Are thing to fast

[gunthnp]

In 1985 you could buy the same computer that IBM made back in 1981 and in 1991 the 286 was still new and hot in ten years very little growth in computer for the public then, now at the end of 2001 intel will realse a 2 GHz cpu that over a 100 times growth rate.

back then a company made a new computer line a best ever two years look at apple or commandor(commandor did not put out a new line till 87 and the 64 came out 82 ) and IBM, but today it's at lest ever 3 months a company comes out with a hole new line.

users bought a new computer in the 80's ever 7 years the in the 90's ever 3 years and now about ever 2 soon we will need a new one ever week. I like change that is part of the reason I am in this field, but I worry about a back lash sooner or later. How fast can we go before the digital divide is to big, and WHAT is the answer? and what about all the resources used to make one and when done we just throw them away the say every ton to computers has 1000's of dollors worth of metals but noe can find a cheap way to get to it. So long and thanks for all the fish.

 

[teknoguy]

so acording to that ratio. by 2010 we will have 200Ghz processors. i can't wait.

 

[pivan]

gunthnp.. as usual a provocative post.

I'm still on a 300 mhz at home, for the work I do there thats more then enough. It work, where I need to be productive 800 Mhz still is not fast enough. Animators that I know would give up their Volvo's and 'Vettes for a 200Ghz box to render on.

Economy of Force is a military tenent that mandates you expend the appropriate amount of resources to achieve your mission. To much is a waste, and not enough is an unnecessary risk. So..let the industry develop the speed and we will use it where we need it.

Remember, one of the things, other then the opposed digit, that separates homo-sapien from the rest of the food chain is our capacity to want more and our ability to produce it.

Regards,
Ivan In not now, when?
If not here, where?
If not us, who?

Just do it!!

 

[Voyager1]

The marketplace will produce what the consumers demand. Have you ever attended a consumer PC show or User Group conference? A large percentage of these folks own 1gHz (or better) machines with huge amounts of memory and disk space just to have the bragging rights! Just to say "mine's bigger than yours".

Our hardware is already outperforming the software. What is the purpose of going further? Answer: people want it...

I'd say (and this is just a semi-informed guess) that less that 5% of computer owners actually "need" (different from "want&quot anything more than 400-500mHz.

Let's get a grip. Invest in something that's not obsolete by the time you get it home. - Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[Sensibilium]

I own a 333Mhz PII and have done for nearly 4 years now, I see no need to upgrade to a P3 or P4. I have a 3D PCI card and it plays Q3A perfectly, my 20GB hard drive gives me all the space I need, 64MB RAM sufficiently keeps my PC nice and fast, and my 56K modem gets me a reasonable internet connection. Why should I upgrade?

The way I deal with this constant shifting of the PC hardware goalposts is to stay a few years comfortably behind. I only bought my 3D card last week! Before that I used my Stealth 64, but now a lot of games require a 3D card to run, so it was definitely time to get one.

Stay behind the race by a few years and save yourself some money (unless you have more money than sense, then by all means get yourself the most blistering PC available - but there really is no need). Ahdkaw
"What would you expect from a bunch of monkeys?"

http://www.sensibilium.com

 

[Kspade]

This also raises the question of 1Does anyone NEED to spend $1000 every week or two on the latest and greatest?' It all basicly comes down to the "keep up with the Jones'" syndrome. maybe there are a few who really want to have the best all the time and can afford it, but for the rest of us having a "new and improved" "top of the line" machine released so often become a little exasporating. I begin to think, "Why do we realy need this?" Until the software on the market catches up to the hardware, the answer must be that we don't need it. As Voyager1 stated, it is just a status symbol. I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every moment of it.

 

[pivan]

My third Porsche now has a GPS that has an Oracle 8i backend, runnning on an HP 200Ghz UNIX box with a 2 Terrabyte HD. It all fits nicely in its trunk, next to the spare tire The ladies swoon when they here the UNIX box cache when I use the GPS to find the nearest Sushi bar or Tai restaurant.

Its so cool that I am going to install one in my Viper which I am getting next week.


Ivan In not now, when?
If not here, where?
If not us, who?

Just do it!!

 

[Yvessss]

Like every one, I was affected by this fast evolution of technologies, with my different PCs over time.

But it strick me hard at work in 1998.
We deliver 12 systemes that we just redone with the latest technology, at the time.

