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IEEE pushes for Ethernet standard between 400Gbps and 1Tbps, hopes to head off big data crunch
Ethernet might seem passé to those of us toting Ultrabooks, but it's important enough to provoke a crisis for internet providers and many of those who depend on high-speed computing networks for a living: based on the rises of streaming video and social networking, the IEEE is worried that many of those large-scale networks will need 10Tbps of total bandwidth just to avoid a logjam in 2020. To that end, the standards body has formed a Higher-Speed Ethernet Consensus group that's mulling a new, breakneck-speed format reaching either 400Gbps or 1Tbps, depending on whose approach you'd favor. Fight the urge to pick the 1Tbps option on instinct, however. Both options would depend on bonding multiple connections together, and the faster of the two formats could lead to some expensive and very ungainly cables if it's not handled well. A meeting is scheduled for late September in Geneva to at least begin hashing out the details. Although we won't be wiring our homes with terabit Ethernet anytime soon, the standard should come quickly enough that the Googles and Netflixes of the world can satisfy our data addictions for a good while longer. [Image credit: Justin Marty, Flickr]
IBM's Holey Optochip transmits 1Tbps of data, is named awesomely
Be honest: was there any doubt whatsoever that something called a "Holey Optochip" would be anything short of mind-blowing? No. None. The whiz-kids over at IBM have somehow managed to transmit a staggering 1Tbps of data over a new optical chip, with the fresh prototype showing promise for ultra-high interconnect bandwidth to power future supercomputer and data center applications. For those who'd rather not deal with esoteric descriptions, that's around 500 HD movies being transferred each second, and it's enough to transfer the entire U.S. Library of Congress web archive in just 60 minutes. Needless to say, it's light pulses taking charge here, and researchers are currently hunting for ways to make use of optical signals within standard low-cost, high-volume chip manufacturing techniques. Getting the feeling that your own personal supercomputer is just a year or two away? Hate to burst your bubble, but IBM's been touting similar achievements since at least 2008. Actually, scratch that -- where there's hope, there's Holey.
