HP To Introduce Flash Memory Replacement In 2013 253
Spy Hunter writes "Memristors are the basis of a new memory technology being developed by HP and Hynix. At the International Electronics Forum, Stan Williams, senior fellow at HP Labs, said, 'We're planning to put a replacement chip on the market to go up against flash within a year and a half. We're running hundreds of wafers through the fab, and we're way ahead of where we thought we would be at this moment in time.' They're not stopping at a flash replacement either, with Williams saying, 'In 2014 possibly, or certainly by 2015, we will have a competitor for DRAM and then we'll replace SRAM.' With a non-volatile replacement for DRAM and SRAM, will we soon see the end of the reboot entirely?"
End of the reboot? (Score:5, Insightful)
Reboots usually don't happen because of hardware, and certainly not because of the type of RAM you're running. It's bad software.
Re:End of the reboot? (Score:3, Insightful)
I assume, then, that you never shut your computer down for the night. Or for the weekend.
end of the HDD (Score:4, Insightful)
it won't mean the end of the reboot, stupid editor. This is sSlashdot, don't you know you have a Microsoft-Windows-BSOD-Daily-reboot meme to maintain?? :)
What I think it could mean the end of is the HDD, or rather the distinction between memory and storage. If all your apps and long-term-storage data could be placed into RAM, then you'd do it wouldn't you. (this assume a few things, like reliability and long-term unpowered persistence) but imagine having 500Gb of RAM that just happened to hold all your data, rather than keeping it separate and shuffling it between the two. That could be quite a change for the way we see computers compared to the ways we've been using them for the last 40 odd years.
Re:Can we believe HP? (Score:4, Insightful)
Given the HP board of directors' track record in making good decisions, one could speculate that they would invest in TTL chip technology for the same reason.
Yes, hundreds of wafers ahead of schedule is good, but they haven't even sold one chip yet. It's hardly time to go all in and throw the car keys on the table, too.