Intel has announced that a research unit has delivered an 80-core processor with performance at the teraflop level. While they insist they have no plans to bring this precise processor to market, the technology demonstrated is astounding. Let me quote from the Intel press release:

 The first time Teraflops performance was achieved was in 1996, on the ASCI Red Supercomputer built by Intel for the Sandia National Laboratory. That computer took up more than 2,000 square feet, was powered by nearly 10,000 Pentium® Pro processors, and consumed over 500 kilowatts of electricity. Intel’s research chip achieves this same performance on a multi-core chip.

Also remarkable is that this 80-core research chip achieves a Teraflops of performance while consuming only 62 watts - less than many single-core processors today.

Let’s stop to think for just a moment about the sort of applications this class of processor makes possible. Mobile speech recognition–not just simple auto-dial commands but genuine speaker-selective recognition–becomes possible. I know people who need adaptive systems–they’re almost literally dying for this performance level. Intelligent adaptation in medial instrumentation takes on a whole new meaning with this much power, as does intelligent navigation for all sorts of transportation systems.

With massive memory and solid-state storage, the ability to solve problems and capture ideas from any location becomes incredible. Add WiMax networking, and you really do approach the time science fiction writers have discussed: when a person can ask essentially any question from any location and get an immediate answer.

The nature of many tasks will change. I get all frothing at the mouth when I talk about education, so I’ll leave that for someone else. My own profession will continue to evolve because the mere presentation of information won’t be special any more. (Frankly, it’s less and less special even today.) Journalists will have to add their own value in the form of telling a compelling story, vouching for the accuracy of statements, and winnowing wheat from chaff on an ongoing basis. I’m excited by the possibilities, but then I think that many current models of publishing have outlived their usefulness already.

Let me know what you think–is teraflop computing in a laptop-capable package a big deal, or will we just make way for an operating system that presents open files painted on lionfish as they swim through the data reef? I wish it were easier for me to swear that this last won’t happen…

Categories: General computing, Hardware