
Honeywell says it will soon launch the world’s most powerful quantum computer - oedmarap
https://techcrunch.com/2020/03/03/honeywell-says-it-will-soon-launch-the-worlds-most-powerful-quantum-computer/
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madengr
Here is the actual paper:

[https://www.honeywell.com/content/dam/honeywell/files/Beta_1...](https://www.honeywell.com/content/dam/honeywell/files/Beta_10_Quantum_3_3_2020.pdf)

This is all very interesting. I work for another division of Honeywell (not
this quantum group) and about 4 years ago designed a “cryogenic device” for a
“Honeywell customer”; I won’t go into specifics but I figured it had something
to do with QC, but they took the design and never responded back.

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klyrs
The title is hype. "World's most powerful" is beyond questionable. They're
using IBM's measure of "quantum volume" which is a nice way to boil down a
hugely complicated system to a single number where management can agree "the
numbers got bigger!" But I have yet to see anything directly connecting it to
any sensible notion of computational power.

How about "Honeywell announces impending launch of their quantum computing
effort"

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MperorM
As someone who understands little about quantum computing, why is quantum
volume not a good measure?

I'd be thankful to better understand better what parts of the complicated
system is lost in the measure.

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lacker
“Quantum volume” is all about how large of a random circuit can be
implemented.

[https://qiskit.org/textbook/ch-quantum-hardware/measuring-
qu...](https://qiskit.org/textbook/ch-quantum-hardware/measuring-quantum-
volume.html#Introduction)

Random circuits are really only good for proving that you are in fact
operating a quantum computer, since you can test the results, and random
quantum circuits can not be efficiently simulated by classical computers. So
quantum volume is not a totally meaningless metric, but it doesn’t necessarily
indicate any capability for real problems that people would like to use
quantum computers on: factoring, solving discrete logs, general search
problems, or simulating quantum physics systems.

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o-__-o
Ahh the Cray performance problem realized all over again (how do you reliably
test something that cannot be classically tested)

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_trampeltier
Is it the same Honeywell who did products like industrial limit switchs and
so? When you go to there homepage now, there is something like "industrie",
but you can't find a real product. Do they just things like consulting now?
Strange website ..

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dr_zoidberg
From the article:

> Honeywell has long built the kind of complex control systems that power many
> of the world’s largest industrial sites.

So I guess it is?

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m3kw9
Most powerful probably isn’t saying much.

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Polylactic_acid
Probably means consumes the most power.

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mixmastamyk
Was just reading about Multics, they had a hand in it. Did anyone ever port it
to the PC or Virtual box?

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unused0
Porting is unfeasible; Multics relies on hardware features not available. An
emulator for the original hardware can be found at:
[http://ringzero.wikidot.com/](http://ringzero.wikidot.com/) Information about
Multics at: [https://multicians.org/](https://multicians.org/)

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craftinator
But... Can it factor the number 15? My watch can. My doorbell can. My car can.
Can their quantum computer do that?

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mdorazio
That's like asking if a stapler can dispense tape. QC is not and never was
intended to be for general purpose computing. It's a tool for specific use
cases where classical computing falls apart very quickly, like the traveling
salesman problem.

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tialaramex
Problems like TSP are terrible examples because we have an excellent and
affordable approximation for lots of them. A working general quantum computer
(if anybody builds one) will be an expensive way to slightly improve those
results. It's the gold-plated HDMI cable of quantum computer applications.

Factoring isn't like dispensing tape, it has one of the few applications
(breaking conventional asymmetric cryptography) for which an expensive but
working general quantum computer gives you a clear benefit (with Shor's
algorithm) over just buying a lot of ordinary computers.

And all these press release "breakthrough" machines can't do it because it's
hard. They're at best a stalling tactic, to buy more time/money to solve the
hard problems and at worst they're essentially a con.

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virtuatony
Good for moneywell. I’m sure it will be as good as everything else they make.

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fortran77
Did you hear that Honeywell is going to merge with Fairchild? The new company
is going to be called Fairwell Honeychild.

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BigBubbleButt
[http://www.cs.utah.edu/~bnnewton/humor/mergers.htm](http://www.cs.utah.edu/~bnnewton/humor/mergers.htm)

