I believe the G3 and G4 cpus(and maybe G5) had general purpose execution units, but I'd imagine there's a downside to doing that too.
BTW, I though the K8 could do simultaneous integer and floating point calculations except when using SIMD.
CPU: I'm not an AMD fanboy, but the fact is that AMD did something amazingly correct. They designed their core for future purposes. Prescott was designed for Single core operation so Smitfield was more difficult to create. The Athlon64 Core, which is basically the same as the Opteron core was made from the start for multi-core operation. Secondly the on-die memory controller alleviated memory problems. This allowed AMD to add more execution units, increasing the IPC, and to keep those units filled.
The biggest thing is to would go away from X86. X86 was good at the start, but I would have to say it is holding back the possibilities. Creating a CPU architecture that is backwards compatible, but still pushes the limits is difficult. Making a change to a more DSP like code base would allow for much greater parallel computing power and increase the performance of multi-core operations, since that is where the industry is heading. Memory bandwith is not going to limit IPC much. So a adding more execution units would be more favorable in a DSP like architecture.
Busses: There would be 1 South Bridge like Chip, except it would act as a Bus mater and nothing more. I also like PCI-e. It offers flexibility and Synchronous speed. The PCIe Bus master would be part of the south bridge chip. I would try to unify USB and Firewire. Having a single serial bus protocol would be more beneficial for compatibility and end users who are not computer literate (A decent sized market if you think of it). This would have its own controller chip and be on the PCIe Bus. Ethernet is still needed and works well for its purpose. It would be on its own specialized bus in order to keep latency down and speed at a maximum. Wireless I won't comment on, because I don?t like it, at the same time I don?t know enough about it to comment on how to change it. The fact that we have to keep the Ethernet protocol for wireless is a mistake. It should be its own protocol, but in the end should have the same type of identification so a driver can provide seamless integration. Sound would be on the PCIe bus since it does not require a great deal of bandwidth.
GPU: Parallel works here, but some more hand optimization on the functional units would provide a lot more performance. Also GPU and CPU's should be made on the latest fab process. Why? They are 2 power guzzling parts with little surface area. Reducing the power would help a lot, and moving to a smaller manufacturing process can help accomplish that. GPU?s tend to be made on slightly older fab technology. Otherwise the Nvidia and ATI seem to be on the right track. GPU?s are very DSP like, but on a massive scale.
Memory: Can?t comment. Problem with memory is that its expensive to make low latency, so companies try to compensate with bandwidth and size. Part of the problem is the way memory cell?s work and the other part is designing faster transistors, although Intel?s terahertz transistors are intriguing.
The biggest thing is to would go away from X86. X86 was good at the start, but I would have to say it is holding back the possibilities. Creating a CPU architecture that is backwards compatible, but still pushes the limits is difficult. Making a change to a more DSP like code base would allow for much greater parallel computing power and increase the performance of multi-core operations, since that is where the industry is heading. Memory bandwith is not going to limit IPC much. So a adding more execution units would be more favorable in a DSP like architecture.
Busses: There would be 1 South Bridge like Chip, except it would act as a Bus mater and nothing more. I also like PCI-e. It offers flexibility and Synchronous speed. The PCIe Bus master would be part of the south bridge chip. I would try to unify USB and Firewire. Having a single serial bus protocol would be more beneficial for compatibility and end users who are not computer literate (A decent sized market if you think of it). This would have its own controller chip and be on the PCIe Bus. Ethernet is still needed and works well for its purpose. It would be on its own specialized bus in order to keep latency down and speed at a maximum. Wireless I won't comment on, because I don?t like it, at the same time I don?t know enough about it to comment on how to change it. The fact that we have to keep the Ethernet protocol for wireless is a mistake. It should be its own protocol, but in the end should have the same type of identification so a driver can provide seamless integration. Sound would be on the PCIe bus since it does not require a great deal of bandwidth.
GPU: Parallel works here, but some more hand optimization on the functional units would provide a lot more performance. Also GPU and CPU's should be made on the latest fab process. Why? They are 2 power guzzling parts with little surface area. Reducing the power would help a lot, and moving to a smaller manufacturing process can help accomplish that. GPU?s tend to be made on slightly older fab technology. Otherwise the Nvidia and ATI seem to be on the right track. GPU?s are very DSP like, but on a massive scale.
