Maybe I'm just not enough of a hardware junkie, but are a few percentage points difference that big a deal?
I think the big deal is the fact that RDRAM is suppose to be so much better in terms of performance than SDRAM. The very fact that SDRAM matches or beats or loses by so little causes one to wonder why spend the extra $$$ for RDRAM. So, no... in terms of performance only a few percentage points don't matter. But if you look at the overall picture: price, availability, compatbility, APPLCATION.... which technology do you really need?
It doesn't look like the PC133 results were massivly better, but almost all of these tests showed minor performance increases. The article states that the tests were done in the same lab, I'm kind of surprised that no one realized they were getting nearly the same results. If the same group of people did the measurements, I would think that someone would have gone "hey, those numbers look familiar." Hmmm.
Normally I keep up with current stuff like this, but I've never looked much into IPv6... Is there room for backward compability, or is this going to be one of those "please change your ip by august 31st?" type things?
Seems like we've been hearing about IPv6 for forever now.
"Could Amazon.com be an itinerant horde instead of a fixed Central Command Post? Yes. "
This is the quote that got my thinking started. Is this guy just making predictions? or is this what he already sees is going to happen? "The internet's power will move towards the desktop." I guess I'm dissapointed since there is almost no technical detail, so it makes it harder to see how what he's talking about is going to happen. For example, how could an e-commerce site like Amazon move its processing power off onto millions of desktop computers, as he suggests in his article. I'm not interested in different possible methods in general, but the way he makes it sound. He makes it sound like the next (and most logical) step in the future of the internet is to move server power into desktop power. So would that mean that internet servers would just become storage houses? (which I think he didn't really cover is what happens to our "current day" servers) If that's the case, then isn't considerable power still going to be needed to retrieve the information from these storage houses? Or will it become the responsibility of the client's desktop to specifiy exactly what it wants from the storage house? If the latter is the case, then how does the client know what to specify?
His mentions on how files should not have to be named, and the notion that all files have names is ridiclous. His analogy was if you have 3 dogs you name them, but if you have 10,000 cattle you don't. Okay. So now is he saying that filenames are obselete, or is file designation obselete? It seems to me that you have to be able to designate a file in some manner, if not by a name, by some other attribute.
See this is what I mean, with no technical detail, I'm having problems understanding where he is coming from on some of his idea.
So that's why I began to wonder if he's just predicting what could happen. If he's predicting how far into the future are we talking? 1 year? (no) 5 years? (bah...) 5-10 years? maybe...
On another note, however, the beginning of the article got my attention quickly. I'm very much in agreement that people do not want to be connected to computers, they want to be connected to information. I think this is very true, and this was the basis of his article. We have to find a way to get people to forget they USING a computer. The computers of today (software and possibly hardware) simply can't do that. I really liked his book analogies. When was the last time you had to think about how to "use" a book?
"I think Transmeta have a damn fine product, and Intel should really watch out if they don't want to lose a big part of the mobile market (hmmm, only the paranoid survive anyone?)... "
You've made some fine points. I wasn't aware that the northbridge was integrated into the cruose. That is a nice move. However, regardless of how fine of a product transmeta puts out, if Intel can keep this "SpeedStep" technology sounding As Good(tm) As Cruose, then Transmeta is at a disadvantage. It becomes a marketing game much like anything with Microsoft. Who cares if their product is better (or usually not), their Marketing department can make you think its just as good as anything else that is out.
Transmeta never WANTED to be a "production machine".
That quote is not referring to the word production as in a factory sense. They mean production as in producing notebooks based on the chip for the general consumer market. A product exists in two basic cycles, (research and) development and production.
What the article is saying is that IBM has a laptop design in development for the Cruose, but might not take it to production (as in producing).
"Intel's Speedstep technology allows lower clock speed and lower wattage. Surely what Transmeta is offering is not radically different to that. It will all depend on pricing," he said."
This goes to show how much Mr. Brown knows about the technical aspect. He seems to make it sound like all Transmeta has done is make a slimmed-down version of a Pentium. He is oblivous to how the Cruose works, and why it runs at lower power consumption levels than an Intel chip.
