Become a fan of Slashdot on Facebook

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Data Storage Hardware

Matrix 3D memory is World's Smallest 183

Posted by timothy from the dense-isn't-always-dumb dept.
nokiator writes "Most of the headlines about cool new high density memory technology are from DRAM or Flash manufacturers these days. Matrix Semiconductor, a small Silicon Valley start-up, broke the trend today and announced that the world's smallest 1-Gbit memory chip. Matrix's chip is an antifuse-based one-time programmable ROM. The total die area of the 1Gb chip is 31 square millimeters (smaller than the blue/red pills in the Matrix movie). Matrix claims that they can achieve this density through a proprietary 3D circuit technology that combines 150nm and 130nm process geometries. When Matrix moves to 90nm process technology, it should be possible to manufacture a 8Gb memory chip on a reasonable sized (i.e. cheap) die. There are many potential applications of this kind of low cost, very high density ROM technology, mostly in content distribution area. One 8Gb ROM chip would have sufficient storage capacity to store the contents of an entire movie using H.264 encoding."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Matrix 3D memory is World's Smallest More

Matrix 3D memory is World's Smallest

Comments Filter:

  • Sweet! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AKAImBatman ( 238306 ) * <akaimbatman@gmaYEATSil.com minus poet> on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:11PM (#12494592) Homepage Journal
    I can think of one use right off the top of my head. Anyone remember the console design [slashdot.org] I suggested? Well, if these chips are cheap enough, it may actually make sense to go back to cartriges! Which means that copious quantities of graphics (including videos and prerecorded music) could be used in games for an inexpensive console system!

    Anyone else have any good ideas for this chip?

    P.S. Definition of an antifuse [wikipedia.org]. Usually the type of thing you only learn about when you're playing with FPGAs [wikipedia.org], ASICs [wikipedia.org], and CPLDs [wikipedia.org]. (The "history of programmable hardware" book that comes with Xilinx's Starter kit [xilinx.com] gives a good overview of the different technologies including antifuse chips.)

    P.P.S. If I'm doing my math right, 1-GBit of memory is ~119 megabytes. 128 megabytes if you're calculating 1-GBit == 2^30.
    • How about an implantable encyclopedia for your brain? Would be better if it could be updated, of course, but you have to have certain trade-offs for it being so small.
      • Well you could leave a fraction of the ROM still blank and leave it for future changes. Just like current CD-Rs.
      • How about an implantable encyclopedia for your brain? Would be better if it could be updated, of course, but you have to have certain trade-offs for it being so small.

        tell you what, I'll work on the storage medium, you work on the interface, deal?
    • I don't know about that. 128 megabytes is very small compared to the size of games today. Jade empire is over 5 GB, the cost would be unreal. I would love to see game companies move back to cartridges too, but unless there is a insane breakthrough in memory technology you will only see them in portables, even there they are dying.
      • From TF blurb: The total die area of the 1Gb chip is 31 square millimeters... When Matrix moves to 90nm process technology, it should be possible to manufacture a 8Gb memory chip on a reasonable sized (i.e. cheap) die.

        These things are tiny too. If you make a cartridge-sized one (even of the lower density variety) you can have a LOT of storage.

      • Re:Sweet! (Score:4, Informative)

        by Short Circuit ( 52384 ) * <mikemol@gmail.com> on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:38PM (#12494755) Homepage Journal
        A CD/DVD's data area is around 10,000mm^2. That's enough area for 343 of these chips at their current size. 343*128MB=42.875GB

        A better arrangement would be to make a 5" (127mm) square cartridge to fit in the same stackable region as a 5" circle. That gives you 520 of these chips. 520*128MB=65GB, which is better than Blu-Ray, and nowhere near as fragile.

        And that's on their current process, which is apparently a blend of 130nm and 150nm. Wait until they shrink that down a bit.

        Data density in the world has just gone up.
        • No, make a cube and paint the individual chips all funny.
          Revenge of the rubics cube, encrypt your sensible data by physically scrambling it!

      • Re:Sweet! (Score:3, Interesting)

        by AKAImBatman ( 238306 ) *
        I don't know about that. 128 megabytes is very small compared to the size of games today.

        If you read the post I linked to, the idea was to bring back classic gaming at a low price point, not compete with today's games. I was originally thinking games along the lines of Duke Nukem II [mobygames.com] and Halloween Harry [mobygames.com]. But with this chip, we could jump all the way to Super Wing Commander [wcnews.com]! (With better voice acting, of course.)

