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February 6, 2005

Gordon Moore Is A God

My annoyance over having to buy a new machine has officially given way to wonder.

Moore's Law gets a lot of coverage in the technical and popular press, and often is used as a conversational shorthand for "quick, continuous change." However, when you take Moore's out of the abstract (e.g., "Processing power will double every 12 to 18 months") and put it in to the particular (like, oh, a new machine you've just forked out some cash to obtain) the results go from intellectually interesting to jaw-droppingly cool.

Consider. I bought my old (now dead) PowerBook in July 2002. It was Apple's midrange machine at the time, and it cost me about $2500.

My new computer is the same size (15"), with the same form factor and approximate weight (about 5 lbs.) and the same screen resolution. I'm also spending about $2500 (a little less with the educational discount) for this thing.

Now, let's put the machines under the microscope. Consider the following table:

One word: wow. My new machine is, in every measurable way, the superior to its predecessor. In addition to the metrics that existed in 2002 (like processor speed or hard drive space), I can now also take advantage of technologies that just didn't exist a mere 30 months ago (like Bluetooth wireless networking, or a DVD burner that fits in a laptop computer), as well as other innovations that make the product much easier to use (like keyboard backlighting, which is so cool that it almost makes my teeth hurt).

Do cars get this good, this fast? No.
Does anything?

God, I love my industry.

UPDATE, May 13, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined.

Posted by Gavin Shearer at February 6, 2005 4:13 PM. Posted to Geek.

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