Using Lasers to Speed Computer Data 85
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "The start-up Lightfleet has developed an unusual way to use lasers to speed the flow of data inside a computer, hoping to break a bottleneck that can hamper machines using many microprocessors, the Wall Street Journal reports. The company plans to sell servers it predicts will be much more efficient than existing systems in tackling tough computing problems. Tasks could include automatically recognizing a face in a video image or sifting through billions of financial transactions for signs of illegal activity. These machines will attempt to sidestep some of the problems associated with parallel computation by ensuring all processors are connected, all the time."
IPOL? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, I know, it's not actually IP, but that's what it makes me think of.
Passive Star Networking (Score:5, Interesting)
The useful thing about it was being completely unpowered. The passive hub could stuffed into/behind anything where the fiber could reach it and there was no configuration, power, management, etc. Of course, those were also its weakness: no configuration, management, etc. A lot of these were installed in the early 90's, but I don't think the Navy uses them any more.
Two words (Score:3, Interesting)