      • 128 megabytes is very small compared to the size of games today.

        GBA and Nintendo DS games are no bigger than 32 MBytes, and the UMD dumps of PSP games are about 128 to 512 MBytes.

    • Re:Sweet! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by kesuki ( 321456 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @10:18PM (#12494957) Journal
      Well, if these chips are cheap enough, it may actually make sense to go back to cartriges!

      For classic gaming maybe, for portable gaming sure. but you'll never get the price of solid state memory below the cost of optical storage. you can deal with the problems optical storage has currently by moving the laser beam with microscopic mirrors, rather than trying to spin the media. The problem with optical media is and was that they used design principals that work great for Magnetic media, and tried to pair that technology with optical storage. Since light can move exponetially faster (light can be moved to read 299,792,458 meters of data per second) than any physical device, it makes massively more sense to move the light, rather than the media or the laser. At current data densities.. that means the entire content of a DVD-rom would be read in 1/19933rds of a second. In other words, you'd have a 14,351,760x DVD-rom if instead of moving the DVD you move the laser light, and managed to move the laser light at the speed of light. There are of course scienitific limitations that prevent us from manipulating a beam of light in order so that it is redirected at the speed of light, but the theoretical limits of rotational speeds for DVD media are being reached. You can probabbly spin them faster than 16X, I seem to recall that at 1x a DVD-rom is moving the disc at the same rotational speed as 4x cdrom would be rotating and cd-roms got as high as 52x before cheaper media began fragmenting in peoples drives..

      So what would you rather be capped with? 18x dvd-rom drives? or not have to worry about the engineering limitations until you can figure out a way to reach 14,351,760x?

      Note: to those wondering, I based my calculations on the assumption that a dvd-rom has 4.7 billion bytes or 37.6 billion pits .4 micrometers apart, for a total length of 15,400 meters. I then used the knowledge that at 1x it takes 2 hours to read that distance, and calculated the speed rating based on that. I didn't check my math twice, so I might have made a miscalculation, but if I did someone will probably coreect me.
      • These are the people Nintendo employes to make DS cards

      • Re:Sweet! (Score:4, Informative)

        by jerde ( 23294 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @02:24AM (#12496420) Journal
        You're not trying to say that the speed of light has ANYTHING to do with the speed at which a beam of light can be swept across a medium, are you?

        A point of light can be moved as fast or as slow as you want it to be. Aim a laser at the moon, now sweep it across the moon as fast as you want. Poof! The "spot" of light just moved across the moon at 18 times the speed of light... no problem.

        No, the real limitation to the speed at which light can be moved along a medium has more to do with how long the spot of light must be focused on each point on the medium for enough photons to reflect back to be read. The faster you sweep your laser across a surface, the more dimly that surface is illuminated.

        (At the limit, you're moving the spot of light faster than the rate photons are being emitted, although at 1 Watt that's something like 10^20 photons per second. If you need at least 10 photons per nanometer, say, you can do the math to find your maximum speed.)

        • A point of light can be moved as fast or as slow as you want it to be. Aim a laser at the moon, now sweep it across the moon as fast as you want. Poof! The "spot" of light just moved across the moon at 18 times the speed of light... no problem.

          I was just about to say this, and let me add that this is consistent with Relativity, as long as you're not moving energy or information from one place to another faster than at c. In this case you're moving information/energy from the laser to the Moon, not betwe

      • Exponential? (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Just wondering, were you thinking when you said that light is exponentially faster?
        It is faster, but where have you pulled this exponential crap out of? You can have an exponential relationship between two variables. The speed of light vs the linear speed of a DVD has SFA to do exponents. It makes you sound like you have no clue.
        Big number =! exponential.
      • I don't think 52X was the physical limit of spinning CDs; I think it's the limit of the IDE bus transfer rate, and you get diminishing returns faster than that because of the long spin-up times.

        Didn't someone get some mechanical engineering testbench equipment and figure out that CDs didn't start to fragment until 100,000X or something insane like that?

        --grendel drago
        • I know someone who had a CD-ROM scatter in, I think, "only" a 40x drive.
          He said nothing really bad happened, just a very wierd, loud noise and the tower shook a bit. So, yes, they actually can fragment at lower speeds - at least when they're damaged as the said disk most likely was.

      • Re:Sweet! (Score:3, Interesting)

        by stonecypher ( 118140 )
        For classic gaming maybe, for portable gaming sure. but you'll never get the price of solid state memory below the cost of optical storage.

