superparamagnetism at 150GB/in2!?!.....Man, its all over......

[Shockwave]

Sounds like its official....Current technologies will make bigger magnetic disk drives impossible in about 2 years. At 150 GB / inch squared, superparamagnetism (magnetic energy holding bits equals ambient thermal energy) will start causing bit flipping.....Just thought you would all want to know..... Now how am I ever gonna get UT installed...??

 

[hans007]

Optical drives will be there to replace it. Besides they always find a way to defy prediction. Microprocessors were supposed to stop at .2 micron were they not?

 

[Shockwave]

guess I forgot to put in my own opinion...."current technologies" is a term used to give people reason to excel. I dont really beleive we will ever reach a point in which we can no longer move forward....As for optical drives....WAY cool....WAY expensive....I'll take 2..

 

[NaughtyusMaximus]

Hrmm.. 150 GB/ in^2.
So with four platters, and (guess) ~7in^2 per platter, that gives us 4200GB.

Yah, I'm getting really worried that I'll run out of room soon.

 

[nuttervm]

hehe NM.

 

[ArkAoss]

naw that aint right, i just read an article in an office, they found they can heat the platters with laser light or something to defeat the paramagnetism. and hear about the "blue" laser cd's ? will be able to hold more than dvd's, and dvd's will be able to hold more too.

 

[Shockwave]

Wouldnt eating the platters cause a thermal tempature rise (hence heating right ) thereby causing even more bit flipping? Heck, I dont know, just speculating....

 

[bigjon]

Time to go 3d - anyone have a link to the proposed FMD (florescent multi-layered disc) that I heard about a year ago or so? It's supposed to have 100 layers or more (looks like a clear CD).

 

[ArkAoss]

im not sure what the laser was for, i dont remember exactly, saw the article briefly,

p.s. i hate win nt 4.0, and fujitsu hard drives, i've installed nt4.0 20 times on this one drive, please some one shoot me or the hard drive put me out of my missery (end rant

 

[thorin]

Here's a FMD Blurb and a Link


Have you had your FMD shots today?

Well, I suppose it was inevitable...another DVD acronym is upon us. If DVD-Video, DVD-Audio, DVD-ROM, DVD-RAM, DVD-RW, DVD-R and DVD-god-knows-what wasn't enough, now we have the announcement of (drum roll, please) FMD-ROM! While I'm sure some of you are going "great, just what we need, yet another DVD-ROM format!" this latest ROM creation does have some interesting characteristics to distinguish it from the rest of the pack. C3D Digital, Inc., a company dedicated to progressive disc-based technology to help build more interactive and entertaining multimedia content, promises a ROM format that offers exponentially higher storage capacity than any existing DVD technology.

The FMD-ROM format takes "simple" laser-reads-pits-on-disc technology and brings into into the multidimensional realm by offering over 100 possible layers on a single FMD-ROM disc (which stands for "Florescent Multi-layer Disc&quot. Yikes! but perhaps what really sets FMD-ROM apart from DVD and CD technology is that it doesn't use a laser to read pits on a disc per se, but instead to stimulate the florescent material imbedded in the grooves of the disc's multiple layers. Then this florescent material is "charged", emitting back its own light beam at a wavelength different than the laser, thus avoiding any interference between the two. Sound confusing?

What all this adds up to in the end is potential storage capacity of over 1.4 terabytes(!), which would certainly make it a strong candidate for HDTV material and some pretty expansive video games! However, as exciting as new technologies like this always seem, the catch is to get the industry, manufacturers and studios to rally around it and adopt it as the next generation standard. Not an impossible task (hey, DVD did it), but then they are plenty of other rivals out there to FMD-ROM for the holy grail that is "HD-DVD". If you'd like to read more on FMD-ROM, check out this story from OS News for the full skinny.