Memory: Can?t comment. Problem with memory is that its expensive to make low latency, so companies try to compensate with bandwidth and size. Part of the problem is the way memory cell?s work and the other part is designing faster transistors, although Intel?s terahertz transistors are intriguing.
The original athlon has the same number of execution units, it also had a foward looking memory bus that was more scalable than what Intel's Xeons used, AMD just never really made products using it though.(Athlon MP only scaled up to 2 processors I believe)
If I were Intel I wouldn't just be dealing with hardware, the biggest challenges today in my opinon are quality of service issues related to running software, and keeping that software from breaking on changing platforms and/or multiple platforms.
The biggest thing in my mind that sticks out is compatability keeps breaking but actual software compilers and development api's like Direct X should handle this automatically. As an example, I can't run the really old direct X games for instance from the voodoo 1 era (Mechwarrior 2 specifically), unless some enterprising programmer writes an emulator and/or redirector dealing with old direct X calls. The problem is when you buy software it should never break, there is no good reason why most software should ever break, sure there is emulation but emulation is not always the best solution, and even when it is it should be handled auto-magically and not seen by the user. This in my opinion is what is needed. I'd often wondered why some sort of automatic update/recompile could not be built into software executables when they are compiled. 1 to 1 functionality is missing, I can understand patching software because of bugs but what I find unacceptable is buying software you know will break at some point, there has to be a better way to make software that doesn't break.
The biggest thing in my mind that sticks out is compatability keeps breaking but actual software compilers and development api's like Direct X should handle this automatically. As an example, I can't run the really old direct X games for instance from the voodoo 1 era (Mechwarrior 2 specifically), unless some enterprising programmer writes an emulator and/or redirector dealing with old direct X calls. The problem is when you buy software it should never break, there is no good reason why most software should ever break, sure there is emulation but emulation is not always the best solution, and even when it is it should be handled auto-magically and not seen by the user. This in my opinion is what is needed. I'd often wondered why some sort of automatic update/recompile could not be built into software executables when they are compiled. 1 to 1 functionality is missing, I can understand patching software because of bugs but what I find unacceptable is buying software you know will break at some point, there has to be a better way to make software that doesn't break.
As for hardware,
Main memory bandwidth is severely lagging behind GPU bandwidth and even onboard CPU bandwidth, the cache bandwidth is somewhere around 22Gb/sec for a modern Pentium 4. It's pretty sad when DDR 2 is pushing (theoretically) 7 Gigs but your latest video card is between 22 and 33 or higher, one wonders if CPU's should go the way of GPU's and have their own expansion slot (ala Slot 1) with the kind of bandwidth GPU's are getting.
Another real problem is booting the OS you should be able to switch between OS's like you swtich between applications (i.e. alt -tab), you shouldn't have to reboot to change OS's, this would go a long way towarcs specializing certain aspects of the os to keep business and gaming sections of the OS from not overlapping with one another and causing weird behaviour or bugs. When you're running games you don't have to load all the other memory hogging junk for everything else you're not using.
Next - lack of hardware quality across the PC industry is pretty insane, there is no kind of hardware quality assurance or authority to go to to make sure the stuff works, like they have with Apple, apple is good in that regard where it doesn't let just anyone make stuff for their computers they make sure the stuff is going to work. So much cheap hardware for the PC is part of why the PC experience is so frustrating, when you get those Blue screen due to buggy hardware or buggy drivers, when stuff like that should NEVER have been a part of anyones computing experience.
Main memory bandwidth is severely lagging behind GPU bandwidth and even onboard CPU bandwidth, the cache bandwidth is somewhere around 22Gb/sec for a modern Pentium 4. It's pretty sad when DDR 2 is pushing (theoretically) 7 Gigs but your latest video card is between 22 and 33 or higher, one wonders if CPU's should go the way of GPU's and have their own expansion slot (ala Slot 1) with the kind of bandwidth GPU's are getting.