        You know, it's funny: I remember someone saying exactly the converse of this to me about fifteen years ago, when NeXT adopted the laserdisc as a standard storage mechanism for the Cube, back when ROM was considered cheap.

        The older you get, the less likely you are to use the word never, especially in regards to the future.
    • Yes, but what I want to know is if this antifuse technology requires a dilithium matrix to regulate particle flow.
    • A lot of people must have forgotten about this.

      About 2 years ago, Nintendo dumped a few million dollars into this company. Outside of being a useful technology on its own, it's basically being developed so that Nintendo can continue to use cartridges for their handheld consoles.

      Remember how the DS has a maximum cartridge size of 1GBit? Yet nothing out now currently uses that? Hmm... awful convenient...

      Anyway, that's exactly what it's being used for -- portable game consoles. No doubt it will wor

    • They don't want me to make backups of my CD's? Well sell me a format which doesn't scratch! Make a small chip I can click into my stereo the way digital cameras work. If it is small enough it should be no problem clicking 20 into a car stereo.
    • Anyone remember the console design [slashdot.org] I suggested? Well, if these chips are cheap enough, it may actually make sense to go back to cartriges!

      I told you then and I'm telling you now: this is the brand of FROM that the Nintendo DS uses.

  • Now, with an infinitely redundant power supply (Score:4, Funny)

    by Trizor ( 797662 ) <trizor@gmail.com> on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:11PM (#12494597)
    I can ramdisk the internet. I just need a warehouse!

  • Oh good (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:15PM (#12494612)

    The total die area of the 1Gb chip is 31 square millimeters (smaller than the blue/red pills in the Matrix movie).

    Just what I always wanted - another unit of measurement. How many millifootballfields is one blue pill? What can this chip hold in terms of LibrariesOfCongress-per-BluePill?

    • 31 square millimeters is between 5 and 6 mm on a side, or about half a centimeter (a quarter of an inch) on a side though to be more exact it's 0.31 cm^2 (go figure). Personally, I prefer to think of it as being 344 picoseconds^2 after setting c=1 and measuring distances in seconds.
      • Personally, I prefer to think of it as being 344 picoseconds^2 after setting c=1 and measuring distances in seconds.

        At which Er? Si, GaAs, InP, Alumina, Quartz... or air? ... ;-)

        Paul B.
    • 1 millifootballfield == .122173591659265 Space Shuttle's of Fuel.
    • How many millifootballfields is one blue pill?
      I've no idea but they have a mass of about 7.3 nanoelephants.

  • USB Linux-on-ROM (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Short Circuit ( 52384 ) * <mikemol@gmail.com> on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:16PM (#12494615) Homepage Journal
    I could do with seeing one of the fortold DVD-based Linux LiveCDs expanded even further and put on a read-only USB stick.

    Oh, and it's OTP? You mean, like CD-Rs and DVD-Rs?

  • Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:17PM (#12494623)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Nice....... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by compmanio36 ( 882809 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:18PM (#12494629)
    Maybe this will help the emergence of solid state memory, as I find something like a Compact Flash card much more handy than a CD. I have had more DVD's that just wouldn't play because of the tiniest scratch on them. No, if there was a slightly more expensive, but much more reliable and robust form of memory storage, I would snatch it right up. Of course, I am waiting for my crystal-based isolinear memory chips that can hold gigaquads of data (whatever the hell a gigaquad is).

  • Not just ROM's (Score:4, Informative)

    by Transcendent ( 204992 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:18PM (#12494630)
    ...but could this be used for CPU on-die caches, or is it too slow/consumes too much power? I couldn't imagine even having 8MB of cache let alone 8GB. (Which will come to haunt me later like the ol' 640K quote).
    • Unlike the 640k quote, you said this. Billy never said his "famous" line.

    • Re:Not just ROM's (Score:2, Informative)

      by Short Circuit ( 52384 ) *
      The technology dictates write-only. Even with a sliding write window ala multisession CDs, it wouldn't be useful as a cache.
      • Actually, it dictates more or less read-only memory. You can only write it if you have a programmer.
        • With all the power a CPU already uses, who'd notice a few watts more to burn ROM data? :)
          • With all the power a CPU already uses, who'd notice a few watts more to burn ROM data? :)

            You're worried about the CPU consumption? Pff! Have you seen GPU consumption lately? ;)

            Seriously though, there's never been a case of a programmer being a standard piece of PC hardware. I seriously doubt this chip will change that.
            • Yeah, I never understood that. If all you need to program is a specific model of chip, what's so difficult about embedding the burning equipment on the mainboard?

