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Undertoad · 09-18-2005, 07:35 AM

They also want to save power because notebooks are the boom business now, not laptops.

And if Moore's law does finally hit the wall, we will see more multi-CPU solutions, so each chip better take less power. It will be difficult to justify 1000 watt desktops with 4 processors in order to run Office 13.

I don't think computing power is driving any innovation right now because all the desktops are faster than we need already. Desktops are about 10 times more powerful than they have to be in order to run Windows, Office, a browser, and full motion video all at the same time. A minority of people do the things that require a really powerful system: Battlefield 2, Unreal Tournament 2K4, video editing and massive photo manipulation.

Even when DOS was prominent and programmers had to do weird and interesting things to get access to more memory, there were more applications pushing the edge. Nowadays, the cheapest system will run Windows and Office and everything they need to do, with practically no difference from the most expensive system.

09-18-2005, 07:35 AM	#2
Undertoad Radical Centrist Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Cottage of Prussia Posts: 31,423	They also want to save power because notebooks are the boom business now, not laptops. And if Moore's law does finally hit the wall, we will see more multi-CPU solutions, so each chip better take less power. It will be difficult to justify 1000 watt desktops with 4 processors in order to run Office 13. I don't think computing power is driving any innovation right now because all the desktops are faster than we need already. Desktops are about 10 times more powerful than they have to be in order to run Windows, Office, a browser, and full motion video all at the same time. A minority of people do the things that require a really powerful system: Battlefield 2, Unreal Tournament 2K4, video editing and massive photo manipulation. Even when DOS was prominent and programmers had to do weird and interesting things to get access to more memory, there were more applications pushing the edge. Nowadays, the cheapest system will run Windows and Office and everything they need to do, with practically no difference from the most expensive system.