{"id":690,"date":"2013-01-21T10:05:37","date_gmt":"2013-01-21T15:05:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.nccomputertech.com\/?p=690"},"modified":"2013-01-21T10:05:37","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T15:05:37","slug":"intel-prepares-to-use-lasers-light-to-shuffle-data-between-computers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2013\/01\/21\/intel-prepares-to-use-lasers-light-to-shuffle-data-between-computers\/","title":{"rendered":"Intel prepares to use lasers, light to shuffle data between computers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Intel is taking the first steps to implement thin fiber optics that will use lasers and light as a faster way to move data inside computers, replacing the older and slower electrical wiring technology found in most computers today.<br \/>\nIntel&#8217;s silicon photonics technology will be implemented at the motherboard and rack levels and use light to move data between storage, networking and computing resources. Light is considered a much faster vehicle to move data than copper cables.<br \/>\nThe silicon photonics technology will be part of a new generation of servers that will need faster networking, storage and processing subsystems, said Justin Rattner, Intel&#8217;s chief technology officer, during a keynote at the Open Compute Summit in Santa Clara, California, on Wednesday.<br \/>\nAt the conference, Intel and server maker Quanta Computer are showing a prototype server rack architecture that is capable of moving data using optical modules. The server uses an Intel silicon switch and supports the chip maker&#8217;s Xeon and Atom server chips.<br \/>\nThe new rack architecture with silicon photonics is a result of more than a decade of research in Intel&#8217;s laboratories, Rattner said. He said silicon photonics could enable communication at speeds of 100G bps (bits per second), and transfer data at high speeds while using lesser power compared to copper cables. The technology could also consolidate power supplies and fans in a data center, reducing component costs.<br \/>\nIntel&#8217;s research revolved around the production of devices needed to implement silicon photonics at the rack level, including modulators and detectors. The company is now producing silicon photonics modules that can transfer data at 100G bps, and is offering it to a few clients for testing.<br \/>\nServer design changes<br \/>\nSilicon photonics could potentially redefine server designs, Rattner said. With the high-speed bandwidth, processing and storage units could be decoupled from servers and stored in separate boxes. Once the infrastructure with silicon photonics is in place, server designs could change even more, Rattner said.<br \/>\nIntel is working with Facebook to define new server technologies that will lead to the decoupling of computing, networking and storage resources. The high-bandwidth connection offered by silicon photonics will be key in bringing the rack technologies to reality, and the processor, switch and other modules need to work together on power management, protocol support, load balancing and handshakes to make high-speed data transfers possible.<br \/>\nCritical to this step is &#8220;the introduction of silicon photonics in not just the inter-rack fabric, but also the intra-rack fabric,&#8221; Rattner said.<br \/>\nIntel is already using fiber optics with its Thunderbolt connector technology, which like USB 3.0, shuffles data between host devices and peripherals. At last week&#8217;s International CES show in Las Vegas, Corning announced Thunderbolt Optical Cables that can stretch up to 100 meters.<br \/>\nAggressive timetable<br \/>\nIntel is being aggressive with pushing silicon photonics into the data center, said Jason Waxman, general manager of the cloud platforms group, in an interview. He said it could be in use in fewer than five years, but did not commit to a timeline.<br \/>\nThere are multiple protocols that could be supported for high-speed data transfers, including InfiniBand, Ethernet and PCI-Express, Waxman said. Intel said it will implement the InfiniBand networking technology inside its chips, which could enable faster data transfers.<br \/>\nIt is only a matter of time until copper wires are replaced by fiber optics, said Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research.<br \/>\n&#8220;Over time you will see the server communication infrastructure\u2014which includes switches\u2014to include photonics,&#8221; McCarron said.<br \/>\nHigh-speed communication networks use optical technology, and so far the bandwidth in servers was adequate, McCarron said. But with more data flowing through networks, there is a growing demand to crank up the speed over connections, which is where silicon photonics comes into play.<br \/>\n&#8220;We&#8217;re going to keep seeing continued demands for the interconnect. It is a forgone conclusion we will have to go to photonics,&#8221; McCarron said.<br \/>\nInitial implementations may be expensive, and there may be a need to introduce protocols that could enable high speed data transfers over fiber optics.<br \/>\n&#8220;Eventually the signalling gets far too complex, and the move to photonics makes sense,&#8221; McCarron said. &#8220;The motivation is how do you economically get to higher speeds.