It’s a very interesting sounding device in a terrible article written by someone who clearly doesn’t understand how it works.
Hopefully Arstechnica posts a more in depth write up on this.
Someone smarter than me tell me if this is amazing and game changing or boring and niche.
I wouldn’t say I’m smarter than you, rather I just know some stuff about how computer components work, but what you’re looking at is the latter.
The problem with trying to move to another type of computer is that modern software is designed solely for digital machines. Considering what’s been stated above, how do you port these programs to another type of computer?
The answer is that you don’t. Porting to different CPU architectures can already take some time for most programs, but asking for a port to a fundamentally different type of computer will take an incredibly long amount of time.
That is, if you can even port anything. Considering that digital and analogue computers are completely different, functional clones would have to be made instead by referencing source code. If you don’t have the source, you’re outta luck.
TL,DR: We’ve over-invested in digital computers and there’s no going back.
If it turns out there’s something they do way better, they’d enter as an accelerator card like GPUs did.
Yup! I just wonder how that would work. Since digital and analogue signals are completely different, signal conversion would be required. The overhead caused by conversion may result in delay between the next instruction, or even reduced performance depending on the other components in the machine. A lot of research would have to be done on getting an accurate, low overhead signal converter built into the device.
it would be the same way expansion cards work now; it would have digital control circuitry that can communicate with the analog circuitry.
We already have expansion cards that can do this. Audio cards are an example of an expansion card that convert between digital and analog signals.
Even things like graphics cards, ASICs, or FPGAs; it’s not a different type of signal, but it’s an architecture that isn’t compatible with the rest of the computer because it’s specialized for a certain purpose. So there’s control circuitry that allows it to do that and a driver on the computer that tells it how to.
Thank you. That helps clear it up!
No problem! I’m sorry if I came off as hostile towards analogue machines here. I actually think they’re cool, just not in the way people think they are (“unraveling Moore’s law” is a bit far-fetched, Microsoft.)
Oh, and some advice for anyone who isn’t too well-versed in technology: The tech industry isn’t known for honesty. For them, hype comes before everything, even profitability. Take any “revolutionary” or “innovative” new piece of tech with a grain of salt, especially now that tech companies are getting a bit goofy with their promises due to investors realizing that unprofitable companies aren’t sustainable.
No problem! I’m sorry if I came off as hostile towards analogue machines here. I actually think they’re cool, just not in the way people think they are (“unraveling Moore’s law” is a bit far-fetched, Microsoft.)
Oh, and some advice for anyone who isn’t too well-versed in technology: The tech industry isn’t known for honesty. For them, hype comes before everything, even profitability. Take any “revolutionary” or “innovative” new piece of tech with a grain of salt, especially now that tech companies are getting a bit goofy with their promises due to investors realizing that unprofitable companies aren’t sustainable.
EDIT: The two deleted comments are dupilcates of this one that were posted due to a bug in Jerboa. Sorry for any confusion!
No problem! I’m sorry if I came off as hostile towards analogue machines here. I actually think they’re cool, just not in the way people think they are (“unraveling Moore’s law” is a bit far-fetched, Microsoft.)
Oh, and some advice for anyone who isn’t too well-versed in technology: The tech industry isn’t known for honesty. For them, hype comes before everything, even profitability. Take any “revolutionary” or “innovative” new piece of tech with a grain of salt, especially now that tech companies are getting a bit goofy with their promises due to investors realizing that unprofitable companies aren’t sustainable.
Yes
Thank you
Just doing my part 👍💪
Yea, makes sense.
For some reason this 3D model reminds me of a very specific pixel art…
Oh no no no. I erased that GIF from my mind, I don’t want it back.