You've made a point I didn't think about (and I'm not sure if anyone else has either).... We are all assuming that the attack occured through the internet. (Again, this is IF the attack actually occured, something which I still don't believe is so). It could have been someone on the inside that did it, why does it have to be someone on the outside? What if it was some crazy college intern they hired.... who knows.
Call me crazy, but a quote from the Gross guy said something like "it shows the potential hackers have to do damage to nasa systems." Okay, now comes the CRAZY idea. Don't hook the vital systems to the internet.
Now, since I'm sure that statement is over simplified, why not make sure systems can't be traced back to the internet.
Somehow I doubt this ACTUALLY happened. Why would NASA have its shuttle monitoring systems networked in a way that an outside connection could be made to them? even if it meant getting into one system, then another, then another, and finially whatever this article is claiming they interfered with.....how many people know how those systems are networked?
You're the first person to post who has obviously read the article.
Its a trend I only noticed recently on slashdot. You only read the paragraph posted on the front page, draw your conclusion immiedately and then proceed to backup your point with no information about the rest of the actual article what-so-ever.
Javascript is buggy? How do you figure? I've seen a lot of Javascript with bugs in it... but not in Javascript itself...I've seen IE mis-interpret code and introduce bugs, but Javascript itself is clean.
Hold on a second. In only the first paragraph does it say "colleges should ban telnet and FTP." If you read the rest of the article its only discussing how web servers can track personal information, and we shouldn't rely on technology to protect our privacy. It seems to me, someone is using a "ban something" approach to just get heard.
I was expecting the article to discuss reasons telnet and FTP are bad, instead I read about how a web server can log what you type in a search box.
I really with the slashdot editors would stop just putting 10% of the story on the front page. Before you go off ranting and raving BXXP won't replace HTTP, or that it is useless because it never will, READ THE ARTICLE.
"When you're building a protocol, you have to decide how you're going to do error- message reporting and how you're going to handle the size of objects"...."BXXP solves all of that for you. Ninety percent of the [work] is done"
BXXP is more about just replacing HTTP. It is more like a protocol framework.
"BXXP is essentially a tool kit that developers can use to quickly create protocols"
The people that are ranting and raving that we don't need more protocols are giving this a limited view. Did you ever stop to think that the internet is more than just http and ftp? POP3, IRC, ICQ, Napster, etc... everything has its OWN protocol. What BXXP is going to help get rid of, is using HTTP for more than what it was designed to do... which was transfer Hypertext documents. Sure HTTP can transfer entire files now (in both directions) but that's not what it was orginially designed for. I wish I could give a better example, but it really makes sense.
You're implying that BXXP's only purpose (or ability) is to replace HTTP. The article clearly states that replacing HTTP is just one of things it can do. BXXP provides a new way to create protocols, so things like Gnutella, napster, and freenet could be developed more quickly.
So yes users have a very good chance of seeing BXXP in action, however, I think you are correct in that it won't replace HTTP (yet).
how does this overcome the inherent limitation in getting data from main memory
If you read the information they have on their site, the card is not ment to be a "second general use processor." They are to offload intensive computing tasks. So it'd be just like a graphics card. The main CPU sends it something to chew on and it does it. What does the main CPU send? Probably a section of code, and some inital data. Then the Processor card plays with that code for a while, and returns the results.
So it works like another PCI card (as far as the host system is concerned), it just has a ton of power to itself.
Yeah... sure..now there aren't... but isn't 2030 just around the corner? I know I'm off by a few years, but according good ol' star trek...we're going to have warp drive soon.
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe I'm just not enough of a hardware junkie, but are a few percentage points difference that big a deal?
I think the big deal is the fact that RDRAM is suppose to be so much better in terms of performance than SDRAM. The very fact that SDRAM matches or beats or loses by so little causes one to wonder why spend the extra $$$ for RDRAM. So, no... in terms of performance only a few percentage points don't matter. But if you look at the overall picture: price, availability, compatbility, APPLCATION.... which technology do you really need?
---
It doesn't look like the PC133 results were massivly better, but almost all of these tests showed minor performance increases. The article states that the tests were done in the same lab, I'm kind of surprised that no one realized they were getting nearly the same results. If the same group of people did the measurements, I would think that someone would have gone "hey, those numbers look familiar." Hmmm.
