computers nothing new in a while

tomsie100

hello
I was just thinking how slow the computer world is in the last 5 years of getting out new computers. My computer is 3 and a half years old & there not much difference between it and the new computers i think.

But when i got my first computer many moons ago. It was out of date in a year. the internet, CD roms and colour printers came out.

Was wondering had the computer stagnated for these last 5 years.

Then again i could be wrong and not know enought about computers.

I am MAN

LOL

Pay attention!

MisterAnarchy

The PC Industry reached a point around 2 years ago,2Ghz mark at which the averag ehome PC was extremely powerful.
For the average user the PC market has remained stagnant over the last 2 years.
Hard drives have become larger,DVD Burners have become common place .
In the last 2 years the price of Hardware has dropped rapidly and its now possible to own a serious piece of hardware for a fraction of the price it was 2 years ago.
TFT screens are now the norm,5.1 sound is popular,DVD burners are able to record a DVD in 7 mins,Wireless Mice and Keyboards are now cost effective.
The modern PC is a Media Centre that incorporates TV Tuners,PVRs,Remote control,Wireless Home Networks.
Computer cases come in every colour and design.
There has never been a better time to buy a PC.

Ajnag

Nothing new?
Pci-express,
64 bit processers,
fastest ram ever
Sata and raid now cheap as fec.

But I guess it sucks that it still is the same keyboard-mouse-computer-monitor set-up.

The vr people promised up blowjobs from our p.c's and sadly that hasnt materialised.

Chong

Ajnag wrote:

Nothing new?
Pci-express,
64 bit processers,
fastest ram ever
Sata and raid now cheap as fec.

But I guess it sucks that it still is the same keyboard-mouse-computer-monitor set-up.

The vr people promised up blowjobs from our p.c's and sadly that hasnt materialised.

How disappointing we cant have blow jobs but we can get screwed in the ass by Bill Gates and Windows Xp.

tuxy

Ajnag wrote:

Nothing new?
Pci-express,
64 bit processers,
fastest ram ever
Sata and raid now cheap as fec.

but apart from maybe the ram speed none of those things make a significant improvment to performance

I am MAN

Of course they make a difference to performance there just isnt a whole lot of stuff that takes full advtantage of them right now and the 64 bit processors are just preparing for the future.

Ajnag

Willem D wrote:

How disappointing we cant have blow jobs but we can get screwed in the ass by Bill Gates and Windows Xp.

If you can live with out games, then you dont have to take it from bill no more. There are some real straight forward linux distros that dont need l33tskillz.

Fedora or suse come to mind.

Raphael

Live without games?

Explain how!

Ajnag

N0rp

steveland?

It's cos the aliens stopped delivering Bill Gates parts a couple of years ago

Peteee

Thats true, a PC ordered from Dell 2 or 3 years ago will essentially be the same, but with a processor boost, and a flat screen.

If you go cheap, they will still sell you the same ram, optical drive and hard drive they were flogging 2 years ago.

JackKelly

the focus i think, has been taken off desktops and put on to other forms of electronics, e.g. Pocket Media (+40Gb of music in your pocket), Phones you can almst watch tele on, etc.

Saying this though, i bough a mid to high range PC the summer before last and already it needs upgrading.
There's been the
Jump up to DX9
Jump to 64bit procesors.
Affordable RAM, 2Gb isnt so silly now.

There hasnt been any major discovery,or new invention, but what we already had has advanced a good bit.

dangerman

the main innovations have moved away from the pc itself and to the internet. look at it that way and everything seems a little bit more impressive:

file sharing anyone? fundamentally going to alter content delivery, copyright & general ip law...exciting times.

what about those multi-core processors - i know nothing about them, but they are on the horizon now aren't they?

Hobbes

Ajnag wrote:

The vr people promised up blowjobs from our p.c's and sadly that hasnt materialised.

You mean you never bothered to get the fufme device?

Actually you can get holograpic laptops now. Think they only sell in Japan though. Don't even need glasses.

If you can live with out games,

Actually WineX will play most stuff these days.

