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Technology Hardware

Carbon Nanotube Memory on the Way 134

Posted by CowboyNeal from the prepare-yourselves dept.
Cyberherbalist writes "Nantero, a nanotechnology company, is expecting prototypes of products using NRAM technology (nanotube-based, non-volatile random access memory) to be available in 2006. In the article at nature.com, it says that 'the company has succeeded in making circular wafers, 13 centimetres in diameter, that hold 10 gigabits of data.' And they are ten times faster than 'flash' memory."
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Carbon Nanotube Memory on the Way More

Carbon Nanotube Memory on the Way

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  • Wafer? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by slashflood ( 697891 )
    A 13 centimeter wafer that can hold 1.25 gigabyte of data? That's not impressive.
    • Indeed, but if I had a server I'd want one of these for RAM.

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by elgatozorbas ( 783538 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:19AM (#13746714)
        Indeed, but if I had a server I'd want one of these for RAM.

        That would make you a 100% technology elitist. If I, for one, would build a server, I would make it out of small, cheap, proven reliable, available components that I know rather than (presumably) expensive, large, unavailable non-field-tested new technology for which the only incentive to buy them would be they are 'cool'...

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by InvalidError ( 771317 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:42AM (#13746795)
        Why would you do that?

        Current DRAM chips were there years ago: current DRAM chips are around 1Gbit per square centimeter. On a ~5" wafer, this means ~40 potentially working chips per wafer and 40Gbits/wafer, four times as much.

        And as far as downtime reduction goes, NRAM would be no good unless the server has time to suspend-to-RAM... so you would still need an UPS or ultra-capacitors to cover this.

        • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Interesting)

          by robj ( 18902 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @12:07PM (#13746900) Homepage
          And as far as downtime reduction goes, NRAM would be no good unless the server has time to suspend-to-RAM...


          Well, unless the server was written using memory transactions [microsoft.com], which are starting to look like a good idea for other reasons also. If you had a transactional layer on top of your NVRAM, then you could structure things to allow crash recovery as well; then you could recover from any crash at any time.

    • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SonicBurst ( 546373 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:48AM (#13746588) Homepage
      It's a prototype for Christ's sake....it'll get smaller with time. You ever see a string of iron core memory? That stuff was big too, but it got smaller.

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Funny)

        by aug24 ( 38229 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:39AM (#13746787) Homepage
        Ah... ferrite core. I remember being shown a 4 inch square of that stuff that held... a kilobit. Yes, that's right, 256 bytes filling the size of your hand. 32 copper wires across and down, with a little lump of black ferrite core at each junction, like the ugliest jewellery you ever saw.

        When they got bugs in the system, they could correct the memory by hand with a magnet...

        Ah, those were the completely off-topic days.

        Justin.

        • Re:Wafer? (Score:1, Offtopic)

          by SonicBurst ( 546373 )
          Yup, 32 wires horizontally and 32 vertically, plus usually 1 or 2 wires for reading the data back. Must have been a PITA to install in a machine. I've never actually seen core memory in person, but have seen a few pictures of it. A bit of a trivia tidbit: An Wang, of Wang wordprocessor fame, apparently invented the stuff (or at least was first to patent it). Man we've come a long way.
        • I remember being shown a 4 inch square of that stuff that held... a kilobit. Yes, that's right, 256 bytes filling the size of your hand.

          Actually, no, that's wrong. Last I checked, a kilobit is 128 bytes...
          • Actually, no, that's wrong. Last I checked, a kilobit is 128 bytes...

            ...when a byte is 8 bits. This is not always the case. Even modern parity memory stores 9 bits per byte (well, 36 bits per word), even if only 8 of those virtual bits are visible to the user.

            It doesn't seem completely impossible that a machine old enough to use core memory might have also had 4-bit bytes, giving 256 bytes per kilobit (yes, kilo and not kibi - you can't make me say it).

            • 4-bit bytes never happened...even counting 1 byte == 1 character (false!). IIRC, baudot used 5-bit characters, morse used variable bit characters, and Conteniental Code used ternary notation variable bit length characters.

              But nobody used 4-bit characters. (4 bits == 16 combinations. Won't work.)

              Besides, IBM *invented* the term byte for their 360 series computers (s.a. EBCDIC), and specified it as 8 bits.
        • I believe it's traditionally called a 'nibble'
      • Haha just a prototype, it will get smaller? Think again. We're not talking about lithography here. The nanotube structures are what they are. Density improvements will come only if they actually figure out how to make transistors and the like at the nanoscale level. Right now, they have effective bond out to traditional silicon technology for those functions. That process is costly in terms of area.

