Maybe one day society will laugh about the early struggles of quantum computing and the criticism launched as computer users leverage data stored in a cloud of servers in just the blink of an eye. But right now vendor D-Wave is on defense, once again, as its $15 million machines are taking flak from the scientific community.
Some say D-Wave's machine doesn't truly function on the principles of quantum mechanics, others struggle to explain or understand how it's really supposed to work.
D-Wave has stated that the wrong questions have been thrown toward the big black box that rests in NASA's research center in Mountain View, Calif.
The machine has been described as a freezer that houses a single chip, which has been constructed from niobium wire. What makes D-Wave's machine remarkable, or at least the idea of how it's supposed to work, are the quantum bits used in processing data.
The latest criticism D-Wave's machine is facing comes from a study conducted by owners and users of one of the company's multimillion dollar machines. In the study's abstract, the author states the group detailed an exact method for measuring "quantum speedup," which ruled out the possibility of producing false positives of the phenomenon.
"We illustrate our discussion with data from tests run on a D-Wave Two device with up to 503 qubits," the study stated. "Using random spin glass instances as a benchmark, we find no evidence of quantum speedup when the entire data set is considered, and obtain inconclusive results when comparing subsets of instances on an instance-by-instance basis."
The qubits the study refers to are quantum bits, an advanced variant of the traditional binary. As opposed to being either a "1" or a "0," qubits can reach both states at the same time.
A computer chip with a large number of qubits, 503 of them in the study's case, should, in theory, process data exponentially faster than the standard binary employed by silicon chips.
In defense of its machine, D-Wave stated the questions were too basic to enable its product to move ahead of the traditional computer it faced during the trials. The company also reminded critics that its machine is in its infancy, compared with the decades of development its silicon-based rival had enjoyed.
With manufacturers of computer components struggling to pack more power into smaller pieces of silicon, interest in quantum computing will assuredly remain in alive and well. D-Wave may just have to retool its product, or another player may arise with more encouraging results.
