Right now, yes computers are very gimmicky. They're machines that are supposed to eventually make lives easier, but right now waste about as much productivity as they give.

I think the hardware side is getting to the point where it should be, and a key indicator of that is the rising popularity of smart phones and netbooks. We're starting to accept that we can in fact trim down some processing power for the sake of price and form factor.

In addition, Windows 7 has put a very big focus on performance.  Vista pretty much fell into the line of previous OSes and kept of the trend of doing more (and getting more bloated in the process) with the reasoning that hardware will keep up. Windows 7 has drastically shifted towards a performance focus and may even run on some netbooks.

In addition, there is an increasing trend towards non-PC devices such as cell phones and non-standard inputs such as touch screens. Multitouch especially appears to be something that more devices will be doing.

So IMHO the hardware trend may start to break a bit from Moore's law, and a new trend may be beginning. The new trend will likely be what I like to call "invisible computing." While I do not believe the standard tower is goingto die, I do think it may be supplemented by more devices with different form factors and more specialized tasks.

For example, imagine a slate like device on the side of a fridge - where anybody could create a grocery list (possibly including the fridge itself, via senors and previous shopping lists) and then the person buying groceries could download it to a cell phone that could referenced and crossed off at the grocery store.

Smart phones are already doing a lot of this "invisible computing" - they are essentially PIM devices, replacing datebooks and calendars.

I do not believe larger form factors are going away. People will always want a machine with a comfortable screen and keyboard for work. People will always desire high powered devices with large screens for entertainment. Families will always need separate work and entertainment machines so that some people can work while others entertain themselves.  So IMHO there is still a place for PCs in the new world of "invisible computing."

Or at least I hope that's the trend. I've got no personal interest in climbing some sort of eternal ladder of power while forgetting that there's more to simplifying and automating our lives than just processing power.  IMHO it's time they started being useful and practical, not just toys.

I'm finding more and more that my biggest complaints about PCs are totally unrelated to processing power.  They're related to synchronization.  How do I sync my software so I get the same thing no matter where I go, be it at my main PC, my netbook, or my Palm T|X?

Right now, I'm looking for a <$20 way to sync my contacts, TODO list, and notes between my PC and netbook.  Email and calendar are easy - there are a gazillion products for those.  But they always seem to forget contacts, TODO lists, and notes.  I just don't understand why nobody has taken the time to create a product that willl sync all of the PIM stuff between PCs.

Sorry about the rant - but it does seem that too many developers are ignoring a large need.

Is a joke.

Sorry, it had to be said.

No, it didn't.  When the Microsoft firewall blocks their own systems, you already know they can't run their own shit, let alone fix someone elses.

For a "joke," I find it quite a bit more useful that XP's. It seems to do a much more thourough check, and even if it doesn't find the problem, it'll usually tell you if it's your settings or something on the network messing up.

XP's "repair" is about as useless as it gets. It just resets the connection and hopes for the best. Vista's seems to at least be aware that the problem could be due to bad settings and tries to be more intelligent about fixing things.

In any case, back on subject, eh?

Yeah, being able to add shortcuts to Impulse is cool. I'm pretty undecided about what way to go, though. Impulse and Steam both manage games, and Vista even has a dedicated games folder.

What's worth a new OS would depend on the person using it.  The stability and reliability improvements are all I needed to give it the thumbs up, though I love the Reliability and Performance Monitor.

As for me, the only OS upgrade MS has put out (since the 9x era) that I probably didn't need was XP x64.  I had it and definately liked it, but I really didn't need it.

As it is now though, both principles are simultaneously accessing the web in multiple ways and from highly variable infra-structures... thus, *why* Impulse fits right back into our discussion.

You may all have the best OS or the fastest ISP and yet, you must squeeze in the bandwidth pipes hoping something out of your control will find the optimal settings or paths. Most recently, we've been having terrible problems accessing I-Mod-Productions, another proof 'something, somehow' is wacky unstable. Sven & i are theorizing on the WAN-routing, be it local or broadband. Heck, even the usual flooding piracy_hacking schemas might as well be responsible. Mirrors and/or Proxies, anyone? Loops of trojans? Repetitive or stoppable.

Now apply this fragile process to logging onto Impulse (or Steam, btw), do a transaction, plainly surf as they say. How reliable is the fact that bazillions of cell-phones go the residual mini-twitter-text pinging ways constantly, continually --  creating a generalized lag in the flow of communications since the grid (of servers) can't handle that ever increasing quantity of, i'll be blunt, waste and junk.

Right there, are the probable **limits**, i mentioned earlier.

Zyxpsilon: Agreed.

I think the end result is not going to be "cloud computing" as most imagine it, with next to no processing power at the clients.  I seriously, seriously, doubt we're going to ever see dumb terminals or thin clients again.

I think the end result is going to be some computing power at both server and client ends, and I think that access to local computing and storage is here to stay. For the purpose of having some redundancy and availability when the network is unavailable, I just can't see us going to thin clients.