              Granted, flash memory made PROM and EPROM BIOS obsolete. Heck...I sometimes wonder if they need the battery backup for anything more than the system clock these days.
              • If all you need to program is a specific model of chip, what's so difficult about embedding the burning equipment on the mainboard?

                A few things come to mind:

                1. The process is *slow*. It's not exactly going to compete with CD/DVD burning. Or floppy disk writing in the old days. Or even worse, writing to tape!

                2. In the old days, that WAS a lot of power to be pushing around a computer.

                3. There's always the possibility that the chip could go bad during a write. If it does, any previous data you stored is n

    • Re:Not just ROM's (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:22PM (#12494662)
      Read only. Cache.

    • Re:Not just ROM's (Score:3, Informative)

      by antifoidulus ( 807088 )
      A lot of Sun workstations already have 8 mb of L2 cache, for instance SunBlade 1000s [sun.com]. However, they like pretty much every other commercial chip in wide use(P4, Athlon, G4, G5 etc) all have 64k l1(32k data 32k instruction).
      But more to the point, did you RTFA? This is anti-fuse technology, ie it cannot be re-written. I guess you could have certain chunks of data that you need to reference again and again that won't change, but for that limited use why would you ever muck up your architecture?
      • Did you RTF Subject? And thank you for the sun link, I had no idea sun made such processors...

        The point was asking if the hybrid scaling and segmented word line techniques could be applied to other memory types, unless there's an inherent physical impossibility (hence the question... I know they made ROMs... again, hence the question) in which volitale memory can't be made using the same techniques. It's a manufacturing process...

        Why am I asking? I assumed the process for making the memory was pretty much
    • A few problems with it:

      1) As you said, it's too slow. CPU cache is incredibly fast (because it doesn't need to be non-volatile).

      2) You can only write it once.

      3) All flash memory seems to have a limit to the number of writes before it screws up. Given how often the cache gets changed in a CPU, it really wouldn't last long.
  • PRINGLES!

    -Foxxz
    • Bit (ok maybe a Gbit) off topic, but in memory of Mitch [mitchhedberg.net]:

      "I think Pringles initial intention was to make tennis balls. But on the day that the rubber was supposed to show up, a big truckload of potatoes arrived. But Pringles is a laid back company. They said 'Fuck it. Cut em up.'" Mitch Hedberg

  • There is no 8Gb ROM chip.

  • Density is fine, but speed ? (Score:5, Informative)

    by karvind ( 833059 ) <karvind.gmail@com> on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:22PM (#12494665) Journal
    What is the latency of this memory module ?

    Secondly it is antifuse-based one-time programmable ROM. It is NOT a flash which can be re-written 100,000 times. So it is more useful for storing application code but not for data storage etc.

    Antifuse base memories are diode like and can be much smaller than regular FLASH memories. But these are inherently slower and also don't have any gain element (like transistor). This requires careful design to achieve good signal-to-noise ration for memory read operation

    More aggressive 3D technology was demonstrated by IBM [ibm.com] last year where they have circuits in 3D.

    A startup R-cube logic [r3logic.com] is also designing 3D microprocessor where memory is put on top of the logic core to reduce latency.

    Xanoptics [xanoptics.com] is more into hybrid design (mixed analog, RF, optics) on a single footprint.

    • Secondly it is antifuse-based one-time programmable ROM. It is NOT a flash which can be re-written 100,000 times. So it is more useful for storing application code but not for data storage etc.

      Sounds great for something like a handheld video game system off the top of my head though. Handheld games are really hurting right now for need of some kind of compromise between hi-latency powerhungry high-capacity discs and low-latency power-cheap low-capacity ROM cartridges...

  • Some foresight required (Score:3, Insightful)

    by motorsabbath ( 243336 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:22PM (#12494667) Homepage
    One 8Gb ROM chip would have sufficient storage capacity to store the contents of an entire movie using H.264 encoding.

    Great, more disposable consumer things. There are many great uses for such a memory config, but the world does not need more disposable devices...
    • we buy our movies on dvds which have the movie manufactured into them and are not rewritable...

      if you are going to shell out the price of prerecorded media you are unlikely to want to record over it thus destroying most of your outlay (blank media is comparatively cheap in most cases by comparision)
    • Great, more disposable consumer things. There are many great uses for such a memory config, but the world does not need more disposable devices...