ShiverinEskimo

According to a friend of mine who watches these things, dual core processors are due soon, but offer marginal increases over dual CPU machines, they are slightly more cost effective but have had to take a speed drop because of the obvious issue to heat. so i wouldn't be expecting a revolution.

pickarooney

Can't say I understand the need for a processor of over 1.5GHz and more than 512MB RAM unless you're into games, video editing or 3d-modelling. For the majority of what people use PCs for, they could have done the same with a Pentium II or less. The spiralling speeds of CPUs kind of tapered off at about the 3GHz mark and the emphasis shifted to better and faster graphics cards, to the extent that the 'game' is almost more about how many frames per second than how many frags per round now.

On the other hand, DVD creation and everything networky has been evolving steadily of late, broadband is getting faster and cheaper all the time, and the new wave of überschnell internet is just around the corner, wireless everything is now a reality (digital tv/cheap telephone/broadband internet in one box is already on sale here) and carrying huge amounts of data in small spaces - removable slimline hard-drives, USB keys, MP3 players, iPods, dual-layer DVDs is the norm. For how many years did we wait for a workable replacement to the floppy drive for transporting data? Cumbersome zip-drives apart, there was no easy way of doing this - now we have gigs of gmail and flash-cards to slip in our pockets.

Caesar_Bojangle

I heard through the grapevine that there is some kind of super computer being developed, called Skynet, I think.

tuxy

Caesar_Bojangle wrote:

I heard through the grapevine that there is some kind of super computer being developed, called Skynet, I think.

is it better than a gibson?

Caesar_Bojangle

Cyberdyne Systems are developing it. I've heard nothing but good things about it.

Ajnag

Tut..
Cyberdyne suck, HAL systems will carry the day....dave!.

halenger

dangerman wrote:

what about those multi-core processors - i know nothing about them, but they are on the horizon now aren't they?

They are indeed. This year will be the year of the multi-core but it'll be a bit of a non starter for some people. They multi-core processors will be _lower_ speed than the current ones (seperately I mean) but combined it's twice the fun and a zillion times the cost.

BTX might make a name for itself or it'll just die a death like the P4 4GHz that inspired it's design - I'm not saying better cooling is a bad thing but Intel did come up with it cause their processors (...latest... one.... I can't think of the name?! Ah... Prescott! Thank you brain) were tooooooo hooot. <sizzle>

There's always going to be something new. True we're all waiting for the next "big" thing. Something new that'll blow our minds but until then it's more of a nerd haven - cheaper x, y, z and all doing what we want blisteringly fast and without throwing too much of a hissy fit, usually.

In conclusion. SOMETHING! :eek:

monster_fighter

This is the year of 25/50GB Bluray drives.

We haven't had a home backup solution for years. Finally, this is it.

C Fodder

BluRay - DVD - CD 20 years ago +
PCIexpress - PCI (AGP - VLB) - ISA 25+ years ago, pre IBM PC
x86 er ! 35 + years ago (4004) ?

whats new nowadays and I don't mean engineering I mean real invention.

sceptre

monster_fighter wrote:

This is the year of 25/50GB Bluray drives.

We haven't had a home backup solution for years. Finally, this is it.

I would say that by the time recordable bluRay becomes affordable the HD size:desired optical disc backup solution won't be any better than the one we have today.

A 25GB disc is only 5 times the size we're currently using. The jump from CDR to DVDR4.7 was proportionally better than that.

As for the innovations, they moved to software and consumer hardware quite a while back. Bottom line is that there isn't all that much different on a hardware basis between a 4Ghz Prescott two steps from setting itself no fire and a 386. At a microprocessor level it's a lot more complicated and a lot faster but all its doing is pretty much the same crapola faster and hotter. Even software innovation's slowed down in the last few years as the GUIs got better (Mac purists can read that as "more like a Mac" if you like) We're now in the nice quiet phase where everything (except bloatware and storage sizes) is getting smaller. I like these phases. Needing a 500 euro upgrade to get better shadows on a Windows box isn't something I'd class as innovation.

rob1891

Multicore is old, ibm have been doing it for ~5 years with POWER4 and now POWER5 processors and Sun got out their Ultrasparc IV processors last year. Consumers aren't going to see multicore this year for sure, and not next year either. AMDs plans (which will probably miss their target) are aimed at servers and workstations. If you aren't buying multi processor opteron systems right now then you won't be buying multicore systems in 6, 12, 24 months either