Mixed Signals

The ISSCC (International Solid State Circuit Conference) has started in San Francisco with keynote speaker James Meindl, professor of microelectronics at the Georgia Institute of Technology, making precise predictions about the future of silicon electronics and what will most likely follow in the post-silicon world.

'We will continue to scale vigorously for the next 15 years,'' he said, according to a report in EE Times. "Beyond silicon microchip technology, revolutionary developments in nanoelectronics, perhaps centering on graphene, may evolve.''

He said silicon could continue to scale to 7.9nm, due in 2024. Graphene, a novel form of carbon, could enable terascale computing (terahertz clock speed, terabyte memory) by then, or thereafter.

Graphene has been intensively studied for the past ten years, and recent breakthroughs in its manufacture and treatment seem set to overcome some of its disadvantages while making the most of its advantages over silicon. IBM recently demonstrated a 100GHz graphene transistor fabricated on a two-inch carbon wafer, which is faster than mainstream silicon transistors - although experimental silicon devices already run at over 60GHz. Researchers at the American Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have also found a way to induce a tunable bandgap in graphene, a necessary electronic state that allows the efficient switching necessary for workable transistors.

Meindl is quoted as giving six reasons why he thinks graphene will be the post-silicon technology of choice for electronics.

1. Graphene has the highest mechanical strength to weight ratio of any known material

2. Carrier mobility [the ease with which electrons can move through it] exceeds 200,000-cm2/Vs. [exceptionally high]

3. ''Carriers with zero effective mass that propagate as 'Dirac fermions' in a manner similar to photons with a velocity 300 times less than the speed of light without scattering for distances in the micrometer range.'' [also known as ballistic conduction, a form of energy transfer akin to superconductivity capable of great efficiency]

4. It can conduct currents one thousand times greater than can copper, without electromigration [a form of structural decomposition within a material due to large current flows]

5.Record values of room temperature thermal conductivity

6. Can serve as all parts of a transistor, as well as the interconnection between transistors

These seem like compelling arguments, especially when compared with the many limitations of potential rivals for the post-silicon world such as spintronics and quantum computing. The combination of the above reasons , together with graphene's ability to operate at room temperature, means that there is no theoretical reason - and ever fewer practical ones - why graphene can't be used to create extremely high performance electronic devices.

The Monday before the launch of the iPad, I had a rather fractious phone call from a TV station.

Broadcaster: "Would you come on the telly on Wednesday morning and talk about the Apple Tablet or whatever it is they're going to be launching on Wednesday evening?"

Me: "I don't even know what it's called, and neither does anyone else. Apple hasn't said what it'll be announcing. I can't really talk about something I know nothing about. I know lots of people are, but I'm not really comfortable..."

Broadcaster: "Well, can you say nobody knows what it is but then talk about what it might be?"

Me:"What? You want me to come on and say I know nothing about the subject I'm discussing? Not sure that's an improvement..."

The conversation went downhill from there. (We made up on Tuesday, and all is well.)

Of course, it is useless hoping people will stop speculating about Apple (it only encourages them...). But I did hope that once the darn thing was out of its closet, things would settle down.

If only. Since Wednesday, I have read more bad-tempered incendiary pseudo-punditry on whether the iPad is (a) The Greatest Thing Ever or (b) Meh than I have on abortion, guns, drugs and Scientology this year.

It's not just that there are two different camps, it's that they have instantly polarised with an almost cultic level of mutual loathing and lack of respect. I've not seen this much raw contempt shored up with catcalls from the gallery since I last looked into Scottish church history: not for nothing did The Economist lead with an image of Jobs as a berobed, behalo'd saint.

And the whole business remains on the level of holy writ: much is written, but you need the eye of faith to read it - and the heart of a crazed crusader to go to war on the strength of the contents. But crazed crusaders are what we find. Not helping.

Can we wind things back a bit until the Second Coming/Dismal Corrupter of consumer electronics actually makes it into the market? Please? It's not as if there aren't other things - yea, even other Apple things - which may be somewhat more important. Here are two: the upcoming war with Google (which may see some surprising alliances), and Steve Jobs' successor. There are others. Any or all of these will have lots of ramifications for the world outside Apple fandom. Go nuclear on those, if you like.