        Mind you these densities are only been achieved in small quantities in labs. If we compare to tradition

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        It's a prototype for Christ's sake....it'll get smaller with time.

        That's what she said.

    • Re:Wafer? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Considering how new the "nano"-technology is compared to silicon based technology, I'm impressed they even made it as far as a press release.

      Jon Jungel

    • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Funny)

      by alexatrit ( 689331 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:49AM (#13746598) Homepage
      And how thick is a wafer, exactly? compared to say, a disk platter? If they attain the access time mentioned in TFA, it is rather impressive. High-capacity, fast, thin, and preferably shiny things are always impressive.

    • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Informative)

      by photon317 ( 208409 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:51AM (#13746608)

      For one, it's first-gen stuff. It will likely gain density quickly in the future. Also, don't forget this is basically NVRAM: way faster than a hard-drive, and way more permanent than DRAM. It fills a unique niche and cannot directly be compared to or replace either of the two. (Well, it could replace hard drives, if it shrunk enough). The day is coming (slowly) when the primary storage on any computer system will probably be some sort of nonvolatile solid-state device. Hard drives with spindles will be for bulk data (music, movies, documents), while the OS goes on the nonvolatile ram which is neccesarily much smaller in size, but more reliable and faster to access. You can do things that way now under Windows or Linux by buying a 1-4 GB-ish solid state flash disk for your root disk (or C: drive) and then putting in a large normal hard drive for all your bulk data, but current SSD technology is overpriced and suffers from various little problems, both of which make it impractical for mass deployment even if the OS vendors put more thought into supporting the setup.

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Laaserboy ( 823319 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:44AM (#13746798)
        For one, it's first-gen stuff. It will likely gain density quickly in the future.

        It may gain density, but gain little in reliability. I have a Ph.D. in solid state physics, so I should respond. The carbon nanotubes bend to make connect with an electrode, so something moves. This is usually a bad sign for long-term reliability. Ask telecom technicians if they would like to replace their solid state transistor-based switches with moving switches. Their answer will be that these moving parts wore out.

        This memory might not improve to the point that it becomes more reliable than your present NVRAM.

        It is very easy for a scientist to produce one working device in the lab. We call these hero devices. The rest of the world does not know this. When engineers get ahold of these claims, though, they tear them up, since the process might not be cheap, reliable or scaleable.

        So yes, it might get better, but I wonder if this group and the related scientist have invented new physics. Have they fundamentally changed the way mechanical switches make contact, the way electrons move and are held in capacitors, and the way domains set up in magnetic memory? I think not. I think this is a step backwards towards old mechanical swithces made smaller and reliable memory made unreliable.

        • Re:Wafer? (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Just Some Guy ( 3352 ) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Saturday October 08, 2005 @02:16PM (#13747371) Homepage Journal
          The carbon nanotubes bend to make connect with an electrode, so something moves. This is usually a bad sign for long-term reliability.

          I'm not a materials researcher, but I could imagine reasons why macroscopic phenomena like "wearing out" don't apply to nanomaterials. It seems at least remotely possible that these nanotubes are small enough that their mechanism of movement is completely understood, and there aren't any nonreversible reactions taking place.

          • Re:Wafer? (Score:3, Informative)

            by fossa ( 212602 )

            Indeed. I am a materials researcher (a very young and uneducated one however), and "movement" may have several definitions... in a paperclip for example, bending it back and forth inches crystal planes over one another until dislocations pile up and the whole thing is too brittle to bend anymore (planes don't slide well through dislocations). In a ceramic, flexure causes intrinsic pores and cracks to propagate until a large fracture forms. In a ferroelectric, ions move back and forth from their rest pos

        • Re:Wafer? (Score:3, Informative)

          by Bloater ( 12932 )

          It may gain density, but gain little in reliability. I have a Ph.D. in solid state physics, so I should respond. The carbon nanotubes bend to make connect with an electrode, so something moves. This is usually a bad sign for long-term reliability. Ask telecom technicians if they would like to replace their solid state transistor-based switches with moving switches. Their answer will be that these moving parts wore out.

          A mechanical moving switch (which is the type of switch I imagined you were talking abou

          • Each bundle of nanotubes in this switch uses more than one nanotube (AFAIK). It's possible that the nanotubes could slide along each other and break their bonds, breaking the circuit.

