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IBM Lab Working on a Device That Could Increase Chip Storage by 10 to 100 Times

Polaris573

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The ability to cram more data into less space on a memory chip or a hard drive has been the crucial force propelling consumer electronics companies to make ever smaller devices.

Now, if an idea that Stuart S. P. Parkin is kicking around in an I.B.M. lab here is on the money, electronic devices could hold 10 to 100 times the data in the same amount of space. That means the iPod that today can hold up to 200 hours of video could store every single TV program broadcast during a week on 120 channels.


Mr. Parkin's new approach, referred to as "racetrack memory," could outpace both solid-state flash memory chips as well as computer hard disks, making it a technology that could transform not only the storage business but the entire computing industry.

His idea is to stand billions of ultrafine wire loops around the edge of a silicon chip - hence the name racetrack - and use electric current to slide infinitesimally small magnets up and down along each of the wires to be read and written as digital ones and zeros.

If the racetrack idea can be made commercial, he will have done what has so far proved impossible - to take microelectronics completely into the third dimension and thus explode the two-dimensional limits of Moore's Law, the 1965 observation by Gordon E. Moore, a co-founder of Intel, that decrees that the number of transistors on a silicon chip doubles roughly every 18 months.

I.B.M. executives are cautious about the timing of the commercial introduction of the technology. But ultimately, the technology may have even more dramatic implications than just smaller music players or wristwatch TVs, said Mark Dean, vice president for systems at I.B.M. Research.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site
 
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NEC is rying to do this too, but only 10GB on a standard RAM chip.
 
This proves that I.B.M are still there even tho they are a company undergoing a 'slow death' as my dad calls it. their there but their fading away slowly
 
Wow - you gotta read the NYT article:

"...His idea is to stand billions of ultrafine wire loops around the edge of a silicon chip — hence the name racetrack — and use electric current to slide infinitesimally small magnets up and down along each of the wires to be read and written as digital ones and zeros.

His research group is able to slide the tiny magnets along notched nanowires at speeds greater than 100 meters a second. Since the tiny magnetic domains have to travel only submolecular distances, it is possible to read and write magnetic regions with different polarization as quickly as a single nanosecond — far faster than existing storage technologies. ..."
 
Wow - you gotta read the NYT article:

"...His idea is to stand billions of ultrafine wire loops around the edge of a silicon chip — hence the name racetrack — and use electric current to slide infinitesimally small magnets up and down along each of the wires to be read and written as digital ones and zeros.

His research group is able to slide the tiny magnets along notched nanowires at speeds greater than 100 meters a second. Since the tiny magnetic domains have to travel only submolecular distances, it is possible to read and write magnetic regions with different polarization as quickly as a single nanosecond — far faster than existing storage technologies. ..."

This will be HUGE if it gets released before 2010 to the consumer market:rockout::rockout::rockout:

However im sure the price will be too:mad::mad::mad:

Im scared of the cost when i hear it saying there will be billions of ultrafine wire loops omg i hope that aint too expensive i know we have technology to do alot of those but billions that just seems insane:cry::cry::cry:
 
Yes, this is only a summary of key points. The full article is much longer, click the source link and read the whole thing. I don't think any company conducting R&D at that level is dying a slow death.
 
Profit only up 20% from 2005. Poor IBM really is struggling. :roll:
 
Previous rank 29, now ranked 42.

Im not talking about stuff thats happend now. im talking about over a period of time. their not as big as they use to be

Personally i wouldnt care if i was in last place if im making almost 9.5 Billion dollars a year:toast::toast:

And thats profits not revenues so yes they really did make 9.5 Billion dollars
 
Nice in theory, in practicality? I have to question the reliability, longetivity, and costs of such technology, among other things.
 
Previous rank 29, now ranked 42.

Im not talking about stuff thats happend now. im talking about over a period of time. their not as big as they use to be

someone apparently forgot that IBM won the console war. lol :laugh: Not too big eh? I think only 26.5 Million Xbox 360's, PS3's, and Nintendo Wii's have been sold. Too bad IBM had a chip in each one.
 
someone apparently forgot that IBM won the console war. lol :laugh: Not too big eh? I think only 26.5 Million Xbox 360's, PS3's, and Nintendo Wii's have been sold. Too bad IBM had a chip in each one.

on top of that, ibm actually produces the cell processor used in the ps3 at a factory not too far from my hourse actually. ibm toshiba and sony all made the chip together(my dad actually worked on the internet access protocool for the chip). ibm produces the chip mainly . and sony uses it mainly. not sure where toshiba comes in other then helping to design it lmao.
 
IBM has become more of a service company than anything else lately. They do put piles of money into research and development to build up patents but the company itself just focuses on customer service now. (usually helping large companies deal with huge systems). Thats what my project management teacher told me anyway (she's an IBM project manager who teachers part time and tries to recruit students)
 
IBM has become more of a service company than anything else lately. They do put piles of money into research and development to build up patents but the company itself just focuses on customer service now. (usually helping large companies deal with huge systems). Thats what my project management teacher told me anyway (she's an IBM project manager who teachers part time and tries to recruit students)

They ditched the desktop segment yes(sold to Lenovo), however IBM still makes processors, chipsets and indeed does a mad amount of research. In the server market they're still one of the strongest players.
 
on top of that, ibm actually produces the cell processor used in the ps3 at a factory not too far from my hourse actually. ibm toshiba and sony all made the chip together(my dad actually worked on the internet access protocool for the chip). ibm produces the chip mainly . and sony uses it mainly. not sure where toshiba comes in other then helping to design it lmao.

where's that? My father is a chip tester at the IBM in Vt. I'm not sure if they manufacture the Cell there, but he has told me the codenames used for the xbox 360, and the Wii...i forget them now though.
 
IBM is still on the ball with driving the computer industry forward. As was mentioned earlier in these replies, they still do alot of work in research and development, co working with other companies, and still continue their trend of designing micro processors. I am really psyched by this news and hope it becomes a viable truth in the not too distant future.
 
Nice in theory, in practicality? I have to question the reliability, longetivity, and costs of such technology, among other things.

Certainly makes for a good read, but yea, it's one of those thing that sounds too good to be true... and market release in 2010??? That seems WAY optimistic.

Edit: IBM revenue = 91.5 BILLION? Wow.
 
Nice in theory, in practicality? I have to question the reliability, longetivity, and costs of such technology, among other things.

Right, I'm sure you know more about this than the Ph.D Physicists and Engineers working on the technology.
 
whatever happened to MRAM!?
 
from the description I think this is MRAM.

edit* or a deviation from it.
 
from the description I think this is MRAM.

edit* or a deviation from it.

yea, it's similar, since it uses magnetics, but the loops design isn't the same as what I remember reading about MRAM.
 
where's that? My father is a chip tester at the IBM in Vt. I'm not sure if they manufacture the Cell there, but he has told me the codenames used for the xbox 360, and the Wii...i forget them now though.

the cell cpu is made at the east fiskhill factory out here in ny, or was it west fishkill lol, same city..
 
yea, it's similar, since it uses magnetics, but the loops design isn't the same as what I remember reading about MRAM.

MRAM uses magnetism, but in a completely different way:

"... The elements are formed from two ferromagnetic plates, each of which can hold a magnetic field, separated by a thin insulating layer. One of the two plates is a permanent magnet set to a particular polarity, the other's field will change to match that of an external field. A memory device is built from a grid of such "cells". ..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRAM

This new tech from IBM seems to blend nano tech with a movable "nano-magnet" :toast:
 
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