Flash cards : a miracle from the 20th century ?

[maximus]

When I look at an SD or CF card, I always have the feeling that the human race is actually accomplishing a lot.

My second PC was an IBM PS2 model 30 with 20 megs harddrive. It was very cool to have the invisible 20 megs storage inside the box, while others only have diskette/floppy drives. Friends use to come at my place, and they were curious, how did my PC boots with empty diskette drive ?

During my undergrad years, I used to run around the school carrying my projects in diskettes, sometime the project is too large to put inside a single 1.44 megs diskette, so I have to use PKZIP and break it into several files, 1.44 megs each ....

And now, This tiny little thing called SD card has 256 megs capacity. The slightly bigger brother, the CF card, has 1 GB capacity. 50 times larger than my IBM PS2 harddrive. An audio CD can take approximately 20 songs. But this little CF card can carry 400 oggs at 80khz.

These little things can also be used in MP3 players, digital cameras ... Photography used to be a very expensive hobby (to me). You buy a roll of film, take 36 shots, have it developed and printed. Each of those activities involves lots of money. Hence you have to be extra careful before hitting the shutter button. This condition hindered most people from taking experimental shots.

But with digital camera, and flash cards ... everything become cheaper. put a 1 GB CF inside the nikon e5700, choose 5 mpixels/fine, and you can take 350 to 400 pictures in a single card. Amazing.

So, the human race is not only ruining the world (by creating the holes in the ozone layer, by cutting down rainforests in 3rd world countries, by destroying natural habitats of endangered species, making them extinct) .... but also created things that will be beneficial to our children.

[TawnerX]

You are kidding right? :D

if you compare the information density a chip to say DNA strand or even a clump of protein. We should be pretty embarrashed declaring this sort of thing as something human can be proud of.

what's worst than information density, the energy put to achieve such state. ie. manufacturing process, are downright criminal compared to DNA strand. You have to check the environmental polution and energy use of a typical chip fab before hand.

I am willing to bet you'll scream crime against humanity instead of something we ought to be proud of.

but hey, we gotta start from somewhere right?

[dean_shan]

I find them pretty amazing!

[WyattEarp]

You are kidding right? :D

if you compare the information density a chip to say DNA strand or even a clump of protein. We should be pretty embarrashed declaring this sort of thing as something human can be proud of.

what's worst than information density, the energy put to achieve such state. ie. manufacturing process, are downright criminal compared to DNA strand. You have to check the environmental polution and energy use of a typical chip fab before hand.

I am willing to bet you'll scream crime against humanity instead of something we ought to be proud of.

but hey, we gotta start from somewhere right?

You can't possibly expect the human race to be on the same level of natural evolution that has taken millions of years to get to its current state. And even in the process of evolution it destroys in order to create. They unfortunately go hand and hand. Lighten up a little. You have got to marvel in the things we create other wise you would use them. :D

[Crystal Eitle]

When I look at an SD or CF card, I always have the feeling that the human race is actually accomplishing a lot.
I agree. This is something I was just thinking about, in fact. I was thinking about all the eBooks, audiobooks, music, photos, programs, etc. that are on my SD cards and marveling that so much storage can be fit into so small a space, and wondering exactly how it works.

Who was it that said, "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"? That's how I feel about SD cards.

And TawnerX, why the negative attitude? Who piddled in your Post Toasties?

[Linus]

Flash media is definitely impressive technology. I wonder if it will change fundamentally in the next several years or if it will just continue to get cheaper, and faster with higher capacities like hard drives have. Can't get a whole lot smaller, that's for sure...

While I don't like the way TawnerX said it, I do appreciate the points s/he made. We're still worlds behind nature in terms of things like information density, and surely we have a lot to learn from organic compounds that could be applied to technology. And while s/he didn't provide any data to back it up, chip manufacturing probably IS more harmful to the environment than most of us are aware of. I personally would be a lot more proud if we were able to create things like flash memory without collateral damage.

In the meantime, I'll hope that the paper I save with my PPC makes up for its expensive manufacture... :worried:

[rasputinj]

Flash memory seems impressive if you remember the days of the old 51/2 floppy disks.

