Comments on: When MIPS are free http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/ A daily round table on the tech industry with experts and callers from all over the globe. Join us as we pick apart the news and get to the meat of what\'s happening out there. Fri, 09 Jan 2009 04:00:29 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: » The Week in Geek - Dec. 4, 2007The Week in Geek http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-73452 » The Week in Geek - Dec. 4, 2007The Week in Geek Mon, 04 Dec 2006 18:20:51 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-73452 [...] When MIPs Are FreeComputing power is often measured in MIPS (million instructions per second). Chris ‘Long Tail’ Anderson & Good Morning Silicon Valley share word that we’ve recently reached a consumer processing point of a penny a MIP. In the article above, blogger Alec Saunders does a great job summing up the advance. Saunders points out that in 1977, a DEC Vax 11/780 was a 1 MIPS minicomputer, and the Cray-1 supercomputer delivered 150 MIPS at a price only governments & the wealthiest of firms could afford. Just 7 years ago, a Pentium III/500 delivered 800 MIPS. A year later the Playstation 2 brought 6000 MIPS along side your TV. If you’ve got a Blackberry Pearl, or Nokia N93 smartphone you now carry 2000-era desktop processor speeds in your pocket. Saunders writes. “If the current trend holds true, and we can each carry 20,000 MIPS of processing power in the palms of our hands by 2012, what will we do with that power?” It’s worth speculation. Moore’s Law means today’s strategists have to be fortune telling futurists, planning for technical disruptions that are today seem impossible. [...] [...] When MIPs Are FreeComputing power is often measured in MIPS (million instructions per second). Chris ‘Long Tail’ Anderson & Good Morning Silicon Valley share word that we’ve recently reached a consumer processing point of a penny a MIP. In the article above, blogger Alec Saunders does a great job summing up the advance. Saunders points out that in 1977, a DEC Vax 11/780 was a 1 MIPS minicomputer, and the Cray-1 supercomputer delivered 150 MIPS at a price only governments & the wealthiest of firms could afford. Just 7 years ago, a Pentium III/500 delivered 800 MIPS. A year later the Playstation 2 brought 6000 MIPS along side your TV. If you’ve got a Blackberry Pearl, or Nokia N93 smartphone you now carry 2000-era desktop processor speeds in your pocket. Saunders writes. “If the current trend holds true, and we can each carry 20,000 MIPS of processing power in the palms of our hands by 2012, what will we do with that power?” It’s worth speculation. Moore’s Law means today’s strategists have to be fortune telling futurists, planning for technical disruptions that are today seem impossible. [...]

]]> By: Alec http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71388 Alec Thu, 30 Nov 2006 03:35:14 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71388 Saad, the bandwidth problem is a different problem from processor speed. Spectrum isn't like silicon. In silicon you can make the die larger, or pack two or more cores side by side. Spectrum is fixed. Jumping into higher frequency spectrum (say 5Ghz vs 2.4Ghz) increases the amount of data you can carry, but at the expense of higher power requirements and decreased range. Bandwidth is likely to continue to lag storage and processing speed, in my opinion, for the foreseeable future. Saad, the bandwidth problem is a different problem from processor speed. Spectrum isn’t like silicon. In silicon you can make the die larger, or pack two or more cores side by side. Spectrum is fixed. Jumping into higher frequency spectrum (say 5Ghz vs 2.4Ghz) increases the amount of data you can carry, but at the expense of higher power requirements and decreased range.

Bandwidth is likely to continue to lag storage and processing speed, in my opinion, for the foreseeable future.

