IBM Optical Chip Zips Huge Files Using Little Power

An anonymous reader wrote to mention that IBM has unveiled a new prototype chip that can transmit data at up to 8 TB/sec, or about 5,000 high-def video streams. While this might not be entirely amazing, the fact that they did it using the same amount of juice required to light a 100-watt lightbulb, is. "The resulting total bi-directional data transfer rate is 300 Gb/s, nearly doubling the performance of a version IBM introduced last year. Compared to current commercial optical modules the transceiver provides 10-fold greater bandwidth in 1/10 the volume while consuming comparable power, IBM said."

So that would make it use about...

[Anonymous Coward]

100 watts? Anybody want to check my math?

Juice!

[kevmatic]

The same amount of juice to power a 100-watt light bulb!?

That's like... 100 Watts!

Unless you go compact florescent. Then its like 15watt.

Re:Juice!

[Anonymous Coward]

My calculations reveal a power usage of 100 watts!

How much power?

[l00sr]

Let's see... how much power does it take to power a 100-Watt light bulb... hm... Well, according to Wikipedia, a 100-Watt incandescent lightbulb outputs about 1700 lumens. A quick googling reveals that the average incandescent bulb achieves a lighting efficiency of roughly 15.75 lumens per Watt. A simple calculation then yields that the power used by a 100-Watt light bulb is roughly 107.93 Watts. Q.E.D.

Scuttlemonkey

[Anonymous Coward]

What the hell are you doing to the language of Shakespeare? Did you translate the submission from German?

While this might not be entirely amazing, the fact that they did it using the same amount of juice required to light a 100-watt lightbulb, is.

ARRRR!

[eggman9713]

Let's just hope the pirate bay doesn't get a hold of this puppy.

Re:What's with the summary?

[macslas'hole]

Ballmer used "squirt"

Please, Mr. Ballmer, don't squirt me!...

YUCK!

The mental image of Sweaty MonkeyBoy and the work squirt should never be in the vicinity of each other. It is an abomination.

Re:Juice!

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe it was written by one of these people: [upenn.edu]. (Or maybe I just wanted an excuse to post the link).

"He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree"

"The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon."

"John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met."

Re:Juice!

[JustOK]

The parent post is as off topic as an off-topic parent post.

Re:How much power?

[that this is not und]

I can probably get detectable amounts of light out of a 100 watt bulb with the bulb consuming maybe 4-7 watts. If you insist we can take this matter to the lab and find out.

Re:How much power?

[thrillseeker]

If you insist we can take this matter to the lab and find out.

Ah, the never tiring slashdotter pick up line ...

Re:So that would make it use about...

[Chapter80]

Proper conversion:

Start with a 100 Watt bulb

Divide by 7, which is the number of watts necessary to properly illuminate a square foot of floor space.
This gives roughly 14.28 square feet able to be illuminated.

Divide this into 2.1 million sq ft [nps.gov], the amount of square feet in the Library of Congress (USLOC).
This tells us that 147,000 watts are necessary to illuminate the US Library of Congress.

Divide by 1.09951163 × 10^13 bytes [google.com], the amount of storage per unit of USLOC. [jamesshuggins.com]
This tells us that 1.33 x 10^-8 bytes are illuminated per watt

Multiply by 7GB (7,516,192,768 bytes), which is the number of gigabytes of printed material that can be properly illuminated by a 1-watt bulb.

Answer: 100.4

So you were close.

Re:So that would make it use about...

[Chapter80]

Answer: 100.4

So you were close.

Oops, I used Excel, so don't trust my calculations. Never mind.

This Story Raises The Burning Question

[SkyDude]

How many /.ers does it take to change a lightbulb?



No one knows. Those who try keep getting electrocuted when their tinfoil hats make contact with the socket.

Re:So that would make it use about...

[maxwell demon]

No, they are speaking about amounts of juice, so the proper unit would be liter/second (or gallons/second for you Americans). So how much juice would you need? Well, they didn't say what type of juice they would need, so I just assumed apple juice. I've found this table [kalorien-tabelle.de] [German], which tells me that 0.2 liters of apple juice with sugar has 175 kJ. That is, we have an energy of 875 kJ/l. Now a 100 W lightbulb needs 0.1 kJ/s, therefore to power a 100 W lightbulb, we need about 10 liters per day.

Re:This Story Raises The Burning Question

[maxwell demon]

But they will be able to tell you amazing things about changing light bulbs.
You'll learn that

• in Soviet Russia, light bulbs change YOU
• In Korea, only old people change light bulbs
• Netcraft confirms: light bulbs are dying
• A reasonable business plan might look like
  1. Change light bulb
  2. ???
  3. Profit!

Also, they'll want to know if the light bulb runs Linux, and ask you to imagine a Beowulf cluster of them.

Re:How much power?

[dreamchaser]

That wasn't a pickup line. It was calling someone out.

"Want to see my rare collection of Star Trek memorabillia" would be a more typical pickup line.

Re:So that would make it use about...

[ScrewMaster]

Well, they didn't say what type of juice they would need, so I just assumed apple juice.

You're a Mac user, aren't you.

Re:So that would make it use about...

[SickHumour]

Odd. I usually measure juice in litres, not light bulbs.

Re:Juice!

[JustOK]

Well, a metaphor is like a metaphor.