From: dmhills{at}attglobal.net (Don Hills)

In article , "Rich"  wrote:
>   Good for you.  At least your claim is that only you don't believe you
>would be more productive not what tony claimed which is that no ordinary
>user would be more productive.

I'm on his side on this one. "Ordinary" users have all the CPU
speed and "traditional" function that they need, though I accept
a more realistic cutoff point. For most businesses, this occurred about the
time of 1 GHz processors and Office 2000. That's more than enough for most
home users too, except for gaming and home video editing. Even there, the
trend is going away from fast CPUs to high-performance GPUs (highly
parallel processors) both for traditional graphics work and for new
applications such as database query processing.

All of which creates a bit of a problem for the CPU makers and Microsoft.
Intel stumbled and is seeing the GPU makers steal their lunch. Longhorn
requires a machine specification that will still be bleeding edge (and
extremely expensive) when it ships. Good luck persuading businesses that
it's a compelling upgrade...

There are other factors to consider, such as the power consumption of the
new machines. Intel's new dual-core processor consumes about 130 watts. Add
that to 100 to 200 watts for the new GPUs and you're starting to look at a
significant energy cost for businesses - both the electricity and the HVAC
required. (On the plus energy side, LCD panels are replacing CRTs.) I think
low-power pizza boxes using VIA or Pentium M processors and running an OS
and business app set that's happy in 512 MB to 1 GB memory will be the
popular upgrade round next time for businesses serious about TCO.

--
Don Hills    (dmhills at attglobaldotnet)     Wellington, New Zealand
"New interface closely resembles Presentation Manager,
 preparing you for the wonders of OS/2!"
    -- Microsoft advertisement on the box for Windows 2.11 for 286

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