Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post Reply
User avatar
wjfox
Site Admin
Posts: 8663
Joined: Sat May 15, 2021 6:09 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by wjfox »

Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

This thread covers general news and developments in computing, telecommunications, wireless technology, gadgets and consumer tech.

More specific and indepth coverage of particular fields or companies will be found in other threads (e.g. quantum computing, BCIs, 6G).


Image
weatheriscool
Posts: 12724
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Warnings on the dangers of screen time are ill founded

by University of Bath
University researchers have carried out the largest systematic review and meta-analysis to date of how people's perceptions of their screen time compare with what they do in practice, finding estimates of usage were only accurate in about five per cent of studies.

The international team say this casts doubt on the validity of research on the impact of screen time on mental health, and its influences on government policy, as the vast majority rely on participants to estimate (self-report) how long they spend on digital devices, rather than logs of actual usage, or tracked time.

"For decades, researchers have relied on estimates of how we use various technologies to study how people use digital media and the potential outcomes this behavior can lead to. Our findings suggest that much of this work may be on unstable footing," said lead researcher Dr. Doug Parry at Stellenbosch University.
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-05- ... unded.html
weatheriscool
Posts: 12724
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Apple May Build 40-Core ARM-Based Mac Pro, Plans 10-Core MacBook Pro

By Joel Hruska on May 18, 2021 at 2:13 pm
Ever since the M1 debuted last year, a question has hung over the PC market: What’s the big brother look like? The M1 is a great CPU as far as performance-per-watt is concerned, but the fact that it offers just four high-performance cores limits the market it can address. If new reports are accurate, however, those limits are coming down fast.

Bloomberg reports that Apple is prepping multiple new M-class variants for different markets. We don’t know how Apple is branding the CPUs, but we’ve heard “M2” floated recently. Supposedly, we’ll see a new round of MacBook Pro systems, “followed by a revamped MacBook Air, a new low-end MacBook Pro, and an all-new Mac Pro workstation.” There are also reports of a revamped Mac mini and a larger iMac system, both with a CPU intended to greatly outperform the current M1.
https://www.extremetech.com/computing/3 ... acbook-pro
User avatar
wjfox
Site Admin
Posts: 8663
Joined: Sat May 15, 2021 6:09 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by wjfox »

Google has announced its 4th generation tensor processing units (TPUs), which it claims can complete AI and machine learning workloads in record time (TPUv4 demonstrates an average improvement of 2.7 times over TPUv3 performance).

https://venturebeat.com/2021/05/18/goog ... tor-chips/


Image
weatheriscool
Posts: 12724
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Breakthrough to Below 1 Nanometer Chips
May 21, 2021 by Brian Wang
TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and National Taiwan University (NTU) have shown a process that uses the semi-metal bismuth to enable the manufacture of semiconductors below 1-nanometer (nm).

Historically, the feature size of a chips was the length of the silicon channel between source and drain in field effect transistors (FET). Today, the feature size is typically the smallest element in the transistor.

The best chips today have a 3nm feature. TSMC N3 risk production is scheduled in 2021. The volume production is targeted in second half of 2022

TSMC is expected to enter 2 nm risk production around 2023.

Intel’s 2019 roadmap scheduled potentially equivalent 3 nm and 2 nm nodes for 2025 and 2027 respectively. In December 2019, Intel announced plans for 1.4 nm production in 2029.
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2021/05/b ... chips.html
weatheriscool
Posts: 12724
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Semiconductor Shortage Enters ‘Danger Zone’ as Lead Times Rise

By Joel Hruska on May 20, 2021 at 9:01 am
https://www.extremetech.com/computing/3 ... times-rise
The semiconductor shortage affecting much of the world’s chip production is still worsening, in at least some markets. The average lead time for chip deliveries increased to 17 weeks in April, up from 16 weeks in March. Just before the beginning of the pandemic began, average lead time was running around 12 weeks.

“All major product categories up considerably,” Susquehanna analyst Chris Rolland wrote in a recent investment note. “These were some of the largest increases since we started tracking the data.” Bloomberg notes that Susquehanna referred to this as a “danger zone” for chips as the risk of buyers engaging in behavior that magnifies the impact of the crisis increases.
User avatar
Yuli Ban
Posts: 4631
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 4:44 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by Yuli Ban »

^
"It feels like AI is currently bottlenecked on multiple consecutive supplychain disruptions, from cryptocurrency to Intel's fab failures to coronavirus... A more paranoid man than myself would start musing about anthropic shadows and selection effects." ~ Gwern
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
User avatar
raklian
Posts: 1746
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 4:46 pm
Location: North Carolina

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by raklian »

It looks like we'd better start seabed and asteroid mining sooner than we anticpated.
To know is essentially the same as not knowing. The only thing that occurs is the rearrangement of atoms in your brain.
User avatar
wjfox
Site Admin
Posts: 8663
Joined: Sat May 15, 2021 6:09 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by wjfox »

Microsoft is finally retiring Internet Explorer in 2022

May 19, 2021, 12:39pm EDT

Microsoft is finally retiring Internet Explorer next year, after more than 25 years. The aging web browser has largely been unused by most consumers for years, but Microsoft is putting the final nail in the Internet Explorer coffin on June 15th, 2022, by retiring it in favor of Microsoft Edge.

“We are announcing that the future of Internet Explorer on Windows 10 is in Microsoft Edge,” says Sean Lyndersay, a Microsoft Edge program manager. “The Internet Explorer 11 desktop application will be retired and go out of support on June 15, 2022, for certain versions of Windows 10.”

While the Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) of Windows 10 will still include Internet Explorer next year, all consumer versions will end support of the browser. Microsoft doesn’t make it clear (and we’re checking), but it’s likely that we’ll finally see the end of Internet Explorer being bundled in Windows either in June 2022 or soon after.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/19/2244 ... pport-date


Image
weatheriscool
Posts: 12724
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: Computers & the Internet News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Seagate Specs the Mach.2, the World’s Fastest Hard Drive

By Joel Hruska on May 21, 2021 at 4:06 pm

https://www.extremetech.com/computing/3 ... hard-drive

Seagate has finally unveiled the specifications on its upcoming dual actuator hard drives. The Mach.2 drive family will be introduced with the Mach.2 Exos 2X14. The hard drive offers 14TB of capacity in “two independently addressable 7TB logical units.”

The 3.5-inch 12Gb/s SAS drive is capable of a maximum sequential transfer rate of 524MB/s, which is substantially faster than any other hard drive on the market. While the 7200 RPM spindle speed isn’t particularly fast compared with the 10K and 15K drives that exist already, Seagate’s dual actuator technology outperforms them all.

Seagate’s Exos 15E900 is a 2.5-inch 900GB HDD with lower claimed latency (2ms compared with 4ms) but a sequential transfer rate of 210-300MB/s. The company’s higher capacity enterprise Exos HDDs claim up to 270MB/s in sequential transfer rates. The 524MB/s for the Exos 2X14 is high enough to match or exceed the performance of early SATA SSDs, though these, of course, are scarcely the competition.

Seagate actually goes into some detail on why it brought dual actuator drives to market. Hard drives have typically gotten faster in three ways: Increased spindle speeds, the integration of drive cache, and command queueing. Hard drives hit 7200 RPM with Seagate’s Barracuda 1 in 1992, drive caches were popularized by drives like the WD800JB in 2002, and Seagate introduced Native Command Queueing (NCQ) support for HDD’s in 2004. Now, in 2021, we’ve got dual actuator drives.
Post Reply