Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S261918AbVEQVmU (ORCPT ); Tue, 17 May 2005 17:42:20 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S261958AbVEQVmU (ORCPT ); Tue, 17 May 2005 17:42:20 -0400 Received: from smtpout.mac.com ([17.250.248.97]:12485 "EHLO smtpout.mac.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S261918AbVEQVmC (ORCPT ); Tue, 17 May 2005 17:42:02 -0400 In-Reply-To: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v728) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed Message-Id: <6A533A3B-685E-46C3-9A2A-948633715B97@mac.com> Cc: Alan Cox , Matthias Andree , Linux Kernel Mailing List Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: Kyle Moffett Subject: Re: Disk write cache (Was: Hyper-Threading Vulnerability) Date: Tue, 17 May 2005 17:41:39 -0400 To: Bill Davidsen X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.728) Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1802 Lines: 51 On May 17, 2005, at 09:15:52, Bill Davidsen wrote: > What would be ideal is some cache which didn't depend on power to > maintain > state, like core (remember core?) or the bubble memory which spent > almost > a decade being just slightly too {slow,costly} to replace disk. There > doesn't seem to be a cost effective technology yet. I've seen some articles recently on a micro-punchcard technology that uses grids of thousands of miniature needles and sheets of polymer plastic that can be melted at somewhat low temperatures to create or remove indentations in the plastic. The device can read and write each position at a very high rate, and since there are several thousand bits per position, with one bit for each needle, the bandwidth is enormous. (And it scales linearly with the size of the device, too!) Purportedly these grids can be easily built with slight modifications to modern semiconductor etching technologies, and the polymer plastic is reasonably simple to manufacture, so the resultant cost per device is hundreds of times cheaper than today's drives. Likewise, they have significantly higher memory density than current hardware due to fewer relativistic and quantum effects (no magnetism). Cheers, Kyle Moffett -----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK----- Version: 3.12 GCM/CS/IT/U d- s++: a18 C++++>$ UB/L/X/*++++(+)>$ P+++(++++)>$ L++++(+++) E W++(+) N+++(++) o? K? w--- O? M++ V? PS+() PE+(-) Y+ PGP+++ t+(+++) 5 X R? tv-(--) b++++(++) DI+ D+ G e->++++$ h!*()>++$ r !y?(-) ------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------ - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/