            • Re:Wafer? (Score:3, Informative)

              by Bloater ( 12932 )
              Yeah, although, looking at the flash intro, it says "Unlimited Lifetime". Which would suggest that it is pretty reliable, or at least that the life is not related to the number of times it switches as it is with flash.

        • It may gain density, but gain little in reliability. I have a Ph.D. in solid state physics, so I should respond. The carbon nanotubes bend to make connect with an electrode, so something moves. This is usually a bad sign for long-term reliability. Ask telecom technicians if they would like to replace their solid state transistor-based switches with moving switches. Their answer will be that these moving parts wore out.

          The question is what is the wear rate and meantime between failures of the nanotube?

    • Wafers are normally cut up into many smaller chips, so it could be a 13 inch wafer holding n 10gb chips. Not sure whether that's the case or not.

      It's probably also a prototype and the size'll shrink more soon.

      • Re:Wafer? (Score:2, Interesting)

        by qray ( 805206 )
        I wonder how thick these things are. Layering them might prove interesting, assuming they don't generate a lot of heat.
        --
        Q

    • Re:Wafer? (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      You're overlooking the retro market. Can't you just see it? 2007: Apple announces the iWalk, a moderately bulky portable player that holds -- get this -- 90 minutes of music! It'll be cool, though, since it will be in rainbow colors (so 70's) and it will be hip since it features Carbon Nanotube Memory. (Of course, /. will totally rave about it when it comes out.)
    • Especially considering RAM chips have an area of roughly 1 square centimeter, or a capacity of about 10 MebiBYTES each. Thats 1993 capacities all over. Also, it isn't much good for RAM, because 1.2 GB is a 13 CM diameter hunk, and it is ONLY 10 times faster than flash. That sounds nice, until you realize 667 MHz DDR2 ram is like 234239523 times (not real number, don't flame me) as fast as Flash. Hard drives are typically about 10 times as fast as flash, so there is a better compairison. Its not that I'
      • 10 MebiBYTES each.

        I know that this is surely off topic, but I can't restrain myself.

        You're actually the first person I've seen really _use_ this "term" in a sentence. I heard of it a while back, and cringed. But I cringed again seeing it actually used ... come on! This is such a blatantly godawfull crapulescent term .. vomitous, disgusting, vile. It's like an incarnation of Barney haunting a word, only worse.

        "Mebi" can kiss my ass.
        Thank you for listening to my rant.
        Now back to your regular /.
        • Well, "mega" is pretty damn incorrect. Mega is the prefix meaning 1000x1000. It is commonly used in computers to mean either 1000x1000 or 1024x1024. This often leads to confusion, as with harddrives, ect... Someone decided to do something besides bitching about it and invented a new term. Better for everyone involved. Deal with it.

    • That prototype is 2 years old (Score:5, Informative)

      by hyc ( 241590 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @01:21PM (#13747155) Homepage Journal
      See Nantero's press releases [nantero.com]; they announced their 10Gbit wafer in May 2003. Their partnership with LSI Logic isn't news either, that was announced June 2004. The fact that they're still signing new partnerships on a steady basis tells me this technology is not a dead-end (yet).

    • A 13 centimeter wafer that can hold 1.25 gigabyte of data? That's not impressive.

      That's probably why they call it a prototype. A fragile wood-and-fabric contraption that can carry only one man and fly less than 100 feet? That's not impressive.

      What is impressive about it is that it is non-volatile and faster than flash memory. If the storage density can be upped by two orders of magnitude, it will be a serious competitor for platter-based hard drives. I have long felt that the distinction between "temp

    • 13 centimeters is only about 5 inches across, and that's plenty small enough to fit in a desktop PC or a laptop.

  • What next? (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    What next, an optical laptop?

  • Transistor (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mysqlrocks ( 783488 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:46AM (#13746578) Homepage Journal
    He says they still have to check that the chips can be reliably produced on a large scale

    When the transistor replaced vacuum tubes it only became economically viable when it was produced on a large scale.

    • Not viable (Score:2, Insightful)

      by 8086ed ( 876715 )
      He didn't say viable, he said reliable. There's a big difference. If they can't be produced reliably, why would they waste their time mass producing them.

      • If they can't be produced reliably, why would they waste their time mass producing them.

        Depends on how they are unreliable. If say 75% of the tubes one a wafer can't be used to store data, but the ones that do work keep working you can map out the bad ones much like you do with bad disk blocks. On the other hand if they come off the line fine but 75% of them die after a month or two, well, there isn't much use for them.