[TawnerX]

http://sci.newsfactor.com/perl/story/19992.html
"The ratio of fossil fuel and chemical inputs to the weight of the final product shows that microchips are energy hogs. The ratio is about 2-to-1 for a car, but a whopping 630-to-1 for a microchip."

according to a new study to be published by the American Chemical Society (ACS) in the December 15th edition of the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

"Microchips may be small, but their 'environmental weight' is much larger than their size would suggest," ACS spokesperson Beverly Hassell told NewsFactor. "Scientists have estimated that producing a single two-gram memory chip requires at least 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel and chemical inputs."


http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0000E57E-E47B-1DC6-AF71809EC588EEDF
the manufacturing of a typical two-gram chip takes 1.6 kilograms of fossil fuel, 72 grams of chemicals and 32 kilograms of water.


http://www.pprc.org/pprc/pubs/topics/semicond/semicond.html
bunch of statistics


http://www.e-insite.net/eb-mag/index.asp?layout=article&articleid=CA211747
In chip manufacturing, most of the water is used to rinse wafers. There's no way around it: All that etching and layering means wafers need to be rinsed in ultra-pure or deionized water. Water is running through the rinsing baths 24/7, even if the wafers aren't there. A typical fab uses 6.7 million gallons of water a day, according to the Pacific Northwest Pollution Prevention Resource Center in Seattle. That's the same amount of water a 60,000-person-city uses each day. And today's bigger fabs potentially use even more water because they produce more product. (Wafers are bigger, too—from 200 millimeter to 300 millimeter is a 4-inch increase in the diameter, meaning more surface area to rinse.) Use less water, or not-so-pure water, and you risk ruining a wafer that could be worth upward of $500,000.

Note: it is important to know that tho globally chip manufacturing does not uses as much water as say farming, but it is a very dense manufacturing complex hence the environmental impact to locality is high.

-------------
bottom line, those little critters don't grow on tree. Be very aware that the manufacturing uses a lot of natural resource. Chip is a low entropy product produce in industrial scale and all those does have significant environmental footprint.

[Skitals]

Note: it is important to know that tho globally chip manufacturing does not uses as much water as say farming, but it is a very dense manufacturing complex hence the environmental impact to locality is high.

Yes, but given the choice of the farming industry and chip manufacturing I think farming would be more "beneficial to our children"

We need food and shelter to survive. Everything else isnt necessary, but helps the economy. Unless you are a farmer, build homes, or make clothes you're not helping anybody :p Back in the day all a family would need is a piece of land and you live off of it. These days someone else built your home, someone else grew your food, and someone else made the shirt on your back.

This is going no where but I thought it was funny how peoples priorities, and views on what's beneficial to life have changed.

[Crystal Eitle]

"Microchips may be small, but their 'environmental weight' is much larger than their size would suggest," ACS spokesperson Beverly Hassell told NewsFactor. "Scientists have estimated that producing a single two-gram memory chip requires at least 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel and chemical inputs."
(Hands over ears) La la la la la, I'm not listening!!!

I just console myself with the thought of how much paper I'm saving. :dilemma:

[maximus]

"Scientists have estimated that producing a single two-gram memory chip requires at least 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel and chemical inputs."


Well, suppose the 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel create an SD card that I am going to use for 12 months (365 days = 525,600 minutes).

While if I put 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel in my car, I am going to burn that in 30 minutes.

Looking from that perspective, microchips are way more environmental friendly than a car (by a factor of 17,000). right ?

[TawnerX]

(Hands over ears) La la la la la, I'm not listening!!!

I just console myself with the thought of how much paper I'm saving. :dilemma:

too late your conscience will forever haunt you now. wmuahahahah... :mrgreen:

but seriously, it's just like everything else ya just have to consume wisely instead of merely considering personal buying capability.

[TawnerX]

"Scientists have estimated that producing a single two-gram memory chip requires at least 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel and chemical inputs."


Well, suppose the 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel create an SD card that I am going to use for 12 months (365 days = 525,600 minutes).

While if I put 3.7 pounds of fossil fuel in my car, I am going to burn that in 30 minutes.

Looking from that perspective, microchips are way more environmental friendly than a car (by a factor of 17,000). right ?

if the impact is dispersed overtime as you proposed yeah, then it's pretty insignificant. But it is not. It's a spike affecting a locality greatly.

plus, I think it's pretty dubious putting it in term of car environmental impact as if car by itself is fundamentally good. I would say finding out the convinience and material saving that an SD card gives is a better justification.

[popabawa]

Who was it that said, "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"? That's how I feel about SD cards.



Arthur C Clarke