[quote author=“Drachen”][quote author=“OnMyWayUp”]Not really… the fact is tht most people have not been introduced to the possiblity of using RAM for loading their O/S and most used programs.
How much would you suppose that would be? My Windows directory alone on my work PC (which I consider to be pretty rinky-dink) is just under 2.5 GB. Add another GB or so for my “most used programs”. If you want instant-on, add another GB or more for the entire working set of the OS in memory. If you want to have the swap file in flash, add 1.5 - 3GB.
How much memory do you think Longhorn’s decendants will take up by the time 6-8GB flash costs as much as 2GB SDRAM?
First off a 5-8 gb flash drive for the O/S and “mostly used programs” would be good in about a year. Who needs their swap on flash? Baby steps…k?
AND LONGHORN!!! funny… ur going Longhorn :shock: !!! O…K… w/e… I think Microsoft has been trying to put a little more effort into improving their system but only enough to get the people back to their products… which would explain their 82% increase in profits for the last fiscal year :shock: ... but I still feel it is just for show… Windows needs to be taken back down to its core and completely restructered. I admit I LOVE the user-frienliness of it…but…I’m NOT willing to sacrifice FUNCTIONALITY of my O/S and have to reinstall it every 3-5 months.
To me having an O/S like Linux, where although it will take you a few headaches to get everything running, and you may have to change a few pieces of your hardware to get it to work 100%, it’s all downhill after it is started… Either way both O/S’s have their bad’s and their goods, but I for one favor the freedom Linux gives you… i mean you can download like 15 of them for 100% free at LinuxIso.org. Can you point me to a website that does that for Windows? And they are still offerring intact distro’s…SUSE, Debian, Mandrake, and Red Hat. I can’t wait for Sun’s Project Looking Glass to be in their first release version…but they need to HURRY UP!!! :shock: Check out their demo… a lot of what Longhorn is gonna have…in 3D!!! (Sorta) I can’t wait… and look at the laptop he is running… not exactly an Alienware with P4 3.66 EE w/ HT is it… :wink: (at least i hope not…. )
But that 8GB WILL come down in price with some time…MY POINT PEOPLE…
Already had your points. People willing to have better performance will get their TB of mechanical HD space as well as get a 10-15 GB flash drive for the important things.
Seriously… you are thinking EVERYONE is going out and already has 500 GB HD’s in their systems so, obviosly, everyone in another year or two will have at least a TB for their systems… not really. I mean, check out Sony’s top-of-the-line preconfigured R series . A 250 GB HD… Obviously if so many people were going out and buying hundreds of GB at this point in time…wouldn’t their top-of-the-line $3100 (after tax) desktop have some more space in it??? Especially one designed for a Media Center? People aren’t in a rush to get TB’s of space for their systems. 10-20 GB flash drives will be available as cheap as you can get a 200GB mechanical HD now within the next 6-9 years IMO.
[quote author=“OnMyWayUp”]Already had your points. People willing to have better performance will get their TB of mechanical HD space as well as get a 10-15 GB flash drive for the important things.
Seriously… you are thinking EVERYONE is going out and already has 500 GB HD’s in their systems so, obviosly, everyone in another year or two will have at least a TB for their systems… not really. I mean, check out Sony’s top-of-the-line preconfigured R series . A 250 GB HD… Obviously if so many people were going out and buying hundreds of GB at this point in time…wouldn’t their top-of-the-line $3100 (after tax) desktop have some more space in it??? Especially one designed for a Media Center? People aren’t in a rush to get TB’s of space for their systems. 10-20 GB flash drives will be available as cheap as you can get a 200GB mechanical HD now within the next 6-9 years IMO.
You can pick up a 250GB drive for less then $100 after rebate. How could flash possibly compete with this? I also never said everyone has at least 500 GB…I said most high end PCs are generally 1-2GB Ram and 250-1TB in space. Those ‘hard-core’ enthusiasts have better systems.
My question to you, is the fact that flash is generally cheap now, $50-75 for 1 GB HD, why don’t the hard-core users actually use them? All the mod’ing sites, i’ve never seen a flash-based system. You could do 4, 1GB drives…one for the OS, one for Swap, one for Apps, one for Games, yet, i’ve never seen one. This would cost about $200 in drives, the same price they put in SCSII and huge 250 IDE drives…so why not flash? I think you guys are overestimating how good a flash HD really is…trust me, it’s not that great.
Oh boy, this one is getting a little hot. We are sort of arguing the same points here. We are not denying that mechanical drives do not offer more for less. You win. But how much space does a person need. If you place your entire music collection, Longhorn, and the average home user’s apps, would it come to more than a TB? I think not.
This is where Flash comes in. Not for storage purposes, but OS loading and maybe a few essential apps. We are very close to this happening in the next few years if manufacturers will open their eyes and build it. Admit it.
[quote author=“TruthSeeker”]Oh boy, this one is getting a little hot. We are sort of arguing the same points here. We are not denying that mechanical drives do not offer more for less. You win. But how much space does a person need. If you place your entire music collection, Longhorn, and the average home user’s apps, would it come to more than a TB? I think not.
Wern’t you the one quoting me that Bill Gates (mis)quote about 640k being enough for everyone?
[quote author=“TruthSeeker”]This is where Flash comes in. Not for storage purposes, but OS loading and maybe a few essential apps. We are very close to this happening in the next few years if manufacturers will open their eyes and build it. Admit it.
