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Information Technology

Network Computers

• Over last 20 years, microcomputer explosion has moved from computing from centralised systems with dumb terminals towards personal computing
• Might start going the other way soon - 'Network Computer' philosophy being mooted
• NC is not a dumb terminal - full PC - but lacks any sort of data storage (HD/FD) facility
• Relies entirely on Internet Connections - storage is handled remotely
• Based around Web Browser Software, running Java Programs
• Big money behind the idea at the moment - first NCs are now available
• But may not ever take off (Hard disks are very convenient to have)

Storage Devices

Removable Media - 'Superfloppies'

• Current 1.44Mb floppy disks outdated
• Higher density 2.88Mb floppy disks exist - but haven't really taken off
• Floppy disks are:

• Slow
• Have little storage space
• Error Prone
  • Pressing need for replacement with high access speeds and capacity in 100's of Mb
  • Several contenders exist in the 'superfloppy' market:
  • Currently unclear which (if any) will emerge as new standard

CD-R

• Covered in Storage Devices Lecture
• Advantages:
• Media fairly cheap
• Storage capacity high (650MB)
• Durable
• Can be read by now near-standard CD-ROM drives

Other WORM and fully erasable optical formats

• Several exist. Nothing standard emerged yet.
• All expensive, but all higher storage capacity than CD-R
• Not readable by ordinary CD-ROM drives

Hard Disk Cartridges

• Have been around for a long while - especially on Macs ('Syquest' disks)
• Use small removable hard disk cartridges - various capacities
• Several competing systems on PC market at present (e.g. Zip drives, ….)
• Advantages:

• Fast
• Drives fairly cheap
• Erasable - not WORM
  • Disadvantages
• Disks relatively expensive
• Capacities not as high as CD
• Incompatible with each other

Floptical disks - magnetic storage, optical tracking

• Use normal type (though better quality) floppy disks
• Store information magnetically
• Locate information with high resolution optical system - very accurate
• Advantages:

• Can read old style floppies
• Drives fairly cheap
• Erasable - not WORM
  • Disadvantages
• Capacities relatively low (<100Mb)
• Slow data access

EEPROM memory

• Solid state devices - form of ROM that can be rewritten
• Advantages:
  • VERY Fast (especially for reading)
  • Reliable, and rugged
  • Erasable - not WORM
  • Can be used in laptop PCMCIA slots
• Disadvantages

• Low Capacities - <10Mb
• Expensive
• Its time has probably yet to come

Main Storage

• Hard disks only form of main storage at present
• High densities, fast access speeds, fairly low cost
• BUT
  • Moving parts- they wear out, and have high power consumption
  • Maximum magnetic densities are being approached
• There is a long term need for alternative devices to provide fast long term storage, with very large capacities
• Possible future for EEPROM devices (see above) as main store if prices fall enough
  • Access as fast as main memory
  • Easy to expand storage by just adding more chips
• Current devices such as Hard Disks 2D - store information on a surface - limited.
• Future (10 years or so hence) probably lies with 3D solid state storage devices
• Various 3D devices are in development, notably:
• Holographic cubes
  • Store information as interference patterns of light
  • Read and written by lasers.
  • Have been built - storage capacities still low.
  • Potentially very fast, packing a lot of information into a small space.
• Molecular/crystal storage devices
  • Store information in a 3D array of molecules arranged as a crystal
  • Special molecules can be set to two states with exact frequencies of laser light
  • State can be 'read' with another frequency of light
  • Would enable VERY densely packed storage and VERY fast access
  • Still at theoretical stage

Processors

• Microprocessor development has been relentless over last 20 years
• Moore's Law - processor speed doubles every two years - roughly held true
• BUT - Theoretic limits of miniaturisation with current technology may be within sight
  • Speed may yet increase to several billion instructions per second
  • Will probably then start to level out
• Most potential at present seems to be with RISC chips
• Intel x86 line may be running out of steam
  • Limits of design improvements with this old instruction set may be in sight
  • Miniaturisation improvements will continue to speed things up though
  • Attempts to change x86 line to 'CRISC' designs only a partial solution
• MAY mean that the future of PCs lies in some eventual transfer to different CPU type
• Hard to see how this could happen in practice

