AllThingsD » Justin Rattner

Just Slap the Thing in a MacBook, Already, Will Ya?

John Paczkowski — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 22:12:40 +0000

With 1.3-billion transistors and a 48-core processor, Intel’s new “Single-chip Cloud Computer” could power a formidable computer indeed. But it will be a while before the SCC reaches market, if ever.

Uncrated at an event in San Francisco Wednesday, the next-generation chip boasts approximately 10 to 20 times the processing power found inside current Intel (INTC) “Core” CPUs. And it can operate on as little as 25 watts, or at 125 watts when running at maximum performance–about the amount of energy consumed by two household light bulbs.

“With a chip like this, you could imagine a cloud datacenter of the future which will be an order of magnitude more energy efficient than what exists today, saving significant resources on space and power costs,” said Justin Rattner, head of Intel Labs and Intel’s chief technology officer. “Over time, I expect these advanced concepts to find their way into mainstream devices.”

But not yet. Right now, Intel is giving the chips to a few select research partners, who will use them to develop new software applications and programming models for future multicore processors. Said Ratner, “This is not a product. It never will be a product. But it provides a very good platform for conducting research.”

China Needn't Surpass U.S., Intel CTO Says

Don Clark — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:59:57 +0000

China’s factories have long churned out high tech products. A big question facing Silicon Valley–underscored in a survey released Monday by Intel (INTC) and Newsweek–is how big a role the country will play in dreaming up those gadgets.

The survey found optimism among Chinese respondents and pessimism among the Americans. Some 63 percent of Chinese believe their country will overtake the United States in technology innovation over the next 30 years. Only one-third of Americans believed the U.S. would still lead over that period.

Justin Rattner, Intel’s chief technology officer, agrees that China will reduce the innovation gap with America. But that doesn’t mean that surpassing the U.S. is inevitable. “Speaking personally, there’s no reason for that to happen,” he said.

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No, That’s a Terminator 2 Script. This Is the Programmable Matter Roadmap

John Paczkowski — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 15:28:08 +0000

If, as futurist Arthur C. Clarke once wrote, “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” then Intel (INTC) may well be the Hogwarts of IT. At the chipmaker’s Developer Forum on Thursday, CTO Justin Rattner discussed a handful of new technologies that might appear to be magic to those unfamiliar with the concepts of wireless power transmission and programmable matter. Taking a cue from Nikola Tesla, who envisioned a “world system” for “the transmission of electrical energy without wires, Intel has designed a system that uses the resonant properties of magnetic fields to broadcast up to 60 watts of power two to three feet, with 75 percent efficiency. “Something like this technology could be embedded in tables and work surfaces,” said Rattner. “So as soon as you put down an appropriately equipped device it would immediately begin drawing power. In the future, your kitchen counters might do it. You’d just drop your espresso maker down on them and you would never have to plug it in.”

Also highlighted during Rattner’s keynote, Intel’s work in programmable matter. With tiny programmable elements called catoms (claytronics atoms), said Rattner, the company believes it will someday be able to build a mobile device that could be stretched wide to browse the Web and then compacted and worn as an ear-piece as needed. … Or, say, a shape-shifting cyborg assassin that might be sent into the past to destroy the human resistance.

Astonishing, right? Almost … magical.

“The industry has taken much greater strides than anyone ever imagined 40 years ago,” Rattner said. “There is speculation that we may be approaching an inflection point where the rate of technology advancements is accelerating at an exponential rate, and machines could even overtake humans in their ability to reason, in the not so distant future.”

Next stop: The Age of Spiritual Machines.