Another real problem is booting the OS you should be able to switch between OS's like you swtich between applications (i.e. alt -tab), you shouldn't have to reboot to change OS's, this would go a long way towarcs specializing certain aspects of the os to keep business and gaming sections of the OS from not overlapping with one another and causing weird behaviour or bugs. When you're running games you don't have to load all the other memory hogging junk for everything else you're not using.
Next - lack of hardware quality across the PC industry is pretty insane, there is no kind of hardware quality assurance or authority to go to to make sure the stuff works, like they have with Apple, apple is good in that regard where it doesn't let just anyone make stuff for their computers they make sure the stuff is going to work. So much cheap hardware for the PC is part of why the PC experience is so frustrating, when you get those Blue screen due to buggy hardware or buggy drivers, when stuff like that should NEVER have been a part of anyones computing experience.
The idea was mentioned on the first page. However I too, would like to see the use of fiber optics running through, rather than copper wires. Maybe not a big mess of wires floating around, but if they could strap down fiber optic cables and network the whole mobo with them, it'd be great. I can't get into high depths of detail with out research or a review, but I believe theoritically fiber optics could carry more data than copper wires, as well as produce less heat(not like it was a problem with the current mobo).
I also agree with the moving parts, do without 'em. I admit though, for the time being, it is much more cost effective to have a spindel drive rather than a 300+gigabite flash drive.
Another complaint that I have, in which I do not have a solution is boot time. I wish my computer was like my tv, I hit the "on" button and its ready to go. Possibly a hybrid hard drive in which windows could boot off of flash while the rest could be stored on a spindle , but I need to be educated on the actual bottle neck of OS loading. Whenever I hit the power button on my computer and I go off and do something else while its loading and then come back, it shouldn't be that way, wastes way too much time! I even hesitate to turn on my computer to check email or the news/weather before I go out because it just takes too long to load! Thinking about it frustrates me!
Last, but not least, the size of the pc, and standardizing connectors/ports. Both are being addressed right now, with SFF's and USB 2.0. There isn't much of an excuse for a powerful pc to be on a full tower anymore. Laptops can now rival the power of desktop PC's. As for ports, it used to be annoying to have specific parallel, ps/2, etc. So USB is really breaking that barrier. Oh and, yes, less wires, for the near future we will probably still need power cables, but printers and monitors should be able to communicate with the pc without them.
I also agree with the moving parts, do without 'em. I admit though, for the time being, it is much more cost effective to have a spindel drive rather than a 300+gigabite flash drive.
Another complaint that I have, in which I do not have a solution is boot time. I wish my computer was like my tv, I hit the "on" button and its ready to go. Possibly a hybrid hard drive in which windows could boot off of flash while the rest could be stored on a spindle , but I need to be educated on the actual bottle neck of OS loading. Whenever I hit the power button on my computer and I go off and do something else while its loading and then come back, it shouldn't be that way, wastes way too much time! I even hesitate to turn on my computer to check email or the news/weather before I go out because it just takes too long to load! Thinking about it frustrates me!
Last, but not least, the size of the pc, and standardizing connectors/ports. Both are being addressed right now, with SFF's and USB 2.0. There isn't much of an excuse for a powerful pc to be on a full tower anymore. Laptops can now rival the power of desktop PC's. As for ports, it used to be annoying to have specific parallel, ps/2, etc. So USB is really breaking that barrier. Oh and, yes, less wires, for the near future we will probably still need power cables, but printers and monitors should be able to communicate with the pc without them.
My Atari ST has its OS (STOS) contained entirely in ROM.
Why there isn't something similar today, I don't know.
Why there isn't something similar today, I don't know.
Of all the posts in this thread, you are touching on the true bottlenecks of computers. Solid state is always better than mechanical. However, fans and CD-ROMs (as they stand now and probably MANY years to come) will always involve some sort mechanics, as they involve physhical motion. Moving electrons is a hell of a lot easier than moving tangible things (discs, air, etc). The only way I know to move air without mechanical movement is to change the ionic charge of it, which can be dangerous to ESD-sensitive components (basically everything in a computer). There has been a lot of research to eliminate the HDD bottleneck that plagues a multitude of computer junkies, but cost prohibtions have kept these things in the hardcore enthusiast's market. (Solid state 'hard drives' etc.) As faras fans go, there is always water-cooling, which usually requires a pump (mechanical). That is not to say that a water cooling system could be designed to run off of a siphon (gravity) but then you would be sacrificing reliabilty. (If the siphon were broken the system would immedietly fail, compared to a mechanical pump, which usually gives some sort of warning before total failure).
