From: J Corbally (icorb@indigo.ie)
Date: Sun Nov 17 2002 - 17:42:11 MST
>Date: Fri, 15 Nov 2002 21:07:06 -0800
>From: spike66 <spike66@attbi.com>
>Subject: Re: fruits of Bill Gates labor worth $50 billion.
> > "Charles Hixson" <charleshixsn@earthlink.net>
> >
> >>Yes. I believe that Mr. Gates has been a net detriment to the
> >>computer community.
>I love games and competitions. They bring out the
>best and worst in humans, they sharpen our minds
>and bodies, they are fun to watch.
I'd agree, just finished Thief 2 recently (been gathering dust for two
years). I especially enjoy the newer titles that have moved away from the
surreal "blast 'em up" formula to a story-based, character-centric
flow. Give "Deus Ex" a look over for something slightly more integrated in
the story department.
It's still early days, but I believe this concept is the one that will
ultimately win out, as it will come into its own with full sensory VR
immersion.
>We are seeing
>a great competition between Gates and Moore.
>Fourteen years ago I bought a mac. Took a couple
>minutes to boot up.
Ah, the Mac. Go back to the mid/late 80's, and I didn't yet own a PC, but
I didn't have a snowballs chance in hell of ever owning a Mac. I remember
well how drastically overpriced even basic Macs were Around 1991, a Mac
would have cost me IR£3K. So I built a PC for IR£1050 exactly. Apple
claimed they built a machine for the masses. Bollocks.
Gates at least made it possible to own a PC. Jobs just made it possible to
gloat about it.
What use is "innovation" if no one can afford it?
*rant mode off, resuming normal service*
>Five years ago I bought a
>Personal Confuser running Windows. Altho the
>PC was 50 times faster, much to my dismay it still
>took about 2 minutes to boot.
50 times? Processor maybe. Other components often spoil the fun.
>Score tied.
>Last year I bought a 2 GHz PC. It only takes
>about a minute to boot, so Moore might be slightly
>ahead of Gates. But wait, Microsloth fans! Bill
>might yet have an effective counterattack. Perhaps
>Billware may prove rapacious enough to cleverly
>devour all the performance increases dished out
>by Intel.
Using Win XP? I've seen some slow booting installations, but not many. My
.933GHz machine boots in 40-50 on Win98. My work laptop (1.1GHz) about 1
min with XP.
>Of course in the long run, computing performance
>improvements face some fundamental limits: the
>size of atoms and the speed of light, whereas
>there is no apparent limit to the ever increasing
>inefficiency of software. Perhaps quantum computing
>will come along and again put Moore in the lead.
>But then of course, Gates could counterattack with
>quantum bloat.
Quantum bloat, love it!
>Can someone explain to me why, on a 2 GHz computer,
>it *still* takes over a minute to boot?
Can you explain to me why you aren't using Standby mode? :))
My system is "always on", just like the net connection I wish I
had. Crashing is extremely rare too, and typically due to older games and
virus protection software.
> In those
>100 billllllion clock cycles, please someone tell
>me exactly what the hellllll is going on in that
>operating system? Why does it takes over 100 billllllion
>cycles? Why could my old mac boot up with less than
>five thousanths as many cycles?
Smaller OS I'd guess. More basic hardware, and so less features to load
and switch on. The speed of your hard disk doesn't hit its full potential
until its bus master drivers are loaded, which isn't till sometime around
when the desktop appears.
>Is this not the most
>stunning example of retrograde technology in all of
>human history? Will we eventually see multi-terahertz
>personal computers that still take 2 minutes to boot?
Hold not one's breath.....
>spike
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home and
crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures
to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid."
-Q, Star Trek:TNG episode 'Q Who'
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