---
Normally I keep up with current stuff like this, but I've never looked much into IPv6... Is there room for backward compability, or is this going to be one of those "please change your ip by august 31st?" type things?
Seems like we've been hearing about IPv6 for forever now.
---
"Could Amazon.com be an itinerant horde instead of a fixed Central Command Post? Yes. "
This is the quote that got my thinking started. Is this guy just making predictions? or is this what he already sees is going to happen? "The internet's power will move towards the desktop." I guess I'm dissapointed since there is almost no technical detail, so it makes it harder to see how what he's talking about is going to happen. For example, how could an e-commerce site like Amazon move its processing power off onto millions of desktop computers, as he suggests in his article. I'm not interested in different possible methods in general, but the way he makes it sound. He makes it sound like the next (and most logical) step in the future of the internet is to move server power into desktop power. So would that mean that internet servers would just become storage houses? (which I think he didn't really cover is what happens to our "current day" servers) If that's the case, then isn't considerable power still going to be needed to retrieve the information from these storage houses? Or will it become the responsibility of the client's desktop to specifiy exactly what it wants from the storage house? If the latter is the case, then how does the client know what to specify?
His mentions on how files should not have to be named, and the notion that all files have names is ridiclous. His analogy was if you have 3 dogs you name them, but if you have 10,000 cattle you don't. Okay. So now is he saying that filenames are obselete, or is file designation obselete? It seems to me that you have to be able to designate a file in some manner, if not by a name, by some other attribute.
See this is what I mean, with no technical detail, I'm having problems understanding where he is coming from on some of his idea.
So that's why I began to wonder if he's just predicting what could happen. If he's predicting how far into the future are we talking? 1 year? (no) 5 years? (bah...) 5-10 years? maybe...
On another note, however, the beginning of the article got my attention quickly. I'm very much in agreement that people do not want to be connected to computers, they want to be connected to information. I think this is very true, and this was the basis of his article. We have to find a way to get people to forget they USING a computer. The computers of today (software and possibly hardware) simply can't do that. I really liked his book analogies. When was the last time you had to think about how to "use" a book?
---
"I think Transmeta have a damn fine product, and Intel should really watch out if they don't want to lose a big part of the mobile market (hmmm, only the paranoid survive anyone?)... "
You've made some fine points. I wasn't aware that the northbridge was integrated into the cruose. That is a nice move. However, regardless of how fine of a product transmeta puts out, if Intel can keep this "SpeedStep" technology sounding As Good(tm) As Cruose, then Transmeta is at a disadvantage. It becomes a marketing game much like anything with Microsoft. Who cares if their product is better (or usually not), their Marketing department can make you think its just as good as anything else that is out.
---
Second to last question on the Slashdot FAQ.
---
Transmeta never WANTED to be a "production machine".
That quote is not referring to the word production as in a factory sense. They mean production as in producing notebooks based on the chip for the general consumer market. A product exists in two basic cycles, (research and) development and production.
What the article is saying is that IBM has a laptop design in development for the Cruose, but might not take it to production (as in producing).
---
Did anyone else find the Intel Pop-Up ads to be intersting addition to this story?
I found it rather humerous..... and my first take was that the story was posted on an Intel hosted page....
---
"Intel's Speedstep technology allows lower clock speed and lower wattage. Surely what Transmeta is offering is not radically different to that. It will all depend on pricing," he said."
This goes to show how much Mr. Brown knows about the technical aspect. He seems to make it sound like all Transmeta has done is make a slimmed-down version of a Pentium. He is oblivous to how the Cruose works, and why it runs at lower power consumption levels than an Intel chip.
---
You've made a point I didn't think about (and I'm not sure if anyone else has either).... We are all assuming that the attack occured through the internet. (Again, this is IF the attack actually occured, something which I still don't believe is so). It could have been someone on the inside that did it, why does it have to be someone on the outside? What if it was some crazy college intern they hired.... who knows.
---
ALSO it is nice to see a news source get it right
You didn't read the article, did you?