I guess that is sort of a ramble, but I like to think of things like that, and your non-mechanical computer intrigues me. (I would like to see it done)
RelaxTheMind
Platinum Member
- Oct 15, 2002
- 2,245
- 0
- 76
A completely solid state computer...
Hard drive = huge solid state hard drives, some people can afford them and I am not one of them. (isnt the hard drive the slowest component in just about any system? even with sata/raid/scsi the bandwidth is just not there) we need something like SATA 5000 yeh right...
cdrom = flashdrives (flash memory is alreay gaining more popularity in more devices)
fan = hmm... nothing comes to mind right now... ionic breeze? (would also eliminate the dust problem...hehe)
im liking the SFF design. its a step in the direction i would like to see.
Concerning the CPUs doesnt Intel have an auto "underclock" function if the HSF fails so the chip doesnt fry? I would think AMD has this now since their Athlon64's have cool'n'quiet (I'm not for sure though).
Anyway, as a simple end user I would probably say that the big areas I would change would be:
1. (As already mentioned) Component layout, not only for airflow but also for ease of use.
2. (As already mentioned) Response times for bootup & program loading.
3. Decrease in PC physical size and power consumption.
Just my opinion as a user.
PS > Non mechanical PC its possible (VIA CPU & Mobo with integrated gfx no fans, & Solid State HDD & Fanless PSU)
Anyway, as a simple end user I would probably say that the big areas I would change would be:
1. (As already mentioned) Component layout, not only for airflow but also for ease of use.
2. (As already mentioned) Response times for bootup & program loading.
3. Decrease in PC physical size and power consumption.
Just my opinion as a user.
PS > Non mechanical PC its possible (VIA CPU & Mobo with integrated gfx no fans, & Solid State HDD & Fanless PSU)
- EEK! what have i the worlds biggest n00b done?!?! an empty post! - sorry folks!
- anyway - change the PC hey? um.. i'm thoroughly sick of faster & faster CPUs - blow all the damn research on making 'em faster - the FSB, memory & HDD are waaaaaaay behind - a Raptor spits out 70mb/s while my cpu does/handle what? 35gb/s? yes please i soo need a faster CPU - NOT! same story with FSB... I just dont get why Intel/AMD make CPUs faster & not the FSB; well u get my point...
- oh & then there is video cards - i wanna be able to change the GPU & memory - in the same way i would change the CPU & memory in my PC....
- oh & more bandwidth for add-on cards ie: PCI = 133mb/s - so why am i plugging in a GB NIC again? And i suppose the should be some kind of choice in how large ur PC is - others have mentioned they want it tiny - i actually like 'em big (bring on MEGA-ATX -jj). power usage? i'm not fussed, but then theres the environment, yeah i know, blah blah blah..
- i'm also not too concerned with heat produced - but i do think watercooling should be a standard for the CPU, GPU & NB - or at least CPU manufacturers should box their CPUs with HS that make use of plenty of heatpipes & a 120mm slow-spinning (thus a lot quieter) fan, in stead of the tiny lil pieces of s**t that rev their guts out (like the pathetic NB fan on my IC7-MAX3)...
I think that about covers my bitching about whats 'wrong' with PCs today!
- anyway - change the PC hey? um.. i'm thoroughly sick of faster & faster CPUs - blow all the damn research on making 'em faster - the FSB, memory & HDD are waaaaaaay behind - a Raptor spits out 70mb/s while my cpu does/handle what? 35gb/s? yes please i soo need a faster CPU - NOT! same story with FSB... I just dont get why Intel/AMD make CPUs faster & not the FSB; well u get my point...
- oh & then there is video cards - i wanna be able to change the GPU & memory - in the same way i would change the CPU & memory in my PC....
