- Efforts to achieve NEC's environmental business vision
- A world first: New technology to eliminate the need for standby power in ICT equipment
- Plastic Made from Straw and Nut Shells
- Obayashi Corporation
- A bioplastic with a biomass ratio of more than 75%
- Optimizing Power and Space with ECO CENTER
- Observing Greenhouse Gases Around the Earth from Space
- Monitoring the forests from space
- High-Performance Workplaces
- e-Learning
A world first: New technology to eliminate the need for standby power in ICT equipment
Able to hold data while the power is off
The system LSI (or CPU), which corresponds to the brain of the device, includes a component called CAM(*1), which performs the processing to select the appropriate program from the programs incorporated in the information device while exchanging data with the main memory. CAM excels at short-term memory and has a fast operating speed. It is thanks to CAM that system LSIs can smartly and nimbly operate ICT equipment.
System that allows ICT equipment to carry out complex tasks by quickly processing data, calling the required programs, and saving dataThe problem is that when the device's power is cut off, the executed programs and data held by the joint operation of the main memory and the system LSI immediately disappear. To prevent this, standby power is continuously consumed by the circuits in the main memory and system LSI.
It would seem that the answer is to replace the main memory and the memory inside the system LSI with a storage device such as a flash memory, which does not require standby power, as this would eliminate the standby power of the device and solve the problem of standby power waste. Unfortunately, the limitations of such devices in terms of the number of rewrites and write/read speed are stumbling blocks that make them unsuitable for system LSIs and main memories, which must execute enormous amounts of arithmetic processing.
In 2006, NEC began research and development into a system LSI that would not lose programs and data even when the power was off (i.e., a non-volatile system LSI). If a non-volatile system LSI could be realized, it would enable ICT equipment to start up quickly even after its power had been switched off, eliminating the stress that people feel when their equipment starts up too slowly. Although system LSIs consume more standby power than main memory, no company had launched full-scale efforts to realize non-volatile system LSIs due to the extreme technological challenges this was thought to pose.
In 2009, research and development into new integrated circuits that will help minimize the energy consumption of ICT equipment was selected as part of the Funding Program for World-Leading Innovative R&D on Science and Technology(*2) announced by the Government of Japan. NEC has been participating in this program along with the group of Professor Hideo Ohno of Tohoku University, who has been involved in research in this field for many years. In June 2011, this research culminated in the development of a completely new semiconductor technology that achieves non-volatility, thereby leaving data in integrated circuits even after their electric power supply is cut off.
*1: System LSIs include special integrated circuits called content addressable memory (CAM) that are used to exchange data at high speeds between the system LSI (or CPU) and the main memory. CAMs feature both logic circuit functions for carrying out operations at high speeds and a data storage function. Although not as widely known as main memory, they play an extremely important role in the system LSI, such as by selecting the appropriate data in the main memory.
*2: Funding Program for World-Leading Innovative R&D on Science and Technology (Title: Research and development of energy-saving spintronics logic integrated circuits)
25% reduction in power consumption of data centers
Tadahiko Sugibayashi Research Manager NEC Green Innovation Research LaboratoriesElectrons not only contain an electric charge, which is the base of all electric phenomena, but also a magnetic charge. By switching the direction of the magnetic field in an integrated circuit through the skillful use of the state that occurs when electrons, which have intrinsic magnetic moment, bump into each other, it is possible to store and recognize the data that is written and read out. This type of technology is called spintronics. While this differs completely from the storage method currently used in hard disks, which involves creating an artificial magnetic field by applying a large current, it is possible to hold data even after the power supply is completely off through the use of the magnetic moment intrinsically held by electrons. Thus the data of a created file will not be lost even if a blackout occurs while the file is being saved.
An electron structureRegarding the memories that manage arithmetic circuits and data storage, NEC has been promoting the development of non-volatile devices, and has already established technologies that eliminate the need for standby power.
This new technology eliminates the standby power requirement of circuits whose job it is to select the appropriate data from the main memory in the system LSIs that operate in ICT equipment.
"Thanks to this latest development success, we now have a way to eliminate the standby power requirement of the entire integrated circuit," says Sugibayashi.
Machine for testing system LSI prototypes"If this 'zero standby power' technology could be applied to all the personal computers and TVs in Japan, we would reduce the nation's daily power consumption by the equivalent of the daily power consumption of 2 million ordinary households. Moreover, this technology will allow further reductions in circuit scale as well as the size of cooling devices by reducing the amount of heat generated by system LSIs," says Sugibayashi. By promoting further product size reductions, this technology will also increase design freedom for devices such as handheld terminals, and has the added merit of boosting data processing speeds. We are likely to see the appearance of even more environmentally friendly products that achieve greater power savings through the use of this new zero standby power integrated circuit technology in notebook computers that use solid state drives (SSD), which have started appearing in stores.
Besides significantly reducing the power consumption and improving the performance of ICT equipment, because this non-volatile technology prevents the programs and data of a system LSI from being lost when the power is cut off, it is also expected to be widely used in the automotive, medical equipment, and other fields that have become increasingly electronic.
This technology can also be applied to server computers. When applied in data centers, which use large amounts of electric power, for example, energy savings of close to 25% can be expected by combining this technology with the energy saving measures being taken for air-conditioning equipment.
NEC is aiming to have this new technology commercialized in about five years. The age of ICT equipment that provides both greater convenience and energy conservation—equipment that offers power-saving without being unplugged and that starts up instantly at power-on—is about to begin.
