IBM To Stop Using Silicon

[Dicehunter]

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IBM has recently spent a whopping $3 billion dollars or £1,752,694,800 to be exact, On research and development to create the next generation of processors used 5 years from now.

Senior Vice President of IBM stated -

"We really do see the clock ticking on silicon, As we get into the 7 nanometer time frame, Things really begin to taper off".

As of this moment IBM are still making their products on the 22nm manufacturing process which will quickly be superseded by Intels up and coming 14nm Broadwell line up.

The alternative to silicon will be the very interesting material known as carbon nano tubes which you can read more about Here and a small picture below of what a carbon nano tube actually looks like, Remind anyone of Crysis ? ^_^

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The other route IBM "May" take is "Nanophotonics" which instead of the traditional electronic current process it will use light, More info about that subject can be found Here.

Also thinking on the bleeding edge of technology IBM is considering "Quantum Computing", Find out more about that Here and "Neurosynaptic" chips, Find out more on that subject Here.

All of this could theoretically happen within the next 5 to 10 years IF the manufacturing process is perfected which is only a matter of time really.

Source - Here

 

[Antony1995]

Very interesting I wasn't aware there were these other alternatives to silicon. I will definitely have a read about it.

 

[barnsley]

IBM to stop using silicon- decides Witchcraft is better.

 

[Dicehunter]

Very interesting I wasn't aware there were these other alternatives to silicon. I will definitely have a read about it.

Silicon is cheap as chips that's mainly why companies use it but thankfully that's all going to change with nano tubes, Cost effective and if the leaked info is true then it will also be a lot faster and efficient.

IBM to stop using silicon- decides Witchcraft is better.

It's the only logical step forward ^_^

 

[Puck]

So... Carbon Lottery?

 

[Dicehunter]

So... Carbon Lottery?

We can always crush up some pencils and throw them at the CPUs for more carbon to make them run faster

 

[Zoot]

They're supposed to be selling off all their Fabs too, and go fabless ala AMD or Nvidia.

 

[Puck]

We can always crush up some pencils and throw them at the CPUs for more carbon to make them run faster

Haha or Diamonds...

 

[WYP]

We can always crush up some pencils and throw them at the CPUs for more carbon to make them run faster

Nice article man, if your graphite theory is correct what will happen if i shovel coal into my PC?

Silicons limit is around 7nm, most companies only seem confident that they can deliver 10nm profitably (Intel, TSMC and GloFo). It is good to see IBM putting this money down to push the envelope, or carbon, like this.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Ya read about this yesterday. Pretty interesting and they are the only big name fab company to state they are researching other types of materials outside of silicon. If they are the first one to do so and get the product to market first they potentially have the upper hand for a long while.

 

[amAzEinG]

You lost some zeros there.. since billion dollars are 1.000 million
but very interesting

 

[maniac]

You lost some zeros there.. since billion dollars are 1.000 million
but very interesting

Lol didn't notice until you pointed it out, at first I was like, woah $3bn is a lot of money, then I read the £1.7m ish in pounds, and was like, well it not that much after all. Guess he's missing 3 zeros haha

 

[Fringie]

Please make break throughs!

 

[Dicehunter]

You lost some zeros there.. since billion dollars are 1.000 million
but very interesting

Lol didn't notice until you pointed it out, at first I was like, woah $3bn is a lot of money, then I read the £1.7m ish in pounds, and was like, well it not that much after all. Guess he's missing 3 zeros haha

Fixed

 

[barnsley]

don't the Americans do billions differently compared to everyone else?

 

[maniac]

don't the Americans do billions differently compared to everyone else?

Not that I recall, they do have everything else f'ed up, but not the billions haha, never mess with their money

 

[barnsley]

Not that I recall, they do have everything else f'ed up, but not the billions haha, never mess with their money

we used to do it differently

In British English, a billion used to be equivalent to a million million (i.e. 1,000,000,000,000), while in American English it has always equated to a thousand million (i.e. 1,000,000,000). British English has now adopted the American figure, though, so that a billion equals a thousand million in both varieties of English.

 

[remember300]

if in "traditional" english then a billion was a million million, but somewhere they stepped it to a thousand million, maybe due to finance. making it easier, who knows lol

And the nano tubes would be awesome, ive worked with nano tubes in carbon fibre but as a structural thing.

I can guarantee they will have the coal range and diamond range lol

 

[maniac]

we used to do it differently

Never heard of the million million thing, ever!

 

[remember300]

some old engineering books referred to billion as a million million, till they came up with trillian