]]> By: Peter Principle » Blog Archive » A cent per MIPS? http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71379 Peter Principle » Blog Archive » A cent per MIPS? Thu, 30 Nov 2006 02:38:49 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71379 [...] In The Rise of “Freeconomics”, Chris Anderson at The Long Tail claims that we have recently passed a milestone: 20,000 MIPS of processing power for $200, or a penny-per-MIPS. He goes on to argue that when technology becomes cheap enough to be effectively free, it radically changes how we use those resources. Of course, the cheapest computer still cost real money. And even though that 20 GIPS claim is a bit suspect, it’s clear that processing power has increased dramatically in the past few decades. Alec Saunders tries to give some context in When MIPS are free: [...] [...] In The Rise of “Freeconomics”, Chris Anderson at The Long Tail claims that we have recently passed a milestone: 20,000 MIPS of processing power for $200, or a penny-per-MIPS. He goes on to argue that when technology becomes cheap enough to be effectively free, it radically changes how we use those resources. Of course, the cheapest computer still cost real money. And even though that 20 GIPS claim is a bit suspect, it’s clear that processing power has increased dramatically in the past few decades. Alec Saunders tries to give some context in When MIPS are free: [...]

]]> By: Saad Shakhshir http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71313 Saad Shakhshir Wed, 29 Nov 2006 22:11:19 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-71313 I have to disagree with you Alec. Even in the mobile space, I do not see the long term trend going towards having the intelligence lie on the device. The trend is clearly towards having thin clients and centralized databases and application servers. Why should I pay for having a complicated piece of software that I have to maintain on my device when I can have the same functionality through a web connection to a server somewhere? That server holds all my data and guarantees me a consistent experience over a variety of devices. It also means I don't have to replicate the software on the various devices that I own, like my mobile phone, my laptop, my desktop, etc. Saying that mobile bandwidth will never get to Gigabit speeds when you have just clearly pointed out how Moore's Law isn't slowing down, is just inconsistent. Ten years ago we were all on 28.8k modems, and that's if we were lucky. Now 10Mb/s is easily accessible, a 500-fold increase. Never say never, especially when it comes to technology. I have to disagree with you Alec. Even in the mobile space, I do not see the long term trend going towards having the intelligence lie on the device. The trend is clearly towards having thin clients and centralized databases and application servers. Why should I pay for having a complicated piece of software that I have to maintain on my device when I can have the same functionality through a web connection to a server somewhere? That server holds all my data and guarantees me a consistent experience over a variety of devices. It also means I don’t have to replicate the software on the various devices that I own, like my mobile phone, my laptop, my desktop, etc. Saying that mobile bandwidth will never get to Gigabit speeds when you have just clearly pointed out how Moore’s Law isn’t slowing down, is just inconsistent. Ten years ago we were all on 28.8k modems, and that’s if we were lucky. Now 10Mb/s is easily accessible, a 500-fold increase. Never say never, especially when it comes to technology.

]]> By: Alec http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70682 Alec Tue, 28 Nov 2006 12:00:08 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70682 Moshe, I think you guys are both still thinking desktop. Your E61 is a remarkably powerful device. It's the equivalent (in terms of processing power) of a 2001 era PC. What you're doing with that is 2001 era client-server computing (at least for email). Would you seriously replace all the capabilities of that device with an over the air substitute? It may be true that high speed fibre to the home is becoming real, but mobile bandwidth isn't at GigE speeds and may never get there. Moshe, I think you guys are both still thinking desktop. Your E61 is a remarkably powerful device. It’s the equivalent (in terms of processing power) of a 2001 era PC. What you’re doing with that is 2001 era client-server computing (at least for email). Would you seriously replace all the capabilities of that device with an over the air substitute? It may be true that high speed fibre to the home is becoming real, but mobile bandwidth isn’t at GigE speeds and may never get there.

