6 ms·

IBM scientists achieve storage memory breakthrough

121 points by interconnector 10y ago

grillvogel 10y ago
they haven't been laid off yet?
digi_owl 10y ago
I am guessing the write cycle numbers are pr bit, as unless the USB stick has crap all wear leveling it can survive way more than 3000 cycles. Frankly the only documented case i recall is of someone killing a USB stick was back during the early MB days, when someone mounted it with the sync option under Linux. This, in combo with it being FAT formated, resulted in the bits holding the allocation table getting a whole lot of writes. Without the sync option, the stick would probably have survived for quite some time as the table would get updated less frequently. These days you are unlikely to see such a problem unless you are scraping the bottom of Ebay listings.
- nikbackm 10y ago
  Wouldn't the stated 10 million write cycles be without wear leveling?
- imtringued 10y ago
  An endurance of 1 million write cycles is not a lot when you can do millions of writes per second.
  - astrodust 10y ago
    It depends on what you're writing and where you're putting those writes. Flash drives survive this level of activity because they intelligently queue up the writes and don't aggressively re-write cells unless it's necessary.
- dv_dt 10y ago
  The USB stick reference is mostly bad tech journalism. For raw flash media itself, 3000 cycles is in the right ballpark for multi-level NAND Flash. For whole USB sticks or SSDs, many mechanisms are in place so that a user doesn't need to worry about the specific 3000 cycle life of a specific chunk of flash.
bhouston 10y ago
What ever happened to HP's memresistors? Did that ever get commercialized?
- mrfusion 10y ago
  Ha I actually logged in the ask that and it's the first comment. I think they were due to come out in 2012?
  - trsohmers 10y ago
    Originally 2006, then 2008, then 2011, 2012, 2014, and 2015... It was officially canned (and by that I mean moved from memristor based to traditional architecture) last year. RIP HP Labs being an actually interesting place for computer architecture research.
- knightofmars 10y ago
  "HP has abruptly changed course on its 'Machine,' a new type of memory-driven computer it thinks will radically alter large-scale data processing. When the company first launched it last year, the plan was to use a new kind of memory chip called the "memristor," which is as fast as DRAM but can permanently store data. The problem is that the tech, which HP expected to commercialize with Hynix in 2013, still isn't ready. Rather than giving up, though, HP has decided to take it in another direction by using both conventional RAM and phase change memory."[1] [1]http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/05/hp-the-machine-no-memristors/ http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/05/hp-the-machine-no-memrist...
  - dekhn 10y ago
    Anybody who thought the Machine, or HP's ability to deploy memristors, was reality, I think is sadly mistaken.
    - voidz 10y ago
      Care to elaborate?
chimtim 10y ago
PCM -- coming soon next year since last 7 years.
- gburdell 10y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_XPoint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_XPoint
- richarme 10y ago
  Nokia Asha 308 / 309 shipped with PCM in 2012. But by then, the feature-phone business was in fast decline, and I guess there wasn't enough demand for continued investment that technology vs. more investment in higher capacity NAND for the smartphone market.
- macrael 10y ago
  I remember reading about 3 state memory in 7th grade. 15 years ago.
agumonkey 10y ago
IBM is spinning the news a lot lately: here they claim to made a breakthrough in antiviral protection http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/49706.wss http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/49706.wss (humans, not computers viruses)
- mrfusion 10y ago
  But could the same concept be applied to computer viruses?
- grillvogel 10y ago
  because they are completely irrelevant in the tech world now they have to release PR stuff like this that sounds cool to the layman investors
  - agumonkey 10y ago
    Typical strategy for old dinosaurs. French post office is now trying to enter tons of unrelated market. Even Apple watch.
swang 10y ago
imagine if ssds didn't actually exist as a consumer product but was just constantly brought up by large companies as the "next big thing!" that never actually came out. i mean intel, and hp all have their own versions and they've been working on them for years and we've yet to see anything come of it. i'm not holding my breath for this to actually get released.
- Gibbon1 10y ago
  I've seen a lot of 'looks promising... can't make work or can't make economic' technologies over the years. Just the nature of the business. I'd hate for companies to stop trying tho. Technologies that seek to displace another older technology often have a long road ahead. Because no green field, the economics and performance has to beat the established technology before anything sees anything but niche applications. I think it took ten years for NAND flash to start seriously chewing into the mass storage market
AnonNo15 10y ago
That looks very similar to Intel's Optane technology which is supposedly getting released to consumer this year.
Quanticles 10y ago
Here is a paper from 2011 where they claim 7 or 8 bits/cell http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5873227 http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=587322... This research seems to take program/erase cycles into greater account.
eb0la 10y ago
This kind of technology could have been great for telcos 10 years ago before virtualization went mainstream. Sadly today servers take a long time to boot (up to 6 minutes) making this ineffective for a baremetal server in that must give five nines uptimes.