- oh & more bandwidth for add-on cards ie: PCI = 133mb/s - so why am i plugging in a GB NIC again? And i suppose the should be some kind of choice in how large ur PC is - others have mentioned they want it tiny - i actually like 'em big (bring on MEGA-ATX -jj). power usage? i'm not fussed, but then theres the environment, yeah i know, blah blah blah..
- i'm also not too concerned with heat produced - but i do think watercooling should be a standard for the CPU, GPU & NB - or at least CPU manufacturers should box their CPUs with HS that make use of plenty of heatpipes & a 120mm slow-spinning (thus a lot quieter) fan, in stead of the tiny lil pieces of s**t that rev their guts out (like the pathetic NB fan on my IC7-MAX3)...
I think that about covers my bitching about whats 'wrong' with PCs today!
ultrastealth,
I was wondering about your first post
Just a note a Gb NIC in the PCI bus will work > Gb NIC = 125MBs, PCI = 133MBs (it could happen)
I was wondering about your first post
Just a note a Gb NIC in the PCI bus will work
> Gb NIC = 125MBs, PCI = 133MBs (it could happen)1. Harder to raise the FSB speed than the cpu speed, though AMD and Intel are both trying. Currently both have cpus that can hit like 300mhz FSB, but memory isn't common place for that speed yet, especially for AMD since there is no DDR standard over 200mhz. Intel could go faster I guess, but latency is higher for ddr2 so it eats up some of the performance increase.
2. Get a Ram drive! That way your cpu could be the bottleneck on transfer speeds again.
3. If they let the gpu be changed seperately from the memory, how would they sell you a $600 card every year?(that, and gpu memory standards change a faster than pc standards)
4. PCI express is replacing PCI.
5. Main problem I have with power usage is that powerful power supplies are expensive...quiet powerful power supplies even more so.
6. I believe AMD and Intel's latest cpus actually have pretty beefy cpu coolers. Water cooling as a standard would be nice, but so far I don't think anyone has invented a no maintenance water cooler. Ducts work almost as well in many cases, and require no maintenance.
BTW, people complaining about boot times, there are sort of solutions today. Standby and hibernation, standby, if it works, is like 2 seconds to power up, and hibernation is about 20 seconds. Standby doesn't work on my PC(for whatever reason), but I use hibernation almost all the time. Hibernation is great for quick saving nonsavable things too, such as maybe during a storm and you're reading something on the Internet and have like 20 web pages open.
I'd like to see a simplifying of the computer in the future. I would invest heavily in holographic harddrives for their improved capacity and bandwidth. Then I would take out the ram. Add in 8+ core processor with a new ISA and take out all the add in cards (like graphics and sound or nics). Harddrives and all input/output devices would use the same hypertransport bus. There would be only 2 inputs: firewire for both internal and external devices and an antena. The software would identify protocol (bluetooth, wimax, etc) and do the packet handling. Removable media will be largley obsolete. All computers would support 2 monitors and would be no bigger than a shoebox.
if it were possible and at the moment its not but ld want a super conductor that runs at room temp, as the cpu , the ram hard drive, vid card sound etc all need to be part of the same block, making it one big chip with the cpu section somewhere in there, the power of this type design l believe would be extreem, ram would plug directly into the cpu,video gpu + ram chip plug directly into the cpu, hard disc s directly into cpu , yes this means things must shrink by an incredible amount, and increase in power in the terrabite area, as the cpu is now what the motherboard was as well, its all together , close, and if all components are up to scratch with room temp super conductor cpus / gpus, OMFG , l can just see virtual battlefield games comming to frightening realism, really making you sweat in game ! And maybe even piss ya self !
geeez l think l already want one....
geeez l think l already want one....
My list of mods/reshapes goes as follows:
1. Proccessor- I would stay away from dual/multi core stuff. Although it's niffty technology and looks to be the wave of the future, I would prefer to see a move from a 64-bit to 128-bit (as when we went from 8-bit to 16-bit, and 16-bit to 32-bit) single core then work in some kind of SMT. I'm fine with x86 for now but would most certainly be intrested if something else came up that could viably replace it. I would like to see a new package style that could offer something other then connecting the CPU to the mobo. Intel's LGA was a welcome change in my book but it's still too much like PGA stuff. Something like being able to add more cache or another exicution core to the package to offer cheap upgrades would tickle my fancy but thats more engineering then i care to think about right now.
