That wasn't just the youtube video where I got my knowlege in quantum computing. I study quantum mechanics all of the time which is the basis of quantum computing and I read alot about it. Do you think I said oh tommorow we are all going to have quantum computers. I said in about 20 years. All of those things could be solved in 20 years. Do you think that people who lived 20 years before the first atomic bomb thought oh that is totally possible. No they thought it was impossible too. So don't use todays basis of technology as a way to say its impossible because every year we discover something new. Oh and I actually know alot more about quantum computers than the average teen would. Because I'm only a teenager. I plan on having a career as an astophysist which use both general realitivety and quantum mechanics.

The youtube video was for people who wanted to get a basic idea of what quantum computing is.

 I'm using the fact that we know functionally very little to say that they won't be in consumer level devices in twenty years. And yes, history is a good sign that absurdly large problems don't solve themselves in a matter of time. Referring to the atomic bomb is a pointless analogy. Are you trying to claim that within 20 years of their work they had consumer level atomic bombs? Or are you trying to claim that we will not only gain that knowledge, but implement it into a consumer level device immediately, with every software house immediately switching to that...architecture? Medium? 

As for your knowledge of quantum mechanics - errr good for you? I mean it's good that you read, and you should continue, but that doesn't change the fact that your knowledge of quantum computing is lacking. I mean it is one thing to not look puzzled with superposition (though you should), but its another thing entirely to pull 20 years out of your rear. Had you looked at the issue at hand its not just a matter of one or two small things, its a matter of mastering basic problems that took over 100 years, that is one hundred years, to be solved in regular computing. Without Boulean alegebra or the babbage machine in the 19th century, computers would still be in their infancy. Without Grace Murray Hopper, computers would just be little boxes that lit up. All of these steps happened over a long period of time, and were in a field that no one had invested in. And that's the cold hard reality of it, computers are a developed industry that aren't going to fundamentally change everything in twenty years.  Look back at Consumer level computers - theres a thirty year gap between ENIAC and the 4004. That was the birth of a market. The current market is established, and it's either going to be extremely cautious to adopt, or its going to take a new market, for anything to come of it.

Don't discount reality when you make wild assumptions. History has a way of repeating itself and running over those who seem to ignore it with hand waving. 

 Yeah that may be true but the difference now is that technology advances at a faster pace than technology in earlier years because there are alot more people taking occupations in scientific fields and there is more funds put into it. So maybe not 20 years as I said ( which I agree I pulled out of my ass) but that was just an estimate I made. SSJ12 said that we could see quantum computers  in about 5 years go mainstream. The point of the quantum mechanics is that I have knowlege of how things work on an atomic level which quantum computers do. Also people aren't starting completely from nothing like regular computers.  So 20 years is a good estimate but I might revise it to 30 years because thats when moore's law starts to be meaningless. I just wanted to prove that I have some knowlege to know about how quantum computers work in my last post, because you said that all of my knowlege was based off the youtube video. It doesn't even matter when quantum computers become mainstream (which they will eventualy if we don't find even something better) the point of this thread was to see how well games would improve on quantum computers. 

I'm under the impression that Quantum Mechanics operates at very, very low temperatures, namely 1 Kelvin Unit or even lower. Does this seem feasible to use as a consumer item to you guys?

My professor of Statistical Mechanics referred to QM as being a low temperature, micro-sized phenomena. It's based on probabilities, hence why it's related to statistical mechanics, so I believe there is a lot of growth in terms of physical theories.

My 2 cents, anyways.

^ Well i don't think the quantum computers today are at temps of 1k. Quantum mechanics isn't something that happends its a type of physics that shows the relation ship between quanta-packets of energy similar to photons and matter. Most of this happends on the sub atomic scale.

I just thought I'd point out that Quantum Computers won't be Effecting anything, unless you're asking if they'll be used to create special effects in video games.

What quantum computers are more likely to do will be Affecting video games. remember kids, you AFFECT(verb) something in order to create an EFFECT(noun).

Thank you for informing us Grey Acumen I always love to try to improve my sucky grammer. / Not Sarcasm

thanks for making the effort, it's an easy one to confuse and took me many years to get straight. Still forget myself which is which occasionally.

@Sqrl, what you're basically describing is "evolutionary computing". Neural networks are a form of evolutionary computing, but it's actually a specific way of doing things (by having multiple "paths" between the input and the output, and strengthening or weakening the weighting of these paths based on multiple trials, named so because it mimics the way the brain learns, but obviously on a much simpler scale) rather than describing the concept. Another form of evolutionary computing you may have heard of is "genetic algorithms", which have a similar goal but mimic natural selection rather than human learning.

@OP. You seem to have a deep misunderstanding of what a quantum computer actually is. It's not just an evolutionary step in computers where everything is more powerful, but it's a completely different direction for computers. Think of it like the Wii compared to other consoles. Regular computers will keep getting more and more powerful, but a quantum computer is not more powerful than a regular computer. What it is is a completely different way of looking at how computers work (ie, we're not even talking about 1 and 0 any more). Now in the real world a quantum computer may not be any more powerful than a real computer, but for some tasks (mainly, many NP problems) it will be much better.

One famous (and an incredibly important, and very real danger) example is the factorisation of very large numbers. Factorisation is an NP problem, it has exponential complexity, every time you add a single bit to the number you are factorising, the amount of time taken to solve the problem doubles. Therefore when the numbers get very large, the amount of time required to solve the problem enters the billions of years. Even as computers get more powerful exponentially, the size of the numbers they can factorise in a small amount of time (say, a year) only increases bit by bit)

This is of course incredibly important because the RSA algorithm relies on the intractability of factorising large numbers, yet there is an algorithm for quantum computers which can factorise in polynomial time. 1024 bit keys should last until the end of RSA's life because the second a decently powered quantum computer comes out, RSA, and I believe, all other current forms of public key cryptography, will be completely useless, which is a huge problem because the entire secure internet world relies on it.

What you will find though, is that while some things will become faster with quantum computers, the main benefit will be that problems we couldn't solve before will now become more solvable. You may find, as Sqrl pointed out, that evolutionary computing may be a viable solution for creating AI players, but don't expect to see photorealistic graphics due to "th4 pow4 of th4 quantum!!1". Of course, the only thing that's going to stop us having photorealistic graphics in 20 years from regular computer advancements will be the designers, but I expect by then all graphics will be procedurally generated.

 Erm, didn't you use it wrong in your previous sentence, then? Regardless, many sources interchange the two; effect is used as both noun and verb, as is affect.

@ sc94597

 I'm aware that it (QM) doesn't just happen; it's 'present' at all times, it just become much more noticeable under certain conditions. The Wikipedia article and even your own video (was it you?) on the subject supports the assertion that the Quantum Computers need low temperatures. In the video, for example, Dr. Seth Lloyd mentions keeping the contents under liquid helium for cooling; though no mention is made as to what temperature it'd have to be.

Of course it happens on the subatomic scale, and though I don't claim to be an expert, Quantum Mechanics is also fundamentally consiting of waves. Nobody really seems to understand exactly of what, though. The way I think of it, QM is just a representative model that works for our current purposes and is not the end product theory of the universe. Very much like the classical theory, its principles are most likely going to be encompassed by a grander scheme.