Coming soon: superfast internet

http://img135.imageshack.us/img135/6886/serverslb6.png

The internet could soon be made obsolete. The scientists who pioneered it have now built a lightning-fast replacement capable of downloading entire feature films within seconds.

At speeds about 10,000 times faster than a typical broadband connection, “the grid” will be able to send the entire Rolling Stones back catalogue from Britain to Japan in less than two seconds.

The latest spin-off from Cern, the particle physics centre that created the web, the grid could also provide the kind of power needed to transmit holographic images; allow instant online gaming with hundreds of thousands of players; and offer high-definition video telephony for the price of a local call.

David Britton, professor of physics at Glasgow University and a leading figure in the grid project, believes grid technologies could “revolutionise” society. “With this kind of computing power, future generations will have the ability to collaborate and communicate in ways older people like me cannot even imagine,” he said.

The power of the grid will become apparent this summer after what scientists at Cern have termed their “red button” day - the switching-on of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the new particle accelerator built to probe the origin of the universe. The grid will be activated at the same time to capture the data it generates.

Cern, based near Geneva, started the grid computing project seven years ago when researchers realised the LHC would generate annual data equivalent to 56m CDs - enough to make a stack 40 miles high.
This meant that scientists at Cern - where Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the web in 1989 - would no longer be able to use his creation for fear of causing a global collapse.

This is because the internet has evolved by linking together a hotchpotch of cables and routing equipment, much of which was originally designed for telephone calls and therefore lacks the capacity for high-speed data transmission.

By contrast, the grid has been built with dedicated fibre optic cables and modern routing centres, meaning there are no outdated components to slow the deluge of data. The 55,000 servers already installed are expected to rise to 200,000 within the next two years.

Professor Tony Doyle, technical director of the grid project, said: “We need so much processing power, there would even be an issue about getting enough electricity to run the computers if they were all at Cern. The only answer was a new network powerful enough to send the data instantly to research centres in other countries.”

That network, in effect a parallel internet, is now built, using fibre optic cables that run from Cern to 11 centres in the United States, Canada, the Far East, Europe and around the world.

One terminates at the Rutherford Appleton laboratory at Harwell in Oxfordshire.

From each centre, further connections radiate out to a host of other research institutions using existing high-speed academic networks.
It means Britain alone has 8,000 servers on the grid system – so that any student or academic will theoretically be able to hook up to the grid rather than the internet from this autumn.

Ian Bird, project leader for Cern’s high-speed computing project, said grid technology could make the internet so fast that people would stop using desktop computers to store information and entrust it all to the internet.
“It will lead to what’s known as cloud computing, where people keep all their information online and access it from anywhere,” he said.

Computers on the grid can also transmit data at lightning speed. This will allow researchers facing heavy processing tasks to call on the assistance of thousands of other computers around the world. The aim is to eliminate the dreaded “frozen screen” experienced by internet users who ask their machine to handle too much information.

The real goal of the grid is, however, to work with the LHC in tracking down nature’s most elusive particle, the Higgs boson. Predicted in theory but never yet found, the Higgs is supposed to be what gives matter mass.
The LHC has been designed to hunt out this particle - but even at optimum performance it will generate only a few thousand of the particles a year. Analysing the mountain of data will be such a large task that it will keep even the grid’s huge capacity busy for years to come.

Although the grid itself is unlikely to be directly available to domestic internet users, many telecoms providers and businesses are already introducing its pioneering technologies. One of the most potent is so-called dynamic switching, which creates a dedicated channel for internet users trying to download large volumes of data such as films. In theory this would give a standard desktop computer the ability to download a movie in five seconds rather than the current three hours or so.

Additionally, the grid is being made available to dozens of other academic researchers including astronomers and molecular biologists.

It has already been used to help design new drugs against malaria, the mosquito-borne disease that kills 1m people worldwide each year.

Researchers used the grid to analyse 140m compounds - a task that would have taken a standard internet-linked PC 420 years.

“Projects like the grid will bring huge changes in business and society as well as science,” Doyle said.

“Holographic video conferencing is not that far away. Online gaming could evolve to include many thousands of people, and social networking could become the main way we communicate.

“The history of the internet shows you cannot predict its real impacts but we know they will be huge.”

:source: Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle3689881.ece

To think I started with a 56 k connection only a few years ago , mind blowing idea .

sounds nice..but will it take another 5/10/20 years for me to use it? lol

hook me up to that shit right now

My internet in a few years - 200mb/s ... LOl :P

more like 1tb/sec

This is crazy

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Originally Posted by jukesta

more like 1tb/sec

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The article says an entire feature length film in seconds.

Assuming seconds means 2 seconds, that's a 256GB film @ 1Tbps.

Seedboxes with 10Gbits connection.
:rolleyes:

We won't be needing seedboxes no more :)

That stuff is just insane...it just looks like fake o_o

This is so crazy :frusty:
Singapore is only going have fibre to home in 7years time :cry:

man. do I feel old...

I wonder if they would have a fair usage policy on this one (download limit for people not in the uk)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dmanjohn

We won't be needing seedboxes no more :)

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Maybe the size of the information will evolve as well. There will be super hyper high definition holographic footage that will be like 6 TB every movie or something.

More likely our computers as we seen them in front of us will just become thin clients.

I mean there is no difference at that speed if you data is local or on the net.

But that means you may have to "subscribe" to software, games, etc. like Xbox Live Service and will mean the end of localized software and a huge reduciton of piracy (like how you don't get on Xbox Live w/ a mod or a hacked dvd drive since you depend on live).

Could be bad...for some and good for others.

But it definitely brings one honest thing:

Change.

We live in a timebombed world in this high tech industry

Whatever it costs, I WILL PAY!!!

This means downloading a movie faster than driking my beer? I want that shit!!

Yeah, great news. BUT, i was wondering how much time it will take until is available for home users. :rolleyes:

[QUOTE=tusks;2772779] the ability to download a movie in five seconds rather than the current three hours or so.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mbucari1

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jukesta

more like 1tb/sec

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The article says an entire feature length film in seconds.

Assuming seconds means 2 seconds, that's a 256GB film @ 1Tbps.

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it means 5 seconds :P lol, now the film is 640GB :P

btw i think it makes more sense @ 1Gbps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Detale

Whatever it costs, I WILL PAY!!!

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http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...s/Thinking.gif Say 300 a month...still willing?

Ha I bet Rodgers Internet is going to love this. It would be funny if they are the first to install this for their home users and still throttle Bittorrent.

cool

Files get bigger, harddrives get bigger, connection will be faster :P
Very cool, though it surely takes many, many years before i could use it :)

I read about it in another forum. Exciting times ahead.

Countries like Isreal, India and other asian countries desperately need fast internet.

i want it now

This and the eventual popularization of nanotechnology will definitely change things in the way we live. :huh:

And yes, only 10 years ago the internet was a very different thing (speed-wise).

i hope we live to see that!!!

Completely amazing, technological advancements are just going to be ridiculous for future generations. Assuming of course we can control our global warming crisis that is.

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Originally Posted by Aaxel21

Ha I bet Rodgers Internet is going to love this. It would be funny if they are the first to install this for their home users and still throttle Bittorrent.

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10tbps, with 10gb cap.:01:

and australia and further and further slipping behind.. :(