]]> By: Moshe Maeir http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70594 Moshe Maeir Tue, 28 Nov 2006 06:51:50 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70594 Alec, I tend to agree with Salim. With the advent of web applications such as the suite of Google applications the user doesn't need a smart terminal! Reminds me of the days when I started out in computing in the '70s and every time we wanted to do something - it was off to the computing center with a pile of punch cards. The IBM mainframe did all the processing. It is almost the same today, hosted web apps replace the mainframe. Due to the ubiquity of broadband - I can access the server from anywhere, no neesd to shlepp over to the computing center :-) Personally I don't carry around a laptop anymore, just my Nokia E61 which gives me great email and web access, sure it is "smart" compared to the punch card terminal, but it is still a "dumb terminal" working off the web servers. If connectivity is "free" why would I want to carry my data and applications around with me? Alec, I tend to agree with Salim. With the advent of web applications such as the suite of Google applications the user doesn’t need a smart terminal! Reminds me of the days when I started out in computing in the ’70s and every time we wanted to do something - it was off to the computing center with a pile of punch cards. The IBM mainframe did all the processing. It is almost the same today, hosted web apps replace the mainframe. Due to the ubiquity of broadband - I can access the server from anywhere, no neesd to shlepp over to the computing center :-)

Personally I don’t carry around a laptop anymore, just my Nokia E61 which gives me great email and web access, sure it is “smart” compared to the punch card terminal, but it is still a “dumb terminal” working off the web servers. If connectivity is “free” why would I want to carry my data and applications around with me?

]]> By: Alec http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70553 Alec Tue, 28 Nov 2006 04:21:35 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70553 Hey Salim -- nice to hear from you! I think what you've described is a usability flaw in the current generation of technology, rather than a fundamental argument against decentralized processing. In a world where storage is effectively infinite (heck, I've got a terabyte of disk around the place right now...), and processors are cheap, connectivity, even with gigE to my doorstep, is still expensive. As the vendor supplying all those "free" services, I will want to push as much of the expense to the user as I possibly can. Hey Salim — nice to hear from you! I think what you’ve described is a usability flaw in the current generation of technology, rather than a fundamental argument against decentralized processing. In a world where storage is effectively infinite (heck, I’ve got a terabyte of disk around the place right now…), and processors are cheap, connectivity, even with gigE to my doorstep, is still expensive. As the vendor supplying all those “free” services, I will want to push as much of the expense to the user as I possibly can.

]]> By: Salim AbiEzzi http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70532 Salim AbiEzzi Tue, 28 Nov 2006 02:34:56 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70532 I disagree with the conclusion that free processing power will automatically mean a reduction in centralized services. Another dynamic that is starting to occur is the advent of gigabit pipes to the premise, which will render centralized services/storage as accessible as local disks. This dynamic opens the door to offloading all headache associated with maintaining a PC (software installation and upgrades, virus protection, spywear, backups, etc) to centralized services that remote the whole UI to HDTVs and productivity high-res monitors at the premise; not even the browser is running locally. This approach has the added advantage of location transparency of services and user data including digital memories (photos, video, etc). I disagree with the conclusion that free processing power will automatically mean a reduction in centralized services. Another dynamic that is starting to occur is the advent of gigabit pipes to the premise, which will render centralized services/storage as accessible as local disks. This dynamic opens the door to offloading all headache associated with maintaining a PC (software installation and upgrades, virus protection, spywear, backups, etc) to centralized services that remote the whole UI to HDTVs and productivity high-res monitors at the premise; not even the browser is running locally. This approach has the added advantage of location transparency of services and user data including digital memories (photos, video, etc).

]]> By: Christopher Small http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70450 Christopher Small Mon, 27 Nov 2006 20:43:10 +0000 http://saunderslog.com/2006/11/27/when-mips-are-free/#comment-70450 "In 1977, Digital Equipment’s Vax 11/780 was a 1 MIPS minicomputer [...]" In fact, the VAX 11/780 executed about 500,000 instructions in a second. This was not widely known at the time, even inside of DEC. http://portal.acm.org/ft_gateway.cfm?id=285946&type=pdf&coll=&dl=acm “In 1977, Digital Equipment’s Vax 11/780 was a 1 MIPS minicomputer [...]” In fact, the VAX 11/780 executed about 500,000 instructions in a second. This was not widely known at the time, even inside of DEC. http://portal.acm.org/ft_gateway.cfm?id=285946&type=pdf&coll=&dl=acm

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