        And of corse you need to calculate the cost per bit after the mapping overhead,

        • And of corse you need to calculate the cost per bit after the mapping overhead, and make sure that is still cheap enough to be useful.

          If reliable, even though expensive, it will certainly be useful. 10 gigs of fast non-volatile random access memory has many uses, even if very expensive. Those uses just might be niche markets, but they exist just the same.

  • wow!! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Lucractius ( 649116 ) <Lucractius@NOsPaM.gmail.com> on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:46AM (#13746579) Journal
    It looks like they have a fnatastic new use for it too
    these guys [ http://atomchip.com/_wsn/page4.html [atomchip.com] ] would love it ! it sounds like the perfect complementary technology to their unique advancement of computing!

    Seriously, this nanotech stuff kicks ass, if it doesnt have the same write burn flash memory has, then this stuff would make solid state storage possible and FAST :D no more noisy hard drive... Perfect. No more worrying about over using your iPod Nano, changing your songs to often. All those nagging hassles GONE :D

    • Re:wow!! (Score:2, Informative)

      by io333 ( 574963 )
      That atom chip corporation is a hoax [dvorak.org]

      7 gigaherz 64 bit processor, 2 terabytes flash hard drive in a laptop? sure...
      • Yes it is. I know that. I was using exessive hyperbole in that part to point it out it was a joke, with all my exclamation marks. Its Obvious! isnt it! That theyve just stuck bits onto a regular laptop! Totaly Fake!
        • I thought it was a joke, but I wasn't sure. I guess the mods didn't get the joke either, as you got modded up informative (!)
          • I was prepared to believe it until I saw the audio jack labeled as 'Removable NvIOpRAM' (http://atomchip.com/_wsn/page3.html [atomchip.com]).. that is just such an obvious joke (didn't see the photoshopped system properties screenshot until much later.. 1TB? Windows XP can't address 1TB...)

            • i just hope someone gets his presentation at the expo next year on video ( if he even shows! )

              I want to see the stuned audience, or the laughter.

              Dvorak is gonna run em down and check it, but i doubt hell get em on tape :P

  • ten times (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by ErichTheWebGuy ( 745925 )
    I bet it's also [at least] ten times as expensive as flash memory
    • I wonder if some bacteria will evolve the ability to eat this stuff. it is carbon after all. One might argue that they don't eat diamonds either (or maybe they do just slowly). But it's a different material and carbon based instead of silicon. Bacteria have evolved to eat other novel man made structures (e.g. nylon). In fact it's the novelty that makes it attractive to a bacteria since it will be a food source it has no competition for. mmmm.....nanotubes.

  • Hype? (Score:5, Funny)

    by mothlos ( 832302 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:51AM (#13746606)
    Is there anything you can't do with carbon nanotubes?

    So far I have heard that they will be the next steel, the next silicon, the next communication line, the next display medium, the next fabric, the next medicinal treatment. I just want to know is will this change the world in the same fundamental way that mineral oil did in the 20th?

    • Re:Hype? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I wonder if you saw this one? : Defective carbon nanotubes [physorg.com]

    • Re:Hype? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:06AM (#13746663)
      I just want to know is will this change the world in the same fundamental way that mineral oil did in the 20th?

      Or the way snake oil did in the 19th?

    • don't forget carbon nanotubes are the predicted best choice for cables in a space elevator---

    • Re:Hype? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Spy der Mann ( 805235 ) <spydermann DOT slashdot AT gmail DOT com> on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:37AM (#13746780) Homepage Journal
      I just want to know is will this change the world in the same fundamental way that mineral oil did in the 20th?

      It's an interesting fact that carbon is the key component for mineral oil.
      Carbon, just like silicon, has 4 electrons in their outer orbit.
      Carbon is one of the 4 components for life (C,H,O,N).

      So, yes, why not?

      But here's something *VERY* interesting: There has been research on nanotubes made with transition metals. As well as DNA-based nanotube-like structures.

      I think this is just the beginning. This week physorg reported bioelectronical components using bacteria. Who knows what the future holds for us? of course, assumming we don't destroy ourselves before we get there.

      • Re:Hype? (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Thing 1 ( 178996 )

        Who knows what the future holds for us? of course, assumming we don't destroy ourselves before we get there.

        I know you're not a native speaker, but this is a common turn of phrase which always amuses me when I see or hear it.

