Interesting view of the implications of Moore's Law

There are limits to what Moore's law can do.

You could buy a 4 GHz PC processor in 2004. In 2013 you could buy a 5 GHz PC processor. WooHoo! :-/ That period is 6 doublings in Moore's law. While it used to be that clock-speed had a Moore's law-like equivalent, you can't buy a 20+ GHz PC processor. More transistors is great, but there are limits (power dissipation among them - you can't dump more than about 50W into a square cm of Si before it gets too hot to work properly). E.g. the P4 was 217 mm^2 (2.17 cm^2) and maximum power was 115W or about 53 W/cm^2.

Higher density and lower power consumption generally means lower speeds. You're not going to see a 5 GHz MacBook Air anytime soon. ;-)

The ITRS is the bible on where the semiconductor industry thinks it is going and the challenges that need to be solved. The 2013 Roadmap has lots of details.

I'd be very skeptical that the advances we have seen in computing in the last 20 years are going to continue at the same pace for the next 20 years without some breakthroughs. But at some point, things will be "good enough". E.g. I can't see the need for 10,000 dpi video displays. And our brains due pretty well with a "clock speed" measured in Hz rather than GHz. :-) Parallelism can do a lot. More advanced sensors for interacting with computers would be great. But, as we know, the software to take full advantage of parallelism is going to lag...

Plus, there's the assumption that everything will keep getting cheaper the way it did in the past. In the past, Intel had competition from NEC, Zlog, AMD, and lots of other CPU vendors. Now, not so much - AMD is still struggling. Intel has licensed ARM (as has AMD and Apple), but their continuing lead in semiconductor processing technology gives them a big advantage apart from the instruction-set. If it gets to the point that Apple and Intel are the only companies that can make a profit on semiconductors, then don't expect the prices to drop any longer...

(As an aside - I'm continually astounded by all the effort put into voice recognition software and wonder if the developers have ever tried using them in a busy airport terminal. But I guess they haven't come up with anything better for portable phones and automated call centers yet...)

My $0.02.

Thanks.

Cheers,
Scott.

Post #394,707 by drook 9/17/14 12:10:53 PM Reply	Interesting view of the implications of Moore's Law http://tapeop.com/interviews/100/the-future/ -- Drew
Post #394,722 by Another Scott 9/17/14 6:22:07 PM Reply	Interesting, but... There are limits to what Moore's law can do. You could buy a 4 GHz PC processor in 2004. In 2013 you could buy a 5 GHz PC processor. WooHoo! :-/ That period is 6 doublings in Moore's law. While it used to be that clock-speed had a Moore's law-like equivalent, you can't buy a 20+ GHz PC processor. More transistors is great, but there are limits (power dissipation among them - you can't dump more than about 50W into a square cm of Si before it gets too hot to work properly). E.g. the P4 was 217 mm^2 (2.17 cm^2) and maximum power was 115W or about 53 W/cm^2. Higher density and lower power consumption generally means lower speeds. You're not going to see a 5 GHz MacBook Air anytime soon. ;-) The ITRS is the bible on where the semiconductor industry thinks it is going and the challenges that need to be solved. The 2013 Roadmap has lots of details. I'd be very skeptical that the advances we have seen in computing in the last 20 years are going to continue at the same pace for the next 20 years without some breakthroughs. But at some point, things will be "good enough". E.g. I can't see the need for 10,000 dpi video displays. And our brains due pretty well with a "clock speed" measured in Hz rather than GHz. :-) Parallelism can do a lot. More advanced sensors for interacting with computers would be great. But, as we know, the software to take full advantage of parallelism is going to lag... Plus, there's the assumption that everything will keep getting cheaper the way it did in the past. In the past, Intel had competition from NEC, Zlog, AMD, and lots of other CPU vendors. Now, not so much - AMD is still struggling. Intel has licensed ARM (as has AMD and Apple), but their continuing lead in semiconductor processing technology gives them a big advantage apart from the instruction-set. If it gets to the point that Apple and Intel are the only companies that can make a profit on semiconductors, then don't expect the prices to drop any longer... (As an aside - I'm continually astounded by all the effort put into voice recognition software and wonder if the developers have ever tried using them in a busy airport terminal. But I guess they haven't come up with anything better for portable phones and automated call centers yet...) My $0.02. Thanks. Cheers, Scott.
Post #394,739 by drook 9/17/14 11:28:19 PM Reply	Not the only kind of competition I like his observation that the gaming industry may drive a lot of this. We're probably already pretty close to "good enough" audio, no matter what the sellers of $10k speaker cables would have you believe. But video still has a way to go. As the games get better, you're going to need the new hardware to play it. -- Drew
Post #394,740 by boxley 9/17/14 11:53:56 PM Reply	youngest boy with zero experience in programming and his one bud who is less experienced than him and a fiance who is an art major are designing a game. Using a gaming template/framework and web instructions on c++. That in itself is amazing. We live in a different world. Last time I played a game I got bored and reversed engineered it. Was in the era of leisure suit larry. Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 59 years. meep
Post #394,905 by Another Scott 9/22/14 9:43:08 PM Reply	Speaking of voice recognition... DogHouseDiaries Yup. (via ThisIsntHappiness) Cheers, Scott.
Post #394,914 by drook 9/23/14 1:17:47 AM Reply	Oh, I want to see that -- Drew
Post #394,923 by Ashton 9/23/14 5:08:05 AM Reply	(I think I'm going into my mind.)
Post #394,939 by Andrew Grygus 9/23/14 10:44:48 AM Reply	Much better would be . . . "Hey Siri: Delete all my emails and addresses. Then you would hear the screams and see the tears flowing.
Post #394,949 by Ashton 9/23/14 4:02:21 PM Reply	How about.. Hey Siri, please demonstrate what "rm -r hda0" means, Sure, you can use "pseudo" ... . . (what's that? btw) . . Siri? Where are you? . . . Siri !!! w.t.F. Are. You?
Post #394,954 by crazy 9/23/14 5:16:06 PM Reply	old joke Does voice recognition trigger on background noise?

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