[JoeSchem]

The interesting thing about Moore's Law is that it seems to have been suspended by bloatware.

I use the same word processor program I used ten years ago. The new machine is ten times faster and has ten times the memory and storage capacity of the old machine.

However, the new machine is not ten times faster, or ten times better. While I can certainly pick up 'obsolete' machines for the cheap, no one is making new machines that can do what my old one did for one-tenth the cost. Indeed, to do exactly what I do now with my current machine, I'd have to spend just as much -- though two or three Moore generations have passed since I bought my last machine.

Is this 'running twice as fast to stay in the same place' what Moore had in mind?

[ctdonath2]

You're not staying in place with the new machine. If you really want to buy a machine to run your old word processor, drop by the local used-computer store and pick up a complete system for $50. The new machine "for the same price" will do far more, like video editing and VCD burning - not possible on your 10-year-old box.

Just because you don't use new capabilities doesn't mean new machines are aren't more capable.

[ctdonath2]

(Typed faster than I think...)

They're not selling new machines at 1/10th the price because people don't want them. It's been tried. People want to play Napstered .MP3s and watch the latest LotR trailers and play Final Fantasy X. There isn't an adequate market for cheap machines running at a ten-year-old performance level. Moreso, there is a critical mass for productivity (CPU, keyboard, monitor, ...), and raising that productivity level by 10 costs far less than 10x the critical-mass cost: 1/10th the performance costs roughly 1/2 the price to make, so why not pay just twice as much to get ten times the performance? The extra power is only a fraction of the total cost; the machine still costs the same to assemble, advertise & ship.