Accelerator based computing is a tell that this is happening already. Shrinking everything down alone is not bringing the big speedups in performance-per-watt anymore, so what chip manufacturers do is putting as much ALUs as they can on the same die size, curbing lots of built-in management features in the process, that our software programming models have been built upon over the decades. Hardware is still getting faster at Moore's law, but only given constantly adapting software, i.e. "The Free Lunch Is Over"[1].
Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
21–30 of 47 posts
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#22No. Every single time someone supposes that any piece of technology is approaching its limits, the answer is no. Technology will continue to improve and advance as we make new discoveries. The simple fact is we do not know the future, so pretending like we know what things will be like in 20 or 50 years is just pointless. What's with this obsession of taking today's technological knowledge and assuming that things wo…
Things will drastically change. But given piece of technology has its limits. Assuming it does not is like expecting horses to run faster than sound some time ago.
"If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, then the meal was cooked long ago."
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#23No. Every single time someone supposes that any piece of technology is approaching its limits, the answer is no. Technology will continue to improve and advance as we make new discoveries. The simple fact is we do not know the future, so pretending like we know what things will be like in 20 or 50 years is just pointless. What's with this obsession of taking today's technological knowledge and assuming that things wo…
That's a very unreasonable point of view. Sure, it's true that in the past 200 years we've had an explosion of technological progress but there's absolutely no reason to assume that it's possible to continue it for an infinite amount of time. It's rather more likely that over time we'll discover the lines that separate "hard but possible" from "theoretically impossible given the physics of this universe". The only re…
In terms of the limits of computer development, we have a way to go yet before we make something like a Matrioshka brain.
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#24The answer to this question is yes. People like to talk about how the real issue is economics, not physics, but the inability to make chips much smaller economically is very much a reflection of physical constraints on the processes we're currently using to manufacture chips (particularly the lithographic process), and as of right now there's no clear successor to those processes that's going to enable them to get smaller for cheaper.
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#25The question I want to ask is, are generic CPUs now fast enough that people no longer need faster CPUs? I have an i7-4771 on my desktop (bought instead of 4770K because I wanted TSX... thanks Intel ;), and I can't really imagine much use for an even faster CPU unless I'm gaming or doing heavy compute work.
> I can't really imagine much use for an even faster CPU
Come on, do you really want to admit that you have such poor imagination? Surely there should be uses for ever more processing power. The question should be rather - how can we get this processing power economically.
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#26Depends on exactly what you mean. You can keep adding cores until the cows come home. And I don't really buy the "we don't know how to use all those extra cores" argument. Multi-threaded code isn't the rocket science it's portrayed to be in the press.
One thing that may become practical is die stacking, depending on what they can do about extra heat.
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#27The answer to this question is yes. People like to talk about how the real issue is economics, not physics, but the inability to make chips much smaller economically is very much a reflection of physical constraints on the processes we're currently using to manufacture chips (particularly the lithographic process), and as of right now there's no clear successor to those processes that's going to enable them to get sm…
Isn't ASML still pursuing EUV?
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#28The question I want to ask is, are generic CPUs now fast enough that people no longer need faster CPUs? I have an i7-4771 on my desktop (bought instead of 4770K because I wanted TSX... thanks Intel ;), and I can't really imagine much use for an even faster CPU unless I'm gaming or doing heavy compute work.
I think gaming is still the big issue. I have an i7-4800MQ and frequently do large compiles. At first, my computer became almost unusable during compiles, which I attributed to the CPU being hogged by the compiler. I recently switched to doing my builds on an external hard-drive and no longer notice any performance difference when I am compiling.
I don't remember the last time I have seen my CPU running near 100% (other than by a process that shouldn't be doing anything and is probably in a while(true) type loop that would eat up any amount of speed), but I do remember plenty of times when my computer was slow, and my hdd led was solid every time.
EDIT: I suppose this does suggest a use for extra CPU: harddrive compression
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#29A metric that really puts things in perspective is the following: take a common consumer CPU, clocked at 3.4Ghz. That means it executes 3,400,000,000 cycles per second. Divide the speed of light by this number, and you obtain approximatively 0,088m. During the time your standard desktop CPU takes to finish a cycle, light only travels 9 centimeters.
I'm not really sure how that puts things into perspective. I actually have no concept of how fast photons are whizzing around the room.
Re: Are processors pushing up against the limits of physics?
#30The question I want to ask is, are generic CPUs now fast enough that people no longer need faster CPUs? I have an i7-4771 on my desktop (bought instead of 4770K because I wanted TSX... thanks Intel ;), and I can't really imagine much use for an even faster CPU unless I'm gaming or doing heavy compute work.
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