentals of thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, etc. Those are…

But we don't know precisely how many incremental improvements we have left to discover before we need to abandon silicon entirely.

Well, it is not as if we will just suddenly stop using CMOS, but the end of improvements is in sight:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_nanometer

If we are willing to putter along with no process improvements whatsoever, then yes, we can keep using 5nm indefinitely. And no doubt there will be incremental improvements in performance and yield at that node.

But we can't, and won't stop there to continue to drive down the cost of computing. It is just the end of the road for CMOS lithography.

Re: Intel Discontinues the Intel Developer Forum; IDF17 Cancelled

#50

Post by ocschwar »

pkaye wrote: post #7

I'm guessing these yearly conferences will fade away as Moore's Law falls apart and Intel and others will have a harder time coming up with something new to showcase every year. No longer can you rely on process shrinks to innovate.

If Intel can't offer more compelling improvements in watts per operation, I would be very disappointed.

We know fab sizing is going to stop being worth it. But bigger dies, with better heat dissipation, and processors that better fit today's use cases, all that should be within Intel's capabilities.

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