The iPad? Until it's out there: not so much.

Apple has launched iPad. Details still coming in, but Steve Jobs has demonstrated it doing things on the Web, playing music, displaying pictures, displaying pictures while playing music, and doing other cool things on the web.

Weighing 1.5 pounds and half an inch thick, the iPad is based on Apple's own custom A4 processor running at 1GHz. There are options for 16, 32, or 64GB of flash storage, and it has 802.11n Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR. Battery life is quoted at 10 hours, and like the iPhone it has accelerometer, compass, speaker, mic, and a dock connector.

Fully compatible with iPhone applications, which it runs either in native resolution or with each pixel doubled in size, the launch of the iPad also sees a new SDK with support for the full resolution of the device.

Full story here.

There has been little official contact between us and Steorn, those plucky proponents of perpetual motion currently being coy with the conservation of energy in a Dublin den of demonstration. In fact, the last volley consisted of me being a bit world-weary in the official forum and CEO Sean saying that the ball was indeed in their court.

However, we do have certain other sources of information close to the Liffey. From these, we now hear that Steorn is gathering up its skirts to make an announcement tomorrow, a promise of a demo on Saturday that will demonstrate your actual over-unity: the Orbo device producing more energy than it consumes.

In the past, Sean has said that the Orbo will manage this to the tune of 3:1 - in other words, churning out three watts for every watt of input. The Saturday demo, our sources confide, will be less dramatic - if they can hit 120 percent, or 1.2 watts out for 1 watt in, it'll be a success.

As indeed it would. The experiment will start at 4pm, run for around thirty minutes, use the 10,000 milliamp-hour D cell (because using electronics to store and feed back the energy would make Joe Public - ie, us - more suspicious than using an enormous battery, apparently), and more than that, we'll have to wait and see. There'll be engineers on hand to answer questions, and more material released in February. But the experiment will "tell alL", and hinge on there being no back EMF on the motor (a technical point you can find discussed at length, though to no particular end, on that Steorn forum).

If I can keep an eye on them from afar, I will - although I have filial responsibilities on Saturday, so I hope that the Steorn lot, being good Irish family types, will forgive me for sins of omission.

Google's decision to pull out of China is the first genuinely new international power play of the 21st century. And that decision has been made: although the company talks of discussing its future with the authorities, Google has practically accused the Chinese government at best of incompetence, at worst of espionage and theft.

There will be no discussions.

Google has publicly declared that doing business in China is incompatible with Western standards of human rights, and that it's commercially well-nigh impossible. This declaration, and the willingness to accept the consequences, stands in fascinating contrast with the approach made by Western political leaders. It's also a rare example of a company acting - at least partially - in a moral plane, without being pushed to do so by prolonged and public pressure. Google's earlier willingness to work to Chinese rules was criticised, to be sure, but the company didn't attract much more opproprium than any other and was generally given the same dispensation of necessity given to other companies working in China (including, for the record, CBSi, which publishes ZDNet UK).

The real reasoning - and how ethical concerns were balanced with practical and commercial ones - will be much discussed. A company as dependent as Google is on the Internet may well not be able to work in a country where the information infrastructure is owned by an actively hostile agency. It would be exceptional if Google was to publish the board minutes of the decision, an act that would defuse -- or confirm -- much of the speculation to come, and that would focus attention back on the act itself.

For now, however, it's fair to take Google's statements at face value. It could have shut up shop with less fanfare and far less confrontation. But the statement is one of a company with patience ended, one that no longer wishes to play the game and wants make it perfectly clear why.

And so over to the Chinese, who have received a very public dressing-down in an international environment where every attempt is made to avoid slight or condemnation. That reaction will be interesting. There are good odds on it being a variation of Stalin's infamous "How many divisions has the Pope?", when dismissing the power of religion to counter his dictatorship. One American company gone away, even Google, is one less to worry about. But the pressure on other companies - and the politicians - to abjure China just got a lot stronger, and the voice of the critics of China just got a lot more force.

And that, no matter how you view Google's real motives, is a rare and rather wonderful event.