Far Out?

[foodchain]

Could you get rid of a motherboard and instead just have a giant processor full of cores? You could have the cpu, ram, and a hard drive. Maybe those can be gotten rid off in place of just a big chunk of flash memory and a cpu. Heck it could probably process in order to maintain a certain temperature even. All of it could be intergrated into the monitor or even maybe the keyboard.

 

What I mean is the motherboard is a series of components, like a cpu for example. Why cant all of that simply become integrated into a huge multicore processor?

 

I think that would be neat is all to try. One thing I can think is that different programs would behave differently on it I imagine, and maybe some of the cores could be programmed to track this behavior and optimize it, which could lead to threads of computer behavior based on its interaction with a human.

 

I know you probably can't put everything that makes up the guts of a computer on a cpu, but if you could put a majority of stuff on it that would I think reduce the size of a computer greatly. I also think it would allow for energy consumption to be regulated more effectively.

[RyanJ]

There are several issues, the first would be the size. This would make the processor larger and thus slower as it would take the electrical signals longer to cross the processor and it's components.

 

The second would be cooling. CPU's already generate huge amounts of heat and need to be kept cool to work optimally. The more you try to cram into them, the more heat generates.

 

The third is that it's pointless. It would not reduce the complexity of the system and would still require just as many connections - why waste time doing something that will not make a great deal of difference in the end?

[foodchain]

There are several issues, the first would be the size. This would make the processor larger and thus slower as it would take the electrical signals longer to cross the processor and it's components.

 

The second would be cooling. CPU's already generate huge amounts of heat and need to be kept cool to work optimally. The more you try to cram into them, the more heat generates.

 

The third is that it's pointless. It would not reduce the complexity of the system and would still require just as many connections - why waste time doing something that will not make a great deal of difference in the end?

 

I would like to argue it from the point of all the logic behind any computer system and why the processor exists to execute these instructions. Even a graphics card has a gpu, and most all of it is simply digital right with a clock? So why can't it all be just brought down into cores that have different structures for say doing floating point numbers and what not? If each core could do the same functions they could relate to each other in optimal ways when doing instructions I would think.

 

I think all the different specialized components ultimately has to use the processor to some regard and all of them have to run from some instruction set. Plus many of these digital devices and what not can be reprogrammed, as in the hardware does not have to be the end all of what it can do.

 

I think it would be interesting to see as I don't know if anyone has tried such.

[RyanJ]

I would like to argue it from the point of all the logic behind any computer system and why the processor exists to execute these instructions. Even a graphics card has a gpu, and most all of it is simply digital right with a clock? So why can't it all be just brought down into cores that have different structures for say doing floating point numbers and what not? If each core could do the same functions they could relate to each other in optimal ways when doing instructions I would think.

 

Because the connections would still need to be as intricate as they are now. A GPU could be integrated into a CPU but why bother? It's no more optimal and would only serve to make the design more complex and harder to dissipate the heat.

 

I think all the different specialized components ultimately has to use the processor to some regard and all of them have to run from some instruction set. Plus many of these digital devices and what not can be reprogrammed, as in the hardware does not have to be the end all of what it can do.

 

I think it would be interesting to see as I don't know if anyone has tried such.

 

Of course you are correct. Most things have a processor at their core but combining them together would cause more problems than it would solve. See my first post.

[Mr Skeptic]

The motherboard allows for a lot of flexibility, and doesn't have much of an energy cost. To save energy, use slower clock cycles.

[RyanJ]

The motherboard allows for a lot of flexibility, and doesn't have much of an energy cost. To save energy, use slower clock cycles.

 

Good point. If everything were built directly into the CPU then extensions (such as extra PCI cards say) wouldn't be possible. Thanks for pointing that out.

[foodchain]

Good point. If everything were built directly into the CPU then extensions (such as extra PCI cards say) wouldn't be possible. Thanks for pointing that out.

 

Yes, but to cycle back onto an earlier point the design of something in terms of hardware itself can be programmed. I guess the big leap I am trying to picture is a cpu of many cores that have properties similar to programmable logic devices. I think way way for this to happen in a more immediate sense is a variety of cores that can synchronize on instructions, but that each core can process different types of instructions. Then say one core would simply be a semaphore of sorts of directing instruction traffic and so on, or maybe all of them could do it.

 

On edit

 

I also think sticking to the motherboard is sort of a stagnation. Not that its bad, but with just a motherboard and related component set up you really don't know what else could work or even how.

[RyanJ]

And that would require you to upload new hardware instructions each time you wish to add a new component? Sorry but programming hardware isn't the best solution.