No, we’re not. First, everything in this business, especially in the consumer world, revolves around cost. When it comes down to selling a commodity device, the lowest-cost-but-acceptable technology always wins. That’s why HDs in consumer machines are not 15k Ultra SCSI III drives. Second, there’s no real need for this - or more importantly the demand. With fast computers and Windows XP, most computers boot in just a minute or so. Compare this to just the last generation of computers running Windows 2000 Pro.
Sure it might happen, just like speech recognition and 3-D desktop environments, but Erik and I have seen and heard way too many undercooked technologies tossed out on the market (like the Tablet PC) to jump onboard any dumb idea that comes down the pike.
[quote author=“TruthSeeker”]
This is where Flash comes in. Not for storage purposes, but OS loading and maybe a few essential apps. We are very close to this happening in the next few years if manufacturers will open their eyes and build it. Admit it.
Exactly what I have been trying to say…
3D environments are happening..didn’t you see my post…
[quote author=“Drachen”]
With fast computers and Windows XP, most computers boot in just a minute or so. Compare this to just the last generation of computers running Windows 2000 Pro.
Well then what is wrong with my TR… it has pretty much always taken up to 5 minutes to load. Since I got it and after I cleared out the unneccesary files in MSCONFIG. I think your exaggerating that… I’ve gone to BestBuy and rebooted their computers their… and trust me it was much longer than a couple minutes to boot…BRAND NEW…
[quote author=“OnMyWayUp”]and trust me it was much longer than a couple minutes to boot…BRAND NEW…
Bloatware…nothing to do with HDs. You install Norton AnitVirus and Firewall, plus a host of other hog apps and any drive (flash inlcuded) will bog down.
A straight OS install of XP bare should boot in under 1 minute using a standard drive…it should shut in under 30 seconds.
[quote author=“OnMyWayUp”]3D environments are happening..didn’t you see my post…
They’ve been “happening” since the days of Doom. It’s just that none of them can hold a candle to a properly-designed 2D graphical desktop system. What they demoed wasn’t all that impressive from an actual usability standpoint. Glorified Mac-style roll-ups that you have to turn your head sideways to read? And who ever needed to write things on the back of a window?? So far I haven’t seen anything that couldn’t be done as well (or better) in 2D.
Note that Longhorn’s Avalon is a 3D programming interface, not a 3D desktop environment. It’s more designed to give programs a Flash-style interface. Again, basically just chrome.
[quote author=“OnMyWayUp”]Well then what is wrong with my TR… it has pretty much always taken up to 5 minutes to load. Since I got it and after I cleared out the unneccesary files in MSCONFIG. I think your exaggerating that… I’ve gone to BestBuy and rebooted their computers their… and trust me it was much longer than a couple minutes to boot…BRAND NEW…
Probably spyware, and everyone knows that Best Buy floor models are in pristine working condition at all times. Most of them even have all their keys. My cold boot time is 2:31 including network password. It’s stretching it, but it still qualifies as “a minute or so”. It would be less, but SmartbarXP and YZ Dock take a while to start up. Waking from hibernation is a glacial 29 sec. In either case it’s a hell of a lot faster than 98 or 2000 on similar hardware.
[quote author=“Drachen”]
Wern’t you the one quoting me that Bill Gates (mis)quote about 640k being enough for everyone?
.
I meant for now, not forever. At some point, though, HD space will not be the priority…..speed and temperature might replace those priorities in future systems. Flash may be the answer if storage capacity is not the issue down the road. Does this make sense or are we still firing blanks here. This is a great topic. I would love to here other members thoughts. Maybe we should make a poll. :D
Would you buy a Flash based system if the cost for 30GB were the same as 800GB for a mechanical driven system?
over 3 years, i have accumulated just about 2tb of fansubbed anime. i wish i could put that all on HDDs, but with the amount of hard drive failures i’ve had, i don’t trust them any more. i keep most of it on dvd-rs and cds, but the optical discs (cds and dvds) being as fragile as they are, i prefer to keep them on my hard drive, but then the hard drives die, so i keep them on cds or dvds, which get scratched very easily, so i keep them on hard drives… etc etc. from what i can see, anything is better than dvds and cds, and anything is better than hard drives (just this morning my hard drive failed) can flash offer stability? if it can’t, then may god help us all. but if it can, windows (or mac os) running off a 5 gb flash drive, then using a hard drive to store the programs would be really nice in the future. a broken hard drive can still show you your programs, but a broken hard drive and windows do not get along (BLANK.sys is missing, please reinstall windows). i think flash will never get beyond that, (or maybe pda drives) with other storage technologys coming out. to solve my problem of storage, hopefully blu-ray dvds in permanent cases will be better.
[quote author=“Anonymous”] it would be fantastic if there was a gigantic push behind flash based technology.
Indeed, there has to be some manufacturers out there that think the same as some of us. If enough demand existed, supply would follow, and competition would keep prices reasonable.
funny… ur going Longhorn :shock: !!! O…K… w/e… I think Microsoft has been trying to put a little more effort into improving their system but only enough to get the people back to their products… which would explain their 82% increase in profits for the last fiscal year :shock: ... but I still feel it is just for show… Windows needs to be taken back down to its core and completely restructered. I admit I LOVE the user-frienliness of it…but…I’m NOT willing to sacrifice FUNCTIONALITY of my O/S and have to reinstall it every 3-5 months.
