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Raw Bytes Computer News KPBX FM 91.1 Radio National Public Radio Network Frank Delaney Producer Broadcast on Thursday Morning 7:35 AM During Morning Edition Support Public Radio ! The Theater Of the Mind |
In computer news this week 12/062006 |
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Supersizing that Christmas computer
– be thankful for market acceptance - The deals
on computers this Christmas are truly amazing. For those of us that remember
spending thousands of dollars for computers decades ago, today prices and
what you get for them are unbelievable. I’m
looking at a complete low-end Dell
system here on my screen for $ 499, that’s a complete computer
system with a 17” flatscreen monitor, mouse
and keyboard, an AMD Athlon processor, 512 Megs of ram, 80 Gig hard disk,
internet connectivity, and a free upgrade to Windows vista. When we
old fogies talk about how expensive computers used to be as opposed to what
they are now – let me use this Dell system as an example. ( Oh no, he’s computer geezering
again .... ) Here you
have a complete computer system, monitor, computer, keyboard, mouse,
operating system, lots of bundled software, internet access, and the whole
ball of wax for $ 499. I can
remember buying one of the first hard disks – A Seagate 20 meg hard
disk, at a dealer cost – for around $ 800 back in the late
1980’s. To do the
math for you, it would take 50 of those 20 meg harddisks
to equal one gigabyte, and this Dell computer has an 80 Gigabyte hard
disk. That’s 4000 times the
data storage !!!!!!! Plus you get a whole computer attached
to the hard disk. Every
time I hear people complain about the costs of computers and peripherals
today, I have no sympathy. Back in
the 80’s, personal computers were just computers, business machines and
you did accounting, word processing, and spread sheets on them. But they did
have modems in them and you could access Bulletin Boards and information
services like Compuserve. And they finally caught on with not just business,
but the home marketplace, and then prices started plummeting. Today,
personal computers have become primarily entertainment and communication
devices, and you can also do business things on them as an aside. So with
computers so ridiculously cheap, in buying computers you can do crazy things
– like supersizing !. Supersize the RAM – get a gig of ram, or even 2 gigs. Supersize the hard disk size – have you seen the
file size of a 6 Megapixel photo? – they eat
up hard disk space quicker than starved sled dogs chow down Purina. Supersize the processing power – I’d go with one of the
new Intel Dual Core processors, and in the Dell product line that means you
have to buy a different model, but that’s ok. Now
we’re into their Dimension
Line, that starts at $ 799 but you get the newest Intel processor, and a
full gig of memory. And this
comes with a supersized 160 Gb hard disk, and a
19” Supersized monitor, and a free upgrade to
windows vista. So this
makes for a much better computer system, supersized,
for just $ 300 more. And most of all – don’t forget the
applications software – like Microsoft Office Basic -
to go with this, IF you
want to do any business things – on the side of course. For Raw Bytes This is Frank Delaney (C) 2006 MTA Micro
Technology Associates http://www.mtamicro.com/kpbx.html PO Box 31522 Spokane, Wa 99223-1522 (509)624-7230 |
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