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Subject: Re: Deeper Blue on a single chip?

Author: Walter Faxon

Date: 13:14:50 04/11/05

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On April 09, 2005 at 07:49:03, Tony Petters wrote:

>On April 08, 2005 at 21:06:02, Walter Faxon wrote:
>
>>On April 08, 2005 at 18:16:15, Tony Petters wrote:
>>
>>>On April 08, 2005 at 15:50:45, Walter Faxon wrote:
>>>
>>>>Just looking around and found this
>>>>(http://sccs.muldermedia.de/index.php?section=links&subsection=deepblue) record
>>>>of a talk by Feng-hsiung Hsu at Hot Chips 10 (1998):
>>>>
>>>>"He thinks state of the art process can give 30 million chess positions per
>>>>second in a single chip today.  A small array of such chips plugged into a PC
>>>>could beat Kasparov.  In a few years (0.18u) a single chip could be as fast as
>>>>the entire Deep Blue machine."
>>>>
>>>>Today MOSIS can supply custom 0.18u chips
>>>>(http://www.mosis.org/Orders/Prices/price-list-domestic.html#ami12).  I estimate
>>>>that their undiscounted price for a single (large) 150mm^2 chip to be about
>>>>$236,625.
>>>>
>>>>Hmmm...  I think I'll wait and buy it used!
>>>>
>>>>-- Walter
>>>
>>>Are you saying that a single CPU can be purchased that makes 30 millions calcs
>>>per second is available for $ 236,000 ?
>>>
>>>DB was clocked at 200 million calcs per second, so why would it be able to beat
>>>Kasparov ?
>>>
>>>Cordially
>>
>>
>>Not 30 million standard computer instructions, rather 30 million chess positions
>>per second.  That's move generation, position updating, and a very complex
>>static evaluator, plus search control.  Equivalent to a thousand or probably
>>several thousand simple integer instructions per position.  That was possible to
>>design into a single chip in 1998.  A better chip could be designed and built
>>today.  You cannot now buy either off the shelf.
>>
>>M NPS = Million Nodes (positions) Per Second:
>>
>>1997 -- Deeper Blue, older technology -- 1M NPS/chip x 200 chips = 200M NPS
>>1998 -- then-current chip technology -- 30M NPS/chip x 7 chips = 210M NPS
>>2005 -- 0.18u chip technology -- 200M NPS/chip = 200M NPS on a single chip
>>
>>Dr. Hsu assumes 200M NPS is enough to beat a Kasparov, since it was in 1997.  I
>>agree since the programming, which has been criticized, can only be improved.
>>Emerson tan is correct that IBM owns all the DB software, but with enough money
>>it can be bought or duplicated.  (Probably not bought if by an IBM competitor.)
>>
>>However, Dr. Hyatt has written elsewhere that due to the increasing power of
>>standard PCs and programs, there isn't enough of a market to make selling these
>>chess chips, however packaged, a paying proposition.  It would be a publicity
>>stunt, like DB itself.
>>
>>-- Walter
>
>
>That is interesting Walter, is this chip being used by a computer chess program
>anywhere on the Internet ?
>
>2005 -- 0.18u chip technology -- 200M NPS/chip = 200M NPS on a single chip
>
>Do u have the exact URL link to this chip, I could not find it at your orginal
>link posted.
>
>Yes, this would be nice to have in a PC, it would certainly increase the power
>of chess programs and computer games in general !!


No URL.  See my quote above:  "You cannot now buy either off the shelf."  The
original post would allow one to roughly estimate what it might cost to produce
a Deep Blue-like machine today.  That's a 1/4 million to produce a single chip,
assuming you had a design for it.  Maybe a like amount of money to design it --
unless you want to spend a few semesters learning integrated circuit design and
design it yourself, but you would need access to commercial IC design tools.  A
newly-designed chip probably would have problems and you'd have to go through
the design-produce-test cycle a couple of times (at 1/4 million a pop).  Then
there's the matter of programming it.  At any rate, a lot of work plus a lot of
money.  But, importantly:  A lot _less_ money than IBM used.

-- Walter



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