New processor technologies may delay or avoid the crumbling of Moore's Law:

GaAs (Gallium Arsenide) chips

• Similar sort of thing to silicon
• Can move impulses faster
• Can operate at higher temperatures (thus circuits can be closer packed)
• Devices already exist - still specialised - but could supplant Silicon eventually

Superconductors

• Superconductors are materials that conduct electricity with no resistance
• Thus generate no heat - circuits can be packed together as close as physically possible
• Most materials only superconduct at very low temperatures (around -250C)
• Recent research has produced superconducting materials that work at much higher (but still very subzero) temperatures
• IF (big if) room temperature superconductors are ever produced - could be used to make superfast processors consuming virtually no power

Vacuum Tubes!

• 1950's computers based around vacuum tubes - now obsolete of course
• Chips could in theory be made with microscopic vacuum tubes rather than transistors
• Electrons move faster through vacuum - devices could in theory be 1000 times faster than Silicon based equivalents
• Currently still theoretical

'Photonics'

• All current computing devices work with electrical impulses
• In theory - can build a device that uses light impulses instead
• Light travels at the speed of light (obviously) - as fast as you can get
• No heat generation problems
• Would work easily with optical storage devices and optical transmission method (optic fibres)
• Could interface fairly easily with electronic devices as well
• A lot of research has been put into 'photonics' - no obvious payoff yet - but watch this space!

'Biochips'

• Possibility has been aired of 'chips' grown biologically
• Would consist of chains of molecules carrying electronic signals
• Could be made very compact, and could in theory interact with biological systems - many medical applications
• Still very hard to make in practice - but progress is being made

Input and Output

Speech recognition systems - the end of the keyboard?

• Concept as old as the electronic computer - input via speech rather than keyboard
• Only really become practical recently - needs lots of processor work to recognise speech
• Still (and possibly always) imperfect - but already useful in some applications
• Effective speech recognition would enable further miniaturisation of computers
• Might also make them more user friendly
• BUT - would make computer labs impossible - would be surrounded by people talking!
• Will probably remain a specialised input method for a good while yet - if not always

Future of output - electronic paper? The Electronic book?

• Flat screens have more potential than CRT based displays
• 5 years hence - TFT screens or something similar will probably be used on most systems

• Technology for paper like screens is currently being developed
• Might eventually enable electronic paper - could make printers and any form of 'hard copy' redundant
• Future computers (a long way off) with voice control and thin screen output - might look like and replace books

Virtual Reality

• Idea of VR is to provide input to as many senses as possible and exclude the real world
• Immerse the user in an artificial environment simulated by the computer
• Take input directly from movements of hands, head etc., feed into simulation
• Associated input devices built as sensory body suits to detect motion
• Output devices:
  • Headset with small flat screen displays on eyepieces
  • Audio input from headphones
  • Sometimes tactile output from gloves
• Despite the hype, still very hard to do well
  • Need a lot of computing power to simulate environments well
  • Bodysuits still rather crude
  • Eyepieces cause headaches - can't cope with human focusing mechanism
• Potential applications
  • Entertainment
  • Training for real world tasks
  • Front end for computing systems?

Artificial Intelligence

• Intelligence not well defined - tend to define intelligence as thinking like we do
• Artificial intelligence then (probably) involves building a computer than works in the same manner as the brain
• Brains work on an completely different principle to computers - they are 'neural networks'
• Computers - one complex central processing unit performing well defined sequential instructions
• Neural Nets - countless very simple cells linked together in intricate ways to process data
• Intelligence is thus a property of such a neural network system
• Neural nets are fuzzy, vague things, unlike sequential computers
  • Good at giving best guess sort of answers to complex problems
  • Poor at performing even simple tasks precisely
• Computers CAN simulate neural networks - by dealing with each cell in turn
• Too slow to simulate a brain (with hundreds of billions of cells)
• But can run simpler neural nets - have been used for applications like object recognition
• Supercomputers of the future could in theory simulate a large enough neural network for intelligence - but problem of how to connect it up is at least as daunting
• Why try to force a computer to be 'intelligent' and act like a human?
• Better to get computers to do the things we can't do - the key to their success!

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This page was last edited on: June 08, 2000

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