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Here's a link to the product page, http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/product.aspx?PID=SPACE-NUCLEAR-EVENT http://www.maxwell.com/products/microel

by geuis 15y ago

Here's a link to the product page, http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/product.aspx?PID=SPACE-NUCLEAR-EVENT http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/product.asp.... Maxwell makes an entire array of microelectronics components. These are generally meant for use in devices that are deployed into space environments.

JonnieCache 15y ago
"FOR SPACE" Holy shit. So this is to protect your orbital weapons platform from EMP blasts?
- pjscott 15y ago
  Or anything you feel like putting in space, that you worry might be near a nuclear explosion or other source of intense ionizing radiation at some point. Be prepared, as the boy scouts say. I assume that maxim goes double in space, considering how expensive it is to put things up there in the first place.
  - sliverstorm 15y ago
    No kidding. I believe NASA had something like 3 dual-redundant flight computers on the Voyager probes.
    - pjscott 15y ago
      Just think how much redundancy you could get, cheaply, with the advances that have been made with Moore's Law over the years. Computers for space probes don't need to be that fancy. It's totally feasible to build processors that use error-correcting codes in their entire datapaths, have tri-modular redundancy for all their functional units, and then are arranged alongside several other identical processors for ridiculous amounts of redundancy. This sounds silly, but the vast majority of the cost is non-recurring engineering cost. Manufacturing it would be a relatively cheap matter of sending the design to a fab like TSMC along with a bundle of money. Transistors are dirt cheap.
      - JonnieCache 15y ago
        Doesn't the difficulty/expense of keeping all those processors running in absolute cycle-for-cycle lockstep increase dramatically with the amount of redundancy? I vaguely remember being taught that this is the big problem developing real-time safety critical systems.
        pjscott 15y ago
        If you make a bunch of (highly redundant) small processors, then I don't see why it would be much harder than the clock distribution issues in large processors, which also need to keep all their parts in sync. Alternately, it's possible to use asynchronous processor design and not worry about clock distribution. The tools aren't really there, but there have been async processors made before, and they work. They handle synchronization with local handshaking, instead of distributing a clock signal everywhere. Another option is to abandon the cycle-for-cycle lockstep requirements, and just ensure that the synchronization time is bounded, and reasonably low. I know there have been some papers published about using this kind of globally-asynchronous-locally-synchronous architecture for realtime apps.
        djcapelis 15y ago
        The problem is when there is an error, and there will be, you need to correct the processor, unit or other part of the circuit which is now in the wrong state.
        sliverstorm 15y ago
        It could be that I just don't know enough about redundant system design, but I'm pretty sure the way Voyager worked was each computer ran independently and identically, and the result of computations was simply compared to the result on the other computers. In other words, you run it like Folding@Home or SETI@Home which send each job to multiple clients. That doesn't seem like a difficult problem to tackle.
      - wtallis 15y ago
        Aren't the mechanisms of Moore's Law (ie. smaller transistors that run at lower voltages) exactly the same things that make chips more susceptible to radiation? Once you compensate for that by including more redundancy, you may not have a cheaper chip.
  - tlb 15y ago
    What is the probability, over the next 10 years. It might be worth it for server farms, even if the probability of a nuclear EMP is only 1%.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  ICMBs go through space you know.
dmm 15y ago
How much does this stuff cost?
- trobertson 15y ago
  I don't think they do regular consumer stuff, it looks like everything is special order. According to this page [1], you have to contact one of their business partners in order to arrange any purchases. [1] http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/where_to_buy.aspx http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/where_to_bu...
  - potatolicious 15y ago
    Presumably someone in the US government will then hear about the interesting fellow trying to buy nuclear-hardened equipment.
    - bigiain 15y ago
      I'm _almost_ tempted to mail them for a sample batch - and make an art project... (But I don't think I need the cavity search every time I enter the US that might come along with that...)
- stevenrace 15y ago
  Seems to be available for $150/ea @ http://rcfreelance.com http://rcfreelance.com
shabble 15y ago
There's some interesting material on the Honeywell HX5000 process (Silicon on Insulator - usually synthetic sapphire) for radiation hardening. There's an interesting (if somewhat technical) document here: http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/myaerospacecatalog-documents/Space-documents/HX5000_Series_0.15um_SOI.pdf http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/myaerospace...