I have a "netbook," but you know what? Most of my stuff is still offline. I use sync software to keep everything synchronized, but it's all synced to the local drive. If I get disconnected, I still have access to my documents.

"and yet, you must squeeze in the bandwidth pipes hoping something out of your control will find the optimal settings or paths"

So very much true. I think that the technologists forget this. They assume that having larger pipes at the endpoints means things will always be faster, but that is simply not true. A chain is only as strong as the weakest link.

"creating a generalized lag in the flow of communications since the grid (of servers) can't handle that ever increasing quantity of, i'll be blunt, waste and junk."

Yup, and there's a lot of junk floating around. Lost packets, old viruses still trying to phone home, new viruses trying to find new homes, network devices trying to find new places to redirect traffic, etc.

A good exercise for anybody wanting to know why hardware firewalls are so important: Place packet sniffers inside and outside the network, and see for yourself how much more quiet a router or firewall makes your local network.

Have you seen the movie "I-Robot" (Will Smith as police officer) loosely based on the Asimov book?

Skynet in Terminator(s)?

Etc!

The current flow of web interactions is getting close to DB growth assignations - by this, i mean, there's only sooooo much bytes submitted to CRC checks that can get there and here in reasonable time.

That's where the cloud theory comes in and how stuff such as Wikipedia can centralize data commonly accessible.

Sure, servers can notch up a few terabytes*∑ for as many clients as needed and yet, the connectivity ratio will eventually bring forward a coordinated attempt by ISP providers to "internationalize" content. We're at the dawn of this important step if not both feet knees deep already into it.

Who was it that said; The web is almost as widespread as the number of users online simultaneously, wherever, however and whenever.

Maybe they were right - all along.

Yeah, they were some nice fiction.

DB? I am unfamiliar with that acronym.

I believe the term you are looking for is decentralize? That's the concept behind P2P networks.

. . . and do you have a point, other than you're finally "getting" the meaning of the word "web" in World Wide Web?

I've known about the decentralized nature of the web for a while now. Nothing special really happens when you switch to a P2P system, other than a lot less strain on the hosting system, since it is merely another peer.

Although that decentralized nature is not really as accurate as it used to be, now that the vast majority of data is really piped along backbones these days.

DataBase.

Taken into context, "information" flow is a feedback loop that can be available in alternate formats present in multiple places. Redundant at best.

Whereas a DB source can be perceived as some of the usual RSS feeds coordinated perpetually to link at general content.

Thus accelerating access to common knowledge even if "too" decentralized.

Okay, I've heard of DB being used for database - but that didn't seem to make sense in the context.

That is one possibility.

I suppose you can think of it that way, but that's a rather unusual way of thinking about it.

. . . and what would be accomplished by having access to common knowledge?

I'll worry about the future of the internet when it becomes the NEAR future...otherwise, I might as well be doing something useful like arguing on forums.

Oh wait...doh! 

Allows everyone to meet the optimal ways of communications headon and to perform maintenance duties on bazillions of similar sites that use (Main servers & nodal dispatchers) bandwidths - thus, accelerating access to the entire grid itself.

IP to IP (add the newest v6 layer, btw) is still a narrow connection ratio. Multiply those by factors beyond *some* wider amounts, we will all eventually feel indirect cuts to our routing speeds. We're monitored on usage meters, which we pay. Slow page loadings, lagging on D/L - time is money & money is time; ask your ISP.

It's physically impossible (as of now) to match the wiring or satellite networks in a stable synchronicity mode fast enough to stabilize point A to point B in any situations.

Besides, 90+% of the current traffic is, how should i put it in general terms; SPAM.

Check your eMails boxes.

Common knowledge?

I use both Steam and Impulse for gaming. I prefer to get my games from Downloads instead of Retail because as long as I know my login and password, I'll always have the game with me. I don't have to worry about lost CDKeys, lost discs, broken discs, all due to misplacement or moving/boxing up. Just the other day I came across my Star Wars: KOTOR box that I've been looking for over the past year. It's frustrating at best.

Also, I keep Steam running in the background all the time, which automatically downloads and updates all my games for me, even if I'm not there to do it. So there's no need to go fishing around looking for patch servers or anything of the sort.

On top of that, when you buy retail, you pay the middle man, the distributor, the store, etc... and only a portion goes to the people who truely deserve your money: the Developers.

When I can bypass all the middle men and know that the majority of my money goes into the Devs' pockets, it further pushes my want to use a service such as VALVe's Steampowered or Impulse. I prefer to pay the Devs and the Publishers, not the Mortar and Brick businesses that just storage the games on shelves.

Plus, if you're worried about what resources Steam or Impulse is using, then I'd suggest updating from your parents' old 1994 Gateway PC166 machine. Ventrilo and Firefox take up 10x the resources that Steam or Impulse use.

Meaning, BETTER games (products) for the same or possibly higher investment in design & features.

Solving the WallyMarty syndromes, forever.

Paying the artists and the coders for what they worked hard on.

Evolution.