      Ok, mister enviro-conservo-nut-job step away from the tofu and put all animal friendly artifacts down! ;-)

      Now that I have your attention, I would think, as an (assumed) environmentalist you would welcome the miniturization of potentially landfill-filling consumer goods. After all, isn't some thing smaller than a pill going to cause a much smaller overall envir
      • Excuse me, mister I-didn't-really-think-this-one-through :P

        How much energy do you think it takes to produce one of these ROM chips? Take into account shipping, handling, packaging...you know. Think of the production methods used to create these kinds of chiups: they're very messy, And all you can think of is "but it's miniature landfill"?

        Grandparent poster's point is very valid: why consume those resources when you can just use some electrons/photons to transport the same data? Sure, this memorychip has i

  • This could actually be bad (Score:5, Insightful)

    by RhettLivingston ( 544140 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:23PM (#12494670) Journal
    ROMs can be very cheap. If they get to 8Gbit and then put it in a multichip stack to get to 4 or 8 GByte capacities, it could possibly give the movies on DVD industry a run for its money. The bad side of that is that we've been benefiting heavily from the demand that that industry has created is responsible for providing cheap RO and later WO and RW DVD drives for our PCs. The movie industry would love this format because the WO and RW versions would always be way more expensive than the RO version. The cost equation of copying would change dramatically.
    • ROMs can be very cheap. If they get to 8Gbit and then put it in a multichip stack to get to 4 or 8 GByte capacities, it could possibly give the movies on DVD industry a run for its money. The bad side of that is that we've been benefiting heavily from the demand that that industry has created is responsible for providing cheap RO and later WO and RW DVD drives for our PCs. The movie industry would love this format because the WO and RW versions would always be way more expensive than the RO version. The cos

  • H.264 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by after ( 669640 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:27PM (#12494701) Journal

    I didn't know what it was right away, so ...



    H.264 [wikipedia.org], or MPEG-4 Part 10, is a high compression digital video codec standard written by the ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) together with the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) as the product of a collective partnership effort known as the Joint Video Team (JVT). The ITU-T H.264 standard and the ISO/IEC MPEG-4 Part 10 standard (formally, ISO/IEC 14496-10) are technically identical, and the technology is also known as AVC, for Advanced Video Coding. The final drafting work on the first version of the standard was completed in May of 2003.

  • Now, all we need are 3D Processors and RAM (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Xeroc ( 877174 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:43PM (#12494780)
    It sounds like to me this 3D Memory construction is vastly improving the density, now all we need are 3D-Constructed processors! They use vertically and horizontally stacked chips to multiply the processing capability.

    Also, if we could only get this in RAM! I'm looking for an upgrade, and my computer case is only so big!

    Yes, for some reason, people do seem to mix up the bits and bytes, for example: Most file sizes are in bytes, to make them seem smaller, and connection speeds are in bits, to make them seem faster!*

    *Actually, this probably isn't the "official" reason, but it makes sense!
    • Files sizes are measured in bytes out of tradition, since a byte was originally the smallest unit of useful data (think ASCII and teletypes).
      Connection speeds are usually measured in bits (actually bits/second) because they tend to be serial.

      Fair assumption, though.

    • Hmm. The problem is, though, 3D processors, unless redesigned, would have a far greater area:surface area ratio, which is bad, since the chip generates heat, and the surface area provides for its dissapation. I'm not saying 3D processors are impossible, it just adds a whole dimension to creating processors, as cooling has just gotten a lot harder. Also, antifuse won't work as RAM, unless you run Windows, in which case your computer, frozen forever, would work as expected (just kidding -- antifuse is write-o
  • Regardless of what the article may say about its speed, it is actually slower than everything because it will often make your computer do the "Matrix Effect".(You know when the people go real slow to avoid bullets)

  • Long time in the making...but worth it... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by robertca ( 816853 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @09:52PM (#12494826)
    Great to see the Matrix Semi news on Slashdot! I was one of the early employees (but have since left), so it's cool to see something that I worked on coming to fruition.

    Earlier posters were correct in stating that it's not a complete replacement for flash (yet?) but there are still many very cool potential applications: Game cartridges (much faster access time than CDs/DVDs), toys (i.e. a supercharged Furby with a massive vocabulary), replacement for CDs/DVDs, archival digital "film", etc.