121 points by interconnector 10y ago

they haven't been laid off yet?

I am guessing the write cycle numbers are pr bit, as unless the USB stick has crap all wear leveling it can survive way more than 3000 cycles. Frankly the only documented case i recall is of someone killing a USB stick was back during the early MB days, when someone mounted it with the sync option under Linux. This, in combo with it being FAT formated, resulted in the bits holding the allocation table getting a whole lot of writes. Without the sync option, the stick would probably have survived for quite some time as the table would get updated less frequently. These days you are unlikely to see such a problem unless you are scraping the bottom of Ebay listings.

nikbackm 10y ago
Wouldn't the stated 10 million write cycles be without wear leveling?
imtringued 10y ago
An endurance of 1 million write cycles is not a lot when you can do millions of writes per second.
- astrodust 10y ago
  It depends on what you're writing and where you're putting those writes. Flash drives survive this level of activity because they intelligently queue up the writes and don't aggressively re-write cells unless it's necessary.
dv_dt 10y ago
The USB stick reference is mostly bad tech journalism. For raw flash media itself, 3000 cycles is in the right ballpark for multi-level NAND Flash. For whole USB sticks or SSDs, many mechanisms are in place so that a user doesn't need to worry about the specific 3000 cycle life of a specific chunk of flash.

bhouston 10y ago

What ever happened to HP's memresistors? Did that ever get commercialized?

mrfusion 10y ago
Ha I actually logged in the ask that and it's the first comment. I think they were due to come out in 2012?
- trsohmers 10y ago
  Originally 2006, then 2008, then 2011, 2012, 2014, and 2015... It was officially canned (and by that I mean moved from memristor based to traditional architecture) last year. RIP HP Labs being an actually interesting place for computer architecture research.
knightofmars 10y ago
"HP has abruptly changed course on its 'Machine,' a new type of memory-driven computer it thinks will radically alter large-scale data processing. When the company first launched it last year, the plan was to use a new kind of memory chip called the "memristor," which is as fast as DRAM but can permanently store data. The problem is that the tech, which HP expected to commercialize with Hynix in 2013, still isn't ready. Rather than giving up, though, HP has decided to take it in another direction by using both conventional RAM and phase change memory."[1] [1]http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/05/hp-the-machine-no-memristors/ http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/05/hp-the-machine-no-memrist...
- dekhn 10y ago
  Anybody who thought the Machine, or HP's ability to deploy memristors, was reality, I think is sadly mistaken.
  - voidz 10y ago
    Care to elaborate?

chimtim 10y ago

PCM -- coming soon next year since last 7 years.

gburdell 10y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_XPoint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_XPoint
richarme 10y ago
Nokia Asha 308 / 309 shipped with PCM in 2012. But by then, the feature-phone business was in fast decline, and I guess there wasn't enough demand for continued investment that technology vs. more investment in higher capacity NAND for the smartphone market.
macrael 10y ago
I remember reading about 3 state memory in 7th grade. 15 years ago.

agumonkey 10y ago

IBM is spinning the news a lot lately: here they claim to made a breakthrough in antiviral protection http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/49706.wss http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/49706.wss (humans, not computers viruses)

mrfusion 10y ago
But could the same concept be applied to computer viruses?
grillvogel 10y ago
because they are completely irrelevant in the tech world now they have to release PR stuff like this that sounds cool to the layman investors
- agumonkey 10y ago
  Typical strategy for old dinosaurs. French post office is now trying to enter tons of unrelated market. Even Apple watch.

swang 10y ago

imagine if ssds didn't actually exist as a consumer product but was just constantly brought up by large companies as the "next big thing!" that never actually came out. i mean intel, and hp all have their own versions and they've been working on them for years and we've yet to see anything come of it. i'm not holding my breath for this to actually get released.

Gibbon1 10y ago
I've seen a lot of 'looks promising... can't make work or can't make economic' technologies over the years. Just the nature of the business. I'd hate for companies to stop trying tho. Technologies that seek to displace another older technology often have a long road ahead. Because no green field, the economics and performance has to beat the established technology before anything sees anything but niche applications. I think it took ten years for NAND flash to start seriously chewing into the mass storage market

AnonNo15 10y ago

That looks very similar to Intel's Optane technology which is supposedly getting released to consumer this year.

Quanticles 10y ago

Here is a paper from 2011 where they claim 7 or 8 bits/cell http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5873227 http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=587322... This research seems to take program/erase cycles into greater account.

eb0la 10y ago

This kind of technology could have been great for telcos 10 years ago before virtualization went mainstream. Sadly today servers take a long time to boot (up to 6 minutes) making this ineffective for a baremetal server in that must give five nines uptimes.