2. Memmory- I think that DDR is fine for now. The one thing I would do with it though is develop some kind of 1-2-2 timming. Other then that its the usual increase speed, make larger sticks(something like a 2+gig stick), etc. and so on
3. Mobo/chipset- I don't have a problem with current stuff but I would say to try to keep everything in one chip. I would also be delighted to see something like a full board integrated cooling system of sorts. Something that would keep a steady airflow over the RAM and supply cool air to the bottom of my CPU. Another thing is with blu-ray disk technology almost here I have a vision in my head of a specilized drive imbedded on the back of the motherboard that could be used to store vitals like the OS and secure files without having a HDD.
4.Storage- Not much else to say other than I'm all for solid state stuff and am looking forward to it (if it ever gets here)
5.Video card- options are the main thing i can think of. A socketed GPU and removable/addable(not sure if addable is a real word) RAM would be the big ones. Maybe if there was Socketed GPU it could be moved onto the motherboard and share a doulble-wide heatsink with the CPU. other than that i would say that (probbably already recommended) they flip the GPU and heatsink so that it faces up instead of down.
Thats eveything I can think of at this time(4:33 AM). I'll be back if i come up with anything else.
1. Proccessor- I would stay away from dual/multi core stuff. Although it's niffty technology and looks to be the wave of the future, I would prefer to see a move from a 64-bit to 128-bit (as when we went from 8-bit to 16-bit, and 16-bit to 32-bit) single core then work in some kind of SMT. I'm fine with x86 for now but would most certainly be intrested if something else came up that could viably replace it. I would like to see a new package style that could offer something other then connecting the CPU to the mobo. Intel's LGA was a welcome change in my book but it's still too much like PGA stuff. Something like being able to add more cache or another exicution core to the package to offer cheap upgrades would tickle my fancy but thats more engineering then i care to think about right now.
2. Memmory- I think that DDR is fine for now. The one thing I would do with it though is develop some kind of 1-2-2 timming. Other then that its the usual increase speed, make larger sticks(something like a 2+gig stick), etc. and so on
3. Mobo/chipset- I don't have a problem with current stuff but I would say to try to keep everything in one chip. I would also be delighted to see something like a full board integrated cooling system of sorts. Something that would keep a steady airflow over the RAM and supply cool air to the bottom of my CPU. Another thing is with blu-ray disk technology almost here I have a vision in my head of a specilized drive imbedded on the back of the motherboard that could be used to store vitals like the OS and secure files without having a HDD.
4.Storage- Not much else to say other than I'm all for solid state stuff and am looking forward to it (if it ever gets here)
5.Video card- options are the main thing i can think of. A socketed GPU and removable/addable(not sure if addable is a real word
) RAM would be the big ones. Maybe if there was Socketed GPU it could be moved onto the motherboard and share a doulble-wide heatsink with the CPU. other than that i would say that (probbably already recommended) they flip the GPU and heatsink so that it faces up instead of down.Thats eveything I can think of at this time(4:33 AM). I'll be back if i come up with anything else.
Jeff7
Lifer
- Jan 4, 2001
- 41,596
- 20
- 81
Problem with this though, is that successive generations would need to be physically and electrically backward compatible. The packages for new video chips change constantly. You can't plug a Radeon 9800 chip into a Radeon 7000 card.
I'm afraid I don't have any ideas right now for improvements. Redundancy is always nice though. Dual BIOSes sound like a nice idea, though I've never used a board with that feature.
Enhanced BIOSes would be good. I had a Supermicro board some time ago, in the Pentium II days, that had a graphic interface, complete with mouse support. No, it did not use a hidden hard drive partition like some old Compaqs did to achieve the same thing.
That was nice. Increased function and autonomy in the BIOS would definitely be an improvement.
Something must be done about thermal management. Motherboards are growing like cities. The regions that are most densely populated (with transistors) are becoming high-rise areas, with heatsinks akin to skyscrapers. The CPU of course was the first to get built-up, first with small structures (passive heatsinks) and now with some monstrous heatsinks and fans on them. Other dense areas are experiencing the same problems - GPUs, northbridge chips, and now even southbridges. Power distribution can also benefit from heatsinks - voltage regulators for instance. Hard drives too can get damn hot (60C+) if not allowed good circulation or a heatsink. And that's just on a few 7200rpm drives I've got.