At the implemantation date...(12 month later) we were no longer up to date with the technology but we were two version behind... never saw that before...

Thank's to internet.

Yvessss

 

[shawnnason]

I don't recommend this for everyone but....I still run my 120 mhz Pentium with a 2 gig hard drive and 32 megs of ram at home. Yeah, I rock with my 28.8 modem too.

 

[iza]

shawnnason : at home i don't even have 2Go harddrive : still stuck with my 1.2G ... and my modem is 14.4 ... we both DO rock ;]

 

[swertel]

Since we're comparing sizes. I still have a P-166Mhz, 2G HD, 64M Ram, and a 56K. Seems like a killer machine in comparison to yours. The only reason I'm thinking about upgrading is because I can no longer run CAD applications at home and my CD Rom doesn't work. (Why replace just the CD when I can get a whole new computer?)

 

[gunthnp]

well if we are going to do this I still use my commandor 64 for a lot of little things:
a killer 486 smaba sever oh yeah! So long and thanks for all the fish.

 

[iza]

yeah, my screen is about to die, i'm only waiting for it to really definitly die and then i'll buy a whole new computer ... just like you ! i'll miss the weird colors it's displaying tho ....

 

[woggie]

This is so cool - one-down-manship!

 

[shawnnason]

More like "mine is smaller than yours is"

 

[woggie]

Xackly!

 

[hotfusion]

I've got (and occasionally still use) a BBC mk2 32K microcomputer - beat that if you can! It boots in about 1 second and I never see a blue screen-unless I want to of course..... Can take half an hour to load a game from the cassette though! All right, that's not what I'm using now, this is a P3600 which is even as we type considered out of date - heck, you can't find them in ready-assembled computers any more. As stated in another post though, it will be some time before software comes on the domestic market that requires a faster processor than this. For example, the newest piece I have is an audio app. called Acid Pro 3.0, just released and requires a 400MHz CPU.
O.K., I also understand the need to possess the best available and am guilty of this myself, and I won't consider here the needs of professionals in the graphics field as their requirements are on another plane.
What interests me especially in this speed race is where this is pushing the technology. We have already almost reached the practical limits of silicon dies and the photo-based system of die rendering, so what's around the corner?
Possibly one way out is to concentrate on intense parallel processing to get the data through rather than raw speed much as happens in the human brain although developing new materials seems to be the more likely route.
Will we start to see biological systems that are able to grow according to demand? Or will some as yet unimagined technology rear it's head - indeed, is it already being worked on?
I can't help thinking about the 'Terminator' scenario whenever this subject is brought up but if the possibility exists for some future machine to become self-aware then I hope Mankind has the presence of mind to ensure such a machine can be completely isolated. Science fiction has an annoying habit of becoming science fact.
Whatever happens, I think most people on this forum would agree these are exciting times to be alive; We are seeing new breakthroughs almost on an annual basis - certainly things have changed in the year that I have been involved with PC's.
So just what medium are our future CPU's going to be formed on an how fast are they going to get? My suggestions are what I would try myself. If incorrect, I welcome corrections to my rather limited knowledge. Andy.

 

[MikeLacey]

Anyone here familiar with the idea of a "singularity", from the Vernor Vinge book "Across Realtime"? One of those ideas that you, initially, dismiss and which then hangs around in your head going "ahem...." for weeks. Mike
michael.j.lacey@ntlworld.com
Email welcome if you're in a hurry or something -- but post in tek-tips as well please, and I will post my reply here as well.

 

[MasterRacker]

Mike,

Vinge was the first to write about it as far as I know (just like James Hogan was writing about Virtual Reality before most others) and I think he is the one who coined the term. There is actually a group researching AI that is trying to actively bring about the Singularity. They are called "The Singularity Institute". Their site is at

http://www.singinst.org

. Makes for interesting reading.
Jeff

I haven't lost my mind - I know it's backed up on tape somewhere ....

 

[neonyak]

Im running a 1ghz cpu, with win2k. I know for a fact it'd go faster yet if I downgraded back to good ole' win98. *sigh* the good old days. I'm kickin back with my 56k, and yeah baby! I'm a rockin away with a reliable 45.2bps connection. If technology prevailed, I wouldn't know it if it kicked me in the rear! LOL


Pointless, yet useless,
Julie