Topic: New exotic material could revolutionize electronics (Read 2376 times)

Capt. Mike · « **on:** August 13, 2009, 05:28:11 am »

Just something I got at work..looks interesting

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Move over, silicon -- it may be time to give the Valley a new name. Physicists at the Department of Energy's (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University have confirmed the existence of a type of material that could one day provide dramatically faster, more efficient computer chips.

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Link to full article http://www.physorg.com/news164289676.html

Isn't science amazing

Mike

Bonk · « **Reply #1 on:** August 13, 2009, 05:54:19 am »

Yeah, spintronics man!

Quantum chemistry is a total mindfrak. Damn differential equations... mutter muttter.

Javora · « **Reply #2 on:** August 13, 2009, 06:51:52 am »

And thus Moore's law keeps going and going and going...

toasty0 · « **Reply #3 on:** August 13, 2009, 07:53:00 am »

And thus they moved along by twos...zeros and ones...only they moved faster.

Panzergranate · « **Reply #4 on:** August 13, 2009, 12:38:43 pm »

There are some exotic materials that engineers (and mechanics) wish scientists would find an equivalent replacement material for.

Such instances occur when repairing or servicing equipment that, when hunting for spare parts, it is found that what is needed is made from a meterial known as "UNOBTAINIUM".

No engineer (or mechanic) actually knows what "Unobtainium" actually looks or feels like because it is so exotic and rare.

However, compnents are apparently made from this stuff, and apparently the older the age of a manufactured item, then the odds of some component part being made from "Unobtainium" increases.

By comparison, Chinese scientists have managed to create a new type of metal that has the strength of Chese, is impossible to tap a lasting screw thread into and corodes in unbelieveable time when exposed to Carbonic Acid (Rain Water).

Western motorcycle owners and mechanics refer to this metal as "Crapite".

_Rondo_GE The OutLaw · « **Reply #5 on:** August 13, 2009, 01:08:51 pm »

cool beans.

Capt. Mike · « **Reply #6 on:** August 13, 2009, 09:08:31 pm »

Quote from: Panzergranate on August 13, 2009, 12:38:43 pm

There are some exotic materials that engineers (and mechanics) wish scientists would find an equivalent replacement material for.

Such instances occur when repairing or servicing equipment that, when hunting for spare parts, it is found that what is needed is made from a meterial known as "UNOBTAINIUM".

No engineer (or mechanic) actually knows what "Unobtainium" actually looks or feels like because it is so exotic and rare.

However, compnents are apparently made from this stuff, and apparently the older the age of a manufactured item, then the odds of some component part being made from "Unobtainium" increases.

By comparison, Chinese scientists have managed to create a new type of metal that has the strength of Chese, is impossible to tap a lasting screw thread into and corodes in unbelieveable time when exposed to Carbonic Acid (Rain Water).

Western motorcycle owners and mechanics refer to this metal as "Crapite".

Panzer..I know exactly what it is..it's when I work on a 20 year old Tektronix oscilloscope, and the chip that fries is obsolete, and no longer in the supply system....Then, you find a vendor that bought all of the old chips surplus, and is now willing to sell you said chip, for more than the oscilloscope is worth, or for what a replacement would cost..

Our biggest problems come from older systems (I contract with the USAF) that are computer controlled, with such modern languages as Atlas, Mate, Unix, and the venerable HP Basic..One must have these interface chips to keep the systems running, and the owners don't want to pay someone (if they could find an old fart like me) to rewrite the program for more modern interfaces...

Which is why, at work, I have to know HP Basic, DOS, Windows 95, XP, Vista, and how to integrate this crap (running from a 386 PC (yes..it runs our microwave measurement system and power sensor calibrator) to the latest vista laptop running the nextgen softeware)....

I'm 54, my goal is to be able to hook up a voltmeter to a calibrater, put in 50 volts, and voltmeter reads 50 volts..

But, at least my job is secure, no one else here knows how to do it...

Mike

Panzergranate · « **Reply #7 on:** August 21, 2009, 02:29:09 pm »

Last year, when I was working as an electronics engineer for Siemens, they were having a clean out of the antique collection of old test gear, jigs, rigs and the like. (Yes, there were s few Tectronics scopes there as well), I spotted an old wel battered COMPAQ "Luggable" II heading for the skip.