        It really should be, "assuming we don't destroy ourselves instead of getting there." The way it's worded, I get a "Monkey's Paw" feeling where the mangled corpse of the son is coming home (in the above, its our mangled corpses reaching "the future" (cue Zappa noise)).

        • >I know you're not a native speaker, but this is a common turn of phrase which >always amuses me when I see or hear it.

          If you pride yourself on being one, perhaps you could try reading up on when "its" is appropriate, and when "it's" is. It's not "its our mangled corpses", it's "it's." It's not too difficult, especially for the native speaker that you purport to be.

          Short lesson:
          its = of or belonging to sth.
          it's = it is

          Hope this helps,
          -ram
          • What's "sth"?

            Your tone seems demeaning. Mine wasn't, it was amused. You're highlighting a typing error (these things just happen); I'm pointing out a thinking issue (acknowledging/understanding it can make the speaker/writer better).

            But yeah, thanks for your attempt at irony which is every more ironful because of your typo.

            (My mentioning "native speaker" was only because I've seen said poster discussing not being a native speaker, and appreciating any help.)

      • Re:Hype? (Score:2)

        by njh ( 24312 )
        "Carbon is one of the 4 components for life (C,H,O,N)."

        You mean apart from phosphorus, sulfur, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, chlorine, iron, cobalt, chromium, copper, iodine, manganese, selenium, zinc, and molybdenum. And probably a few more we don't understand.

    • Is there anything you can't do with carbon nanotubes?

      Divorce them. It's totally impossible. I've tried.

    • Connect them into a string longer than an inch or so, of durablity comparable with cotton.
      At least nobody succeeded so far.
      • So what we really need is a carbon-nanotube cotton gin.
        • I'm thinking they are going to be formed quick and fast. So we are looking at taking one form of carbon and turning it quickly into another form through the application of pressure and magnetism. So maybe like a magnetic press?

  • Yes, but... (Score:5, Funny)

    by wootest ( 694923 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @10:55AM (#13746624)
    ...does it scratch easily?

  • "On The Way" (Score:4, Insightful)

    by LesPaul75 ( 571752 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:04AM (#13746656) Journal
    They should call it DNFRAM, because I heard that each DIMM will come bundled with Duke Nuke-em Forever. I also heard that their first major customer was the Phantom game console.
    And ferromagnetic RAM (FRAM) technology shows promise for making faster non-volatile components: it uses the orientation of crystal atoms to store data.

    But both flash and FRAM chips wear out over time and lose the ability to store information. FRAM chips, adds Schmergel, cannot be made as small as NRAM ones.
    How long have people been announcing that a new, non-volatile, and/or huge-capacity, and/or incredibly fast memory technology is on the way, and soon to be released, and just going through the very last stages of entering mass production? Has even one of them made it to store shelves? The last real revolution in storage technology that I know of, that actually went anywhere, was "spintronics." And that has turned out to be practical only in hard drives, even though it was claimed by some that it would completely revolutionize memory in general.

    • Re:"On The Way" (Score:2, Insightful)

      by LiquidCoooled ( 634315 )
      Hey, innovation comes along.

      I remember hearing about Perpendicular [hitachigst.com] drives. You can buy them now.

      (Ok, I know its not a huge advance, but I like the marketting, so its mentioned here)
    • As with what LiquidCoooled said, we also have MRAM now working. Advances come dude.
      • But that's just it... it's "working." There's a big gap between "working" and "shipping." They have quantum computers "working," but try finding one at Fry's. Where can I buy some MRAM? I'd love to have a computer that doesn't need to shut-down or reset or hibernate. Or how about FRAM? Or NRAM?

        Progress is great, but these companies are so eager to hype their technology that they jump the gun. And then they find out a month later that there's a huge problem with acually mass producing them. Or, the

  • More nano hype. (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Anyone remember 'holographic' storage that was going ti give TB's in something the size of a sugar cube, or all the other similar technologies touted over the last 10 years. They all came to nothing, we are still stuck with slow HDD's and flash technology. 10 years from now things will be much the same, we will have even bigger, marginally fast HDD's.
  • Ever heard of the FLASH hard drives? Well, think about it. 10 times faster than flash drives, no limit to the number of write operations... this has the potential to become the *ultimate* hard drive technology. Silent hard drives, which can be operated no matter the humidity conditions (7500+ RPM hard drives don't operate very well in places with high humidity and heat, i.e. coasts)...