    I really like the idea of a kiosk that houses blank Matrix 3DM cards and loads of digital content. You could walk up to the kiosk and buy a game/software/movie/album/book, have it programmed right then and there, and walk away with your customized content in a few minutes. These kiosks could be everywhere...gas stations, grocery stores, etc. Extremely convenient for consumers, plus it would seriously cut down the overhead for retailers since they wouldn't need to keep inventory or have huge stores to house thousands of DVDs, etc.
    • The huge problem with that model is massive piracy. The people who own one of those machines can empty out the money any time they want, and print unlimited copies to sell at whatever price they desire without paying back the rightsholders.

      Unless you have some way of making it completely secure, authenticated, and with no removable money, you'll have another Nintendo FDS Disk Writer fiasco.
  • ...Nintendo Revolution's cartridge based format is announced!
  • For data storage there's the good old Library of Congress (just how many LoC's DOES this store anyway?)
    and for physical dimensions we now have "matrix red/blue pills". Interestingly, my mobile phone is exactly 67.4 Matrix Pills in total area.
  • Just let me know when the "brain-stem jack mod" is available. I could always use the extra memory.

  • Gb somewhat aloof measurement? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gumpish ( 682245 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @10:10PM (#12494915) Journal
    I know that the bit is the atomic unit of measure when it comes to data storage and transmission, but sometimes I really wish everyone would stick to bytes.

    When I see 1 Gb I have to think for a second to get to 128 MB.

  • 31 mm movies (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @10:10PM (#12494921)
    GUEST: Do you mind if I have some more m&m's?
    HOST: What m&m's? I don't have any m&m's.
    GUEST: In the bowl... on top of the tv...?
    HOST: Aaaaaaargh! That's my movie collection, nimrod!

  • Smallest memory (Score:5, Funny)

    by Junior J. Junior III ( 192702 ) on Tuesday May 10, 2005 @10:13PM (#12494937) Homepage
    And here, I thought that I had the -- wait, what whas I talking about?
  • Well with these size's we could be seeing OS's distributed on a ROM soon. Great anti piracy, well least add's another level that will remove a high percentage of copies out there. Remember nothing is perfect.

    Roll on 3D holographic cubes for ROM storage, ready by laser :>
  • If we approach 4GHz bus rate, thar be a core meltdown!

  • Motherboards (Score:3, Insightful)

    by charlie763 ( 529636 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @12:13AM (#12495793)
    With the small physical size and large memory capacity might we eventually see a motherboard manufacturer shipping a Linux distro integrated into the motherboard? Not necessarily for the sake of using as you default OS, but as a distro with a full set of diagnostic tools. In any event, this sort of crap is way cool!
    • Or a BIOS chip where a new address range is programmed for each update, with the option to revert to an older version.
      You'd be limited to a certain number of BIOS upgrades (10? 100?), but if the upgrade fails, you could get back to the last version.

  • Cool (Score:2, Interesting)

    by midnight2038 ( 848433 )
    Another great technology to be attacked by the RIAA, first in name "3D Matrix", and then for it's use!
  • Imagine going back to cartridge-based systems, instead of DVD-based?
  • Guess I'll have to buy the White Album again
  • One 8Gb ROM chip would have sufficient storage capacity to store the contents of an entire movie using H.264 encoding.

    Um, seeing as how 2.5+ hours of video compressed with mpeg2 encoding can fit on a *4* Gb dvd, and H264 is a large improvement on mpeg2, it would seem that the above statement is rather modest. I'd bet that eight movies could be stored in H264 on an 8Gb chip.

  • on board base OS (Score:3, Interesting)

    by displague ( 4438 ) <slashdotNO@SPAMdisplague.com> on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @08:44AM (#12497773) Homepage Journal
    Does anyone remember early PC systems that had memory cards with a read-only operating system? A friend of mine had one that had dos 5 (or the likes) and a sort of literal folder appearance gui with it.

    Rant begins. If we had ultra fast, high density ROM chips like this it might be nice to put the core of an OS onto the chip and only use the harddrive (or large RAM) for updated components. A new 'Windows' or 'Linux' system would be inserted into a little cube-tray on your computer . All your 3rd party applications would be left on the hard disk. Hrmm, or, the software could also be purchased on cubes like this. Maybe we end up with a daisy chain of USB2 attached cubes, or a cube-tray, each representing a DVD sized 3rd party application. This sounds more attuned to commercial software. Rant over.

Slashdot Top Deals

1 + 1 = 3, for large values of 1.

Close