Thorin

 

[Moohooya]

I've been in this field for way too many years. A decade they thought they were only a couple of years away from the end of what it was physically possible to push a computer to. And every year since then and now I believe I hear the same. As long as it stays a couple of years away we'll never reach it. We'll pass one technology and move onto another. Look at the old valve computers. Sure we hit what they were physically limited to, and then the discrete transistors became a limit. We've moved beyond them, and will continue to do so as long as there is a demand. Eventually maybe we will hit a limit to how small a computer can be built, so we'll build 64 bit computers, then 128 bits, then 256 bits and so on. Along the way a single IC will contain one CPU, then2, the 4 and onwards and upwards. The first microprocessors were 4 and 8 bits, but to get better speed we moved up to 16 then 32 and now 64. Maybe when your great grandkids go to school there will be these 1024 bit computers the size of a text book running of solar and thermal energy. They won't be 'fast' (but they'll kick the crap out of everything today in Seattle combined) as they'll just be the front ends to the web. Possibly by using distributed processing most people won't have workstations, all work would be sent to other computers that have free cycles. Sure, some people will have secret information and won't want to send their tasks out, so there will always be workstations and backend servers.

Personally, as long as there is a market, I feel that people will be paid enough money to work and study damn hard to figure out a solution to tomorrow's technology needs.

 

[bigjon]

*Sigh* I love these threads

Thanks Thorin!

 

[SUOrangeman]

Super-Para-Magne-Tism-Expi-Ala-Docious!

Sorry, it's just that kind of day.

-SUO

 

[thorin]

bigjon
No Problemo!

I love this stuff, there's nothing better then new exciting technology. Well maybe owning new exciting technology (especially before my firneds )

Thorin

 

[ArkAoss]

yeah baby gimme the hi technology star trek stuff, oh yeah, optical data storing cubes and junk

 

[Soccerman]

heh, well theoretically, you will be limited eventually anyway.. for example, take the mass of a laptop, and make every piece of matter work for u, through quantum physics. can u tell me how I'd be able to INCREASE that any more?? extra dimensions perhaps (to hide the extra mass that u need!).

of course, along with something like extra dimensions, you would be developing ways to travel through these extra dimensions (ala Warp Drive!).

anywho, back to my measly old K6-2 400!

 

[zippy]

150GB? Damn...

I haven't even used up my 18.79GB (formatted) on my two hard drives. My Quantum Fireball 13.6GB...12.8GB formatted (eh, I was let down when I found out too ) is only 7.37GB full. My Western Digital 6.4GB...5.99GB formatted is only 2.79GB full. My WD drive is where I have most of my MP3s (about 1.98GB) and some stuff that I backed up before I formatted (and before I got my burner).

 

[Stephen24]

My old fujistu(sp?LOL) doesn't work on windows 2000 either.

 

[SSP]

Geez... I only a 18Gig drive...


BTW - It's spelled Fujitsu.

 

[bigjon]

Years ago I read about scientist's speculations on what to do after running out of particles to work with for storage, and someone suggested changing the color of individual molecules (or at least I think it was down to the molecular level) and using >base 2 arithmetic (so more than 2 states per particle). Why stop at base 10 or 16? The eye can see roughly 16 million colors - if they could get something like that working in 3D they could have tons of growing room Eventually I'll bet they'll just have to overcome on/off states and go analog again.

 

[gregulator]

you people are missing the coolest technology of all... we now even have a computer in a cute little platic box! now how cool is that?

 

[LocutusX]

I'll congratulate Apple when they make a computer that looks like an apple, not before that.

 

[ArkAoss]

GREGULATOR, HAVE YOU SEEN THE INSIDEE OF THE MAC CUBES???? I HAVE A THREAD ON THEM, ITS LIKE A NUKE OUT OF A SCI FI MOVIE IN THERE END RANT

Ok peep's r you tellin me you've had problems with fujitsu's and win nt????
and yes, I been sayin to myself for years why havent they gone back to analog data storage, you can store alot more on an analog signal. and in less space

 

[Gunbuster]

What is the point error rate in analog data storage? More data in less space?
On what a C64 audo tape drive?
No thanks

 

[Dulanic]

We will always find a new method. Infact I read an article on a organic type HD.... storing information on.... proteins? I cant remeber what the info was stored on.... but it allows about 100 times the storage of magnetic drives.