Now I own a earlier IDE hard drive version with the fancy "push the door to open" floppy disc drive version that has sat idle in the workshop since the power supply went to Silicon Heaven a few years ago. Needless to say, I was relived to have something to canabalise for spares.

I've been aroun computers from when they were just massive amounts of TTL chips on numerous boards in large frames. I still have new 6110 (128 x 8 Bytes) memory chips around.

My first home computer, a Radofin 1296, programmed 6.6 K.Byte E2PROM memory cartridges in Signetics 2650 assembly language, so as a result, I find assembler in any processor seconf nature, if not easier than C++ to use.

I've had every version of Windows since 1.03 and can use MS DOS, DR DOS and even CP/M and CP/M 80.

I've noticed how lowly IT folks hold proper engineers in awe when iy comes to being able to manipulate a computer system using ye olde assembly language and other mustical incantations.

There are occasions when I feel my years.

Bonk · « **Reply #8 on:** August 21, 2009, 03:00:07 pm »

Quote from: Panzergranate on August 21, 2009, 02:29:09 pm

... mustical incantations.

Yeah, some engineers are rather musty!

I've always enjoyed the friendly rivalry between chemists and engineers.

I think anyone who took pure science courses in the last century will have had similar exposure to low level programming and test equipment. <insert kids today speech here...> The transition from gear like jewel setting meters and analog scopes to DMMs and Digital scopes and ICs happened here during my school years.

I'm a first principles science kind of guy, these days there is too much black box "CSI" style "science". Th modern gear is great but I think people get a little lost if they don't have a sense of its history.

Capt. Mike · « **Reply #9 on:** August 21, 2009, 03:57:03 pm »

My real frustrations come from when I actually have to condemn a 27 year old piece of test equipment, because parts are unavailable, and the customer squeals because now they don't know how to set up thier new replacement (I condemned a 464 Tek scope, and they got the top of the line digital phosper scope). Thier technical orders give explicete instructions on how to set the old scope, but they couldn't make that leap to menu driven parameters..and these are the kids that beat you every which way on a computer game..

So, I sat down and spent a few hours of the USAF's time (and I make a good buck..how do you think I afford 42 guitars) explaining how they can use this new fangled stuf, and how it's better, because you can store the perfect signal, and use that to compare with what you now have, measure for voltage offsets, when they're not supposed to be there, phase differences in signals..

They depend too much on the tech orders (which take forever to update), what they learned in Tech School (which can take forever to update), etc.

BTW, the oldest piece of test equipment I work on currently is a HP 204C audio oscillator made in 1962..good thing guitar amps use the same tubes, I've always got a source of supply

Mike

Bonk · « **Reply #10 on:** August 21, 2009, 04:09:05 pm »

You know what I think part of the the distinction is? Willingness to RTFM. Old school techies like fat technical manuals. Mind you, one has to allow for the fact that almost nobody provides printed documentation anymore.

Panzergranate · « **Reply #11 on:** August 21, 2009, 04:43:52 pm »

I've had to patch in new compnents and make them replace "unobtainium" parts on expensive old pieces of kit, rather like Scotty on Star Trek TOS.

Scotty is an old school "If I don't have the parts available I'll make something else fit" true engineer.

Improvisation is the difference between run of the mill and briliant engineers, if not legendary engineers.

The nice thing with computers is that they all still work in the same way, rather like a lawn mower motor works in exactly the same way as a Cesna aero engine.... both will suffer for the same Gremlins and faults.

A modern PC will work and eventually fail for exactly the same reasons as an old Sinclair ZX81 (Timex 1000), Apple I, CBM 64, Macintosh, etc.

Nemesis · « **Reply #12 on:** August 22, 2009, 06:12:24 am »

Quote from: Panzergranate on August 21, 2009, 04:43:52 pm

Scotty is an old school "If I don't have the parts available I'll make something else fit" true engineer.

Improvisation is the difference between run of the mill and briliant engineers, if not legendary engineers.

The sign of a craftsman.

Panzergranate · « **Reply #13 on:** September 03, 2009, 02:49:06 pm »

The ture skill in engineering is knowing not only what lump hammer to use (there are 24 sizes) but where and how hard to hit somethinbg to make it fit....

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