What is it going to evolve into? Heatsinks all over the motherboard, with several huge ones sprouting up at the high-population areas?
One only need to look at embedded systems to see how efficient computers can be. Can a PC be that way? Depends on what you're willing to give up. Swappable hard drives? Backwards compatibility with current HD's? How about no more memory chips? There are simply tons of things you can do when you move away from simple Von-Neumann style machines. And keep in mind that half the computer is software. Assuming you can remake that too the possibilities are endless.
To start, no more main memory. Most processes cannot use too much anyway so why bother. Have small pockets of memory (~512MB each) instead of GB's of them and have them be fast. Each has their own processor and we'll use a central processor to coordinate them all. Each processor can be different to play on different strengths but still general purpose enough to run a Turing-complete process. SIMD is optional on these processors. Perhaps some will have it and some not, although ideally, they will all at least support it. Some can be stronger at processing SIMD while others weaker.
The system will have one, read ONE interface to software. All commands will be handled by the coordinating processor while heavy processing tasks will be handled by the helper processors. The coordinating processor should have some form of SMT (possibly with support for a lot of threads).
There are probably many more things you can do with this but that's at least my take.
To start, no more main memory. Most processes cannot use too much anyway so why bother. Have small pockets of memory (~512MB each) instead of GB's of them and have them be fast. Each has their own processor and we'll use a central processor to coordinate them all. Each processor can be different to play on different strengths but still general purpose enough to run a Turing-complete process. SIMD is optional on these processors. Perhaps some will have it and some not, although ideally, they will all at least support it. Some can be stronger at processing SIMD while others weaker.
The system will have one, read ONE interface to software. All commands will be handled by the coordinating processor while heavy processing tasks will be handled by the helper processors. The coordinating processor should have some form of SMT (possibly with support for a lot of threads).
There are probably many more things you can do with this but that's at least my take.
Being a mechanical engineer... I know less about working on the FSB, chipset, ect.... but
I can easily see many ways that computers could be laid out so that they don't reject as much heat or take up so much space... I mean all the wires floating around, please...
1) Ditch the conventional "tower" configuration. Instead of cards and periferial facing everywhich way integrate sound (soundblaster not realtec) /etc into the mobo and have limited USB/sound/cables out. Use ultrawideband or other non physical connections to the hard-drive/floppy/etc.
Power supplys could be integrated into the case, so that you plug into the powersupply when you mount your hard-drive/floppy/dvd burner.
2) Design the system for optimal airflow - afterall who cares where the hard drive or motherboard is actually located?
3) Integrate heat pipes/etc into the motherboard/case... the case's surface area could conduct alot of heat away from the cpu without requiring the towers of power that we see as heat spreaders.
I can easily see many ways that computers could be laid out so that they don't reject as much heat or take up so much space... I mean all the wires floating around, please...
1) Ditch the conventional "tower" configuration. Instead of cards and periferial facing everywhich way integrate sound (soundblaster not realtec) /etc into the mobo and have limited USB/sound/cables out. Use ultrawideband or other non physical connections to the hard-drive/floppy/etc.
Power supplys could be integrated into the case, so that you plug into the powersupply when you mount your hard-drive/floppy/dvd burner.
2) Design the system for optimal airflow - afterall who cares where the hard drive or motherboard is actually located?
3) Integrate heat pipes/etc into the motherboard/case... the case's surface area could conduct alot of heat away from the cpu without requiring the towers of power that we see as heat spreaders.
SMOGZINN
Lifer
- Jun 17, 2005
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The first of the two switches is quite possible to do as a case/psu mod (wouldn't really be that hard either) I would have to think about it, but I bet the second would be possible as well, I believe some motherboards support a sleep or hibernate button. Hooking it up to a toggle switch would be easy.
EDIT: After thinking about it I might try this, it is such a simple thing, but I like the idea of having an insta-off switch that is protected, I might look into the hibernate switch too, although I normally don't mess with hibernate, seems to cause to many stability issues.
(edited for speling
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