 

Graphics cards for example are optimized for their task and for their specific hardware. While other hardware may be able to emulate the features they won't be as good as the originals. No code can, for example, turn an Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT into a 275 GTX. The hardware has to be changed.

[foodchain]

And that would require you to upload new hardware instructions each time you wish to add a new component? Sorry but programming hardware isn't the best solution.

 

Graphics cards for example are optimized for their task and for their specific hardware. While other hardware may be able to emulate the features they won't be as good as the originals. No code can, for example, turn an Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT into a 275 GTX. The hardware has to be changed.

 

There would be no new components, just code. The optimization issue would be how well such a system could possibly execute information in any giving configuration, as any component is obviously some form of an electrical device doing the same from basically the same technology in a sense. How many people use those super multi core processors to the max every time they get on a computer, but yet even with new components you cant expect the same outcome with higher end graphics cards and other components just having some 386 processor if that was even possible.

[RyanJ]

That isn't true I'm afraid. If it were that simple it would have been done a long time ago no?

 

Things like graphics cards don't reply on the underlying "software" (the firmware) but also on advances in the hardware. Compressing everything into one multi-cored CPU where each core could be programmed individually wouldn't allow for one to expand upon hardware and, say, upgrade to a faster graphics card because removing the core would not be possible. See what I mean? You need to have flexibility and that can't be given by programming.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Indeed. Graphics cards, for example, use fundamentally different CPU types than a regular processor. They're optimized for very specific massively parallel operations. Replacing them with a generalized CPU is not going to be efficient. Have you ever tried using a computer that had no graphics card and had to use software rendering? It's painful.

[foodchain]

That isn't true I'm afraid. If it were that simple it would have been done a long time ago no?

 

Things like graphics cards don't reply on the underlying "software" (the firmware) but also on advances in the hardware. Compressing everything into one multi-cored CPU where each core could be programmed individually wouldn't allow for one to expand upon hardware and, say, upgrade to a faster graphics card because removing the core would not be possible. See what I mean? You need to have flexibility and that can't be given by programming.

 

I understand that part, but here is something I am saying that I think is getting missed also. Most all of the electrical components in any giving computer operate instructions in the form of some standardized logic operating on some standardized electrical devices. This holds true for processors. If you could make say some 15 core processor that has all kinds of capability it could run in various ways depending on the instructions. For instance maybe a maximum graphics potential for a giving program would require six of the cores.

 

I think it would be nifty to have something like that which held trillions if not more possible configurations from a code standpoint on how it could handle instructions. I just wonder if you could get them all to clock independently or in certain ways when required.

 

I also don't know if economics has really made this idea happen, I am sure its occurred to people before me though, but I have never heard of it.

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Indeed. Graphics cards, for example, use fundamentally different CPU types than a regular processor. They're optimized for very specific massively parallel operations. Replacing them with a generalized CPU is not going to be efficient. Have you ever tried using a computer that had no graphics card and had to use software rendering? It's painful.

 

 

Yes I have, and I know it sucks.

 

I am not arguing though that this processor be standard by any current definition, just that its design allows for some tremendous amount of possible configurations. I think if you allowed for enough of those in some way that can be reconfigured on the fly it could be able to simulate the behavior of many other components.

[RyanJ]

I understand that part, but here is something I am saying that I think is getting missed also. Most all of the electrical components in any giving computer operate instructions in the form of some standardized logic operating on some standardized electrical devices. This holds true for processors. If you could make say some 15 core processor that has all kinds of capability it could run in various ways depending on the instructions. For instance maybe a maximum graphics potential for a giving program would require six of the cores.

 

No, I understand what you are saying but I am trying to explain that it comes down to more than just the "code" that runs the hardware. The hardware it's self is usually configured specifically for a task. Just adding more standard cores will not make up for hardware optimizations that can't be programmed in.

 

As I said you could emulate virtually anything that way sure but you would never get as good results as hardware specific optimizations combined with firmware optimizations.

[Dudde]

It's entirely unwise to have everything on your computer jam packed into a single small space. Admittedly today's towers aren't exactly huge, but what your talking about seems dangerous both in levels of heat and space for components, which they do require. Your hardware would wear out ridiculously faster

 

the next step in making computers smaller should be minimalizing components and making the motherboard smaller, not trying to eliminate the connections

[bascule]

What you're describing is generally referred to as a "System-on-a-chip"

 

SoaCs are generally mounted on a logic board, but combine many functions that might otherwise be spread out across many more integrated circuits and allow a smaller package.

 

Remember, a Smartphone is a computer in your pocket.