    Only one thing concerns me, tho. 2 years ago, Nantero had announced the fabrication of their nanotube memory. I was skeptical then, and I'm still a bit skeptical. What if their prototypes don't work? Will Nantero suffer the fate of so many dot-com's we all (don't) know about?

    Only time will tell.

    • Re:Perhaps RAM isn't the ideal application... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rodwthompson ( 921397 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @11:41AM (#13746791)
      I am an old timer, been through the tube age, then on to transistors with tubes, then transistors then the first chips and on and on... All new technologies have a rough start, I know we will soon have solid state memory that is cheap, reliable and non-volatilse that will allow our computers to be instant on instead of loading all of the crap we now have to. Do prototypes work to begin with, hell no, but give it all a chance. A techno nerd before they were words... Rod

      • I agree with your perspective. The only really big hiccups I recall where prototypes were talked about in the popular press as the next big thing were "silicon was too slow and was going to be replaced by GaAs by the mid 80's" and "Bubble Memory".

        Some things also take longer than expected to become economical. I saw Vertical Density recording in floppy diskettes at a Hitachi exhibition in Tokyo in 1983. IIRC, they had >3MB in 3.5in and >8MB in 5.25in. I can't remmeber if there were hard drives there

      • There have been and still are a lot of "instant on" computers. The problem is that people expect more of their computers at an economical cost, as such, the idea of instant on gets thrown out, though, IMO, sleep and standby gets most of the functionality right there, you get a computer that's on and functional in a couple seconds and the computer takes very little power in standby/sleep.

    • Re:Perhaps RAM isn't the ideal application... (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Here's a link to news from year 2003 where they accounced it:
      http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn3838 [newscientist.com]
  • Ok, holy freakin crap, but this thing is HUGE... This is bigger than most hard drives , and it holds ONE gigaBYTE of data . You are NOT fooling me with your non-standard measurements. I would have expected a bit better from "NANO" technology.

    This is not going to replace ANYTHING with these dimensions... I can get an Ipod NANO with 4 GB of space, and I get a screen, a click wheel, audio processor, and a battery in less space...

  • Nice (Score:1)

    by tsa ( 15680 )
    When I started my study in 1989 the Bucky ball had just been discovered. Carbon nanotubes followed a few months or so later. And now, 15 years later we see the first products based on them appear. It's nive to have seen something develop from first discovery to useful product.

  • But why? (Score:1, Funny)

    by StoatBringer ( 552938 )
    Nobody will ever need more than 640k of memory!
  • I wonder if this type of thing would allow a DSLR to be hacked to shoot at 24fps continuously. Just a thought.
  • Uhm, yeah. I thought nano technology was supposed to be small ;P

  • That's it? (Score:3, Informative)

    by KidSock ( 150684 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @03:20PM (#13747639)
    10 gigabits in a 13cm diameter wafer? Does this really sound that good to anyone? I mean a little flash card is like 3cm wide and holds a gigaBYTE. This wafer holds 10gigabits/8bits = ~1.2 gigabytes. Harddrives? Assuming you have a bunch of these wafers for "platters" the size would still be pretty limited.

  • Down the tubes! (Score:3, Funny)

    by VegeBrain ( 135543 ) on Saturday October 08, 2005 @03:53PM (#13747765)
    So finally when the system crashes we can say it went down the tubes and really mean it!
  • Several times every year, we hear of some company expecting to soon release a storage product that'll be orders of magnitude better than any existing technology, yet somehow they hardly do.
  • As a nanotube researcher, I usually have some snotty remark about how no one pays attention to reality when it comes to carbon nanotube research. However, this thing works. It's really not that complicated, and has passed scientific review multiple times. These people have been in the nanotube research community almost as long as it has existed. They are real scientists, doing real work.

    I'm not saying they're going to hit the exact specs they're shooting for, just that the basic science is prooven, and
  • I want to know what happened MRAM, a magnetic based, faster, and static replacement for our current DRAM? Guess they are faster at producing acronyms then product.
  • I am in charge of the SEM on our campus, and we have people from physics over all the time, and last month we had a guy over who was making carbon nanotubes.

    The ones I saw were made from Acetylene gas and ammonia. A tiny particle of Iron starts the process of tube formation. The carbon adheres to the base of the iron particle and builds up from there, the iron particle determining the diameter of the tube.

    Reminded me of the smelly back snake fireworks I used to like as a kid.
    Except that they are a lot small

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