Anyone can build a fast CPU. The trick is to build a fast system.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The speed at which modern CPUs perform computations still blows my mind daily.
One of the reasons microcomputers progressed so fast is people are willing to accept crashes. It's faster to build something and try it, even if it means you'll have to rebuild later... If you spent too much time building and massaging one vehicle, you don't learn anything.
I used to build my own PCs... and actually had one of the first water-cooled, overclocked PCs around. I ran it at over 4Ghz, and this was back in 2001... but alas, I do not have the time for that fun anymore.
I could never understand how to build a computer, but the best I could hope for is to understand the people that do.
It's very hard to cheaply build anything significant in a multi-platform, mobile world.
Look at what Silicon Valley has done - the advance of computers.
One of the things that's interesting is that the PC has always had a huge amount of scalability. It was sort of the wild dog that moved into Australia and killed all the local life because it could just adapt. There used to be these dedicated devices, like dedicated word processors.
On the molecular scale, you find it's reasonable to have a machine that does a million steps per second, a mechanical system that works at computer speeds.
If you wanted to build the most powerful computer you could, you can't do better than including everything in the universe that's potentially available.
I don't care how big and fast computers are, they're not as big and fast as the world.