&#8221;<br \/>\nvia <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pcworld.com\/article\/2025461\/intel-prepares-to-use-lasers-light-to-shuffle-data-between-computers.html\" target=\"_blank\">Intel prepares to use lasers, light to shuffle data between computers | PCWorld<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Intel is taking the first steps to implement thin fiber optics that will use lasers and light as a faster [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,6,10],"tags":[960,975],"class_list":["post-690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hardware","category-networking","category-technology","tag-server","tag-silicon-photonics"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/papNkV-b8","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6877,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2014\/11\/18\/intel-turns-to-light-beams-to-speed-up-supercomputers\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":0},"title":"Intel turns to light beams to speed up supercomputers","author":"NCCT","date":"November 18, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Intel will start using light pulses next year to move data at blistering speeds in supercomputers, yielding potentially massive advances in high-performance computing. It will use optical cables to move data more quickly than conventional copper wiring for linking computing and storage units. That faster data movement should improve system\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7910,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2015\/03\/30\/bit-by-bit-intel-looks-to-quadruple-ssd-storage\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":1},"title":"Bit by bit, Intel looks to quadruple SSD storage","author":"NCCT","date":"March 30, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"With all the photos, videos, apps and tunes you have, the storage on your smartphone may not be enough. With that in mind, Intel is researching new ways to up the storage capacity in mobile devices and PCs without hurting the size or price of devices. One effort underway at\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8565,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2015\/08\/19\/intels-five-not-very-big-announcements-from-idf-this-week\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":2},"title":"Intel&#8217;s five (not very) big announcements from IDF this week","author":"NCCT","date":"August 19, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"If you\u2019ve paid any attention to Intel\u2019s developer event in San Francisco this week, you\u2019ve probably gathered already that there\u2019s almost no chip news at the show. Intel has moved up the food chain, so to speak, and is showing developers what they can build with its technologies rather than\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8896,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2016\/04\/18\/intel-launches-budget-minded-540s-series-ssds-pricing-starts-under-55\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":3},"title":"Intel launches budget-minded 540s Series SSDs, pricing starts under $55","author":"NCCT","date":"April 18, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"By Shawn Knight | Techspot Intel\u2019s budget-minded 540 Series solid state drives are now available to purchase. The drives, based on 16-nanometer TLC NAND flash memory from SK Hynix, are available in two form factors and half a dozen capacities. The new Intel 540s Series drives are offered in capacities\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8354,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2015\/06\/03\/intel-launches-long-delayed-quad-core-broadwell-cpus-and-the-iris-pro-6200-gpu\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":4},"title":"Intel launches long-delayed quad-core Broadwell CPUs and the Iris Pro 6200 GPU","author":"NCCT","date":"June 3, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Photo: Intel The first products based on Intel\u2019s Broadwell chips were introduced last fall, but it was not a smooth launch. Yield problems with the company\u2019s new 14nm manufacturing process forced Intel to stagger Broadwell\u2019s rollout. The low-power, low-performance Core M chips came first, followed by faster U-series dual-core parts\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/bdw-h-noreflect-noshadow-640x384.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/bdw-h-noreflect-noshadow-640x384.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/bdw-h-noreflect-noshadow-640x384.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7329,"url":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/2015\/01\/05\/intel-brings-next-gen-broadwell-processor-tech-to-mainstream-notebooks-desktops\/","url_meta":{"origin":690,"position":5},"title":"Intel brings next-gen &#8216;Broadwell&#8217; processor tech to mainstream notebooks, desktops","author":"NCCT","date":"January 5, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"LAS VEGAS\u2014Intel\u2019s Core M processor promised a new wave of small-screen tablets. But at CES 2015, Intel hustled in the main event: the launch of the fifth-generation \u201cBroadwell-U\u201d Core processor for mainstream desktops and notebooks. The new Core processors\u2014over 14 of them, including new chips designed for consumer and business\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hardware&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hardware","link":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/category\/hardware\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nccomputertech.com\/techtalk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}