andy@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman) (10/21/89)
In article <318@ssp1.idca.tds.philips.nl> roelof@idca.tds.PHILIPS.nl (R. Vuurboom) writes: [Comparing the PC industry with the auto industry:] >Theres another analogy with the automobile industry and thats the rate >at which new models were introduced...in the seventies the rate of >model introduction was reduced (to me the sign of a mature technology). >This (I assume) will also occur in the computer industry at a "certain >point in time". The 70s trend may have been a reduced introduction rate (and I'm not convinced it was; complete redesign rate may have gone down, but the partial revision rate went up), but the 80s trend has been towards an increased model introduction rate. The Japanese (especially Honda) started this with the every three-year complete revisions, and the US automakers have cut a substantial amount of time out of their redesign cycle. It looks to me like the introduction rate increased in the computer industry in the mid 80s. Some of it was start-up (the MIPS folk got the R3000 out the door fairly quickly after the R2000), but even Intel and Motorola got on the bandwagon. That's why the killer micro attack is working. Cray's cycle time is too long. (I'm talking about Seymour.) It's the old "lots of small improvements" vs "infrequent large changes" problem. Both make lots of progress, but at different times. -andy UUCP: {arpa gateways, sun, decwrl, uunet, rutgers}!polya.stanford.edu!andy ARPA: andy@polya.stanford.edu BELLNET: (415) 723-3088
sritacco@hpdml93.HP.COM (Steve Ritacco) (10/27/89)
The point in time when performance will no longer be an issue, is when there is sufficient performance to execute advanced software for any given task. For the secratary with an XT and WordPerfect, OK, but is that configuration providing him/her with the highest level of productivity? Would a nice interactive display oriented environment let her do a better job? We need to drive the cost/mips rate down, so that things like animated 3-D graphics are reasonable on a machine for a secratary, because we can provide him/her with a better user interface! This is what we are driving for!