by geuis 15y ago

JonnieCache 15y ago

"FOR SPACE" Holy shit. So this is to protect your orbital weapons platform from EMP blasts?

pjscott 15y ago
Or anything you feel like putting in space, that you worry might be near a nuclear explosion or other source of intense ionizing radiation at some point. Be prepared, as the boy scouts say. I assume that maxim goes double in space, considering how expensive it is to put things up there in the first place.
- sliverstorm 15y ago
  No kidding. I believe NASA had something like 3 dual-redundant flight computers on the Voyager probes.
  - pjscott 15y ago
    Just think how much redundancy you could get, cheaply, with the advances that have been made with Moore's Law over the years. Computers for space probes don't need to be that fancy. It's totally feasible to build processors that use error-correcting codes in their entire datapaths, have tri-modular redundancy for all their functional units, and then are arranged alongside several other identical processors for ridiculous amounts of redundancy. This sounds silly, but the vast majority of the cost is non-recurring engineering cost. Manufacturing it would be a relatively cheap matter of sending the design to a fab like TSMC along with a bundle of money. Transistors are dirt cheap.
    - JonnieCache 15y ago
      Doesn't the difficulty/expense of keeping all those processors running in absolute cycle-for-cycle lockstep increase dramatically with the amount of redundancy? I vaguely remember being taught that this is the big problem developing real-time safety critical systems.
      - pjscott 15y ago
        If you make a bunch of (highly redundant) small processors, then I don't see why it would be much harder than the clock distribution issues in large processors, which also need to keep all their parts in sync. Alternately, it's possible to use asynchronous processor design and not worry about clock distribution. The tools aren't really there, but there have been async processors made before, and they work. They handle synchronization with local handshaking, instead of distributing a clock signal everywhere. Another option is to abandon the cycle-for-cycle lockstep requirements, and just ensure that the synchronization time is bounded, and reasonably low. I know there have been some papers published about using this kind of globally-asynchronous-locally-synchronous architecture for realtime apps.
        djcapelis 15y ago
        The problem is when there is an error, and there will be, you need to correct the processor, unit or other part of the circuit which is now in the wrong state.
      - sliverstorm 15y ago
        It could be that I just don't know enough about redundant system design, but I'm pretty sure the way Voyager worked was each computer ran independently and identically, and the result of computations was simply compared to the result on the other computers. In other words, you run it like Folding@Home or SETI@Home which send each job to multiple clients. That doesn't seem like a difficult problem to tackle.
    - wtallis 15y ago
      Aren't the mechanisms of Moore's Law (ie. smaller transistors that run at lower voltages) exactly the same things that make chips more susceptible to radiation? Once you compensate for that by including more redundancy, you may not have a cheaper chip.
- tlb 15y ago
  What is the probability, over the next 10 years. It might be worth it for server farms, even if the probability of a nuclear EMP is only 1%.
burgerbrain 15y ago
ICMBs go through space you know.

dmm 15y ago

How much does this stuff cost?

trobertson 15y ago
I don't think they do regular consumer stuff, it looks like everything is special order. According to this page [1], you have to contact one of their business partners in order to arrange any purchases. [1] http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/where_to_buy.aspx http://www.maxwell.com/products/microelectronics/where_to_bu...
- potatolicious 15y ago
  Presumably someone in the US government will then hear about the interesting fellow trying to buy nuclear-hardened equipment.
  - bigiain 15y ago
    I'm _almost_ tempted to mail them for a sample batch - and make an art project... (But I don't think I need the cavity search every time I enter the US that might come along with that...)
stevenrace 15y ago
Seems to be available for $150/ea @ http://rcfreelance.com http://rcfreelance.com

shabble 15y ago

There's some interesting material on the Honeywell HX5000 process (Silicon on Insulator - usually synthetic sapphire) for radiation hardening. There's an interesting (if somewhat technical) document here: http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/myaerospacecatalog-documents/Space-documents/HX5000_Series_0.15um_SOI.pdf http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/myaerospace...