---
Call me crazy, but a quote from the Gross guy said something like "it shows the potential hackers have to do damage to nasa systems." Okay, now comes the CRAZY idea. Don't hook the vital systems to the internet.
Now, since I'm sure that statement is over simplified, why not make sure systems can't be traced back to the internet.
Somehow I doubt this ACTUALLY happened. Why would NASA have its shuttle monitoring systems networked in a way that an outside connection could be made to them? even if it meant getting into one system, then another, then another, and finially whatever this article is claiming they interfered with.....how many people know how those systems are networked?
---
You're the first person to post who has obviously read the article.
Its a trend I only noticed recently on slashdot. You only read the paragraph posted on the front page, draw your conclusion immiedately and then proceed to backup your point with no information about the rest of the actual article what-so-ever.
Its just life I guess.
---
Javascript is buggy? How do you figure? I've seen a lot of Javascript with bugs in it... but not in Javascript itself...I've seen IE mis-interpret code and introduce bugs, but Javascript itself is clean.
---
Hold on a second. In only the first paragraph does it say "colleges should ban telnet and FTP." If you read the rest of the article its only discussing how web servers can track personal information, and we shouldn't rely on technology to protect our privacy. It seems to me, someone is using a "ban something" approach to just get heard.
I was expecting the article to discuss reasons telnet and FTP are bad, instead I read about how a web server can log what you type in a search box.
---
This guy is in the U.K.
---
http://www.chaltech.com/images/atx_large.jpg
I like the nature approach. Makes me wonder if these motherboards are really "rock solid"...
:)
---
I really with the slashdot editors would stop just putting 10% of the story on the front page. Before you go off ranting and raving BXXP won't replace HTTP, or that it is useless because it never will, READ THE ARTICLE.
"When you're building a protocol, you have to decide how you're going to do error- message reporting and how you're going to handle the size of objects"...."BXXP solves all of that for you. Ninety percent of the [work] is done"
BXXP is more about just replacing HTTP. It is more like a protocol framework.
"BXXP is essentially a tool kit that developers can use to quickly create protocols"
The people that are ranting and raving that we don't need more protocols are giving this a limited view. Did you ever stop to think that the internet is more than just http and ftp? POP3, IRC, ICQ, Napster, etc... everything has its OWN protocol. What BXXP is going to help get rid of, is using HTTP for more than what it was designed to do... which was transfer Hypertext documents. Sure HTTP can transfer entire files now (in both directions) but that's not what it was orginially designed for. I wish I could give a better example, but it really makes sense.
---
The only purpose of BXXP is not to replace HTTP. It is just one of things that BXXP can do. BXXP is a protocol framework.
---
You're implying that BXXP's only purpose (or ability) is to replace HTTP. The article clearly states that replacing HTTP is just one of things it can do. BXXP provides a new way to create protocols, so things like Gnutella, napster, and freenet could be developed more quickly.
So yes users have a very good chance of seeing BXXP in action, however, I think you are correct in that it won't replace HTTP (yet).
---
how does this overcome the inherent limitation in getting data from main memory
If you read the information they have on their site, the card is not ment to be a "second general use processor." They are to offload intensive computing tasks. So it'd be just like a graphics card. The main CPU sends it something to chew on and it does it. What does the main CPU send? Probably a section of code, and some inital data. Then the Processor card plays with that code for a while, and returns the results.
So it works like another PCI card (as far as the host system is concerned), it just has a ton of power to itself.
---
>Too bad most traditional PCs don't support either yet.
No traditional PCs don't, but servers do. Like the Dell Poweredge 4400 and almost all of Dell's enterprise servers.
Yeah they are pricy, but doesn't this much computing power usually require money anyway?
---
Did anyone else read the whitepaper and press release on their site, and find yourself going "huh?"
I don't it, myself. All I read was how current development tools suck, and that the web is like a mainframe.
Where is this talk of integrating your computer with the internet?
---
the link is probably fine, the hostname isn't resolving.... at least that's what is happening for me.
---
Its an expensive vacation, but no crowds...
:)
Yeah... sure..now there aren't... but isn't 2030 just around the corner? I know I'm off by a few years, but according good ol' star trek...we're going to have warp drive soon.
---