If you buy the fastest new computer, how long will it last? The hard drive should be expected to be replaced in 3 to 5 years, not because of failure, but to prevent failure and because it will rendered too small by new software and new hard drives to go with the new software. The video may get too slow for you in about 5 years. The CD drive will likely fail within 3 years. (The manufacturers have dropped the warranty coverage from the previous 3 years to 1 year recently, if that's any indication). Floppy drives are no big deal if they fail. The case and power supply, if of sufficient quality should last 5 to 10 years. The monitor will probably last 10 years, give or take. Memory will usually last a lifetime as should the motherboard and processor, if the fans keep working and you make sure the fans, cooling vents, and passages are never blocked. These estimates are assuming moderate use. Your mileage may vary. So unless you seldom use your computer, you will probably be talking to someone who repairs, upgrades, or sells computers within 5 years after purchasing a new computer. (Did I mention that I repair, upgrade, and sell computers?)

All of these time estimates apply to the fastest or the slowest current new computer model. So what should you buy? To answer that let's look at computer history. As one of my history teachers in high school liked to say, "He who fails to learn history will be condemned to repeat it."

In 1990, if you bought the fastest computer, if it was still working without upgrades, and it's possible that it could, you would have a computer with a 486 processor operating at 25 MHz, with a 150 Mb hard drive, a 16 bit VGA video card with 512 Kb memory, 4 Mb RAM, a 14" VGA monitor with 1024x728 resolution. (The video card would limit it to 256 colors). The computer would be running MS DOS 3.3 and MS Windows 3.0. (The 150 Mb hard drive would be too small to fit Windows 95 or 98 on it comfortably, and they were not yet available in 1990 anyway.) You would have paid about $5200 for it. If you had bought the next one down, by 1995 it would have been just as obsolete, but it would have cost about $2000 less For either one Windows 95 would have been too big to fit on the hard drive with any but the most basic functionality and the amount of RAM would not run Windows 95 well anyway. So there are two examples. The fastest computers in 1990, obsolete by 1995. They would still do what they were designed to, just don't expect to find much new software that would run on them even 5 years after they were made. By the year 2000 their abilities would draw stares and ridicule from anyone who doesn't appreciate historical relics. What would you have if you had bought a computer 2 or 3 steps down from the fastest? Well, it would have gone obsolete about six months, that's six months not years, earlier but would have cost only about $1800, instead of $3200 or $5200. That's $1400 or $3400 less. That's enough to buy two computers instead of just one. No, don't get two $1800 computers. Not at the same time anyway. Get one first. Then, after 3 to 5 years, retire, sell, or give away the first one and buy a new one.

In 1995, Pentium had arrived. In 1997 you could get a Pentium 100MHz for about $1200, with 8 Mb RAM, 850 Mb hard drive, 64 bit PCI graphics with 2 Mb DRAM, a 6X CD ROM drive, a sound card, speakers, 28.8 fax/modem, floppy drive, mouse, keyboard, a 15" monitor with 1280x1024 resolution, running Windows 95 with enough memory and hard drive space to run it quite well. That's instead of having an obsolete $5200 computer after 5 years, you will have had, successively, an up to date computer renewed every three to four years, for a total cost of $3800, after 7 years. In 1997 you could have bought a Pentium 100 that would have cost only about $1200, for a total of $5000, still less than that $5200 computer was in 1990, and much more up to date. These prices were all with a monitor. You probably could have bought a computer without a monitor one of those times, using your old monitor, saving you another $200, approximately.

So why do they make $5000 computers? For power users who need them, or for those who have more money than they need and just want them. This is a free market and you can buy whatever you can afford. Heck, if you have credit, you can even buy what you can't afford. But using credit, you may find that the bill lasts longer than the computer.

Now let's fast forward ten years. What will computers be in the year 2010? Well, there is, of course no way to know for sure. But here's my best guess:

An Octavium or Decathalon 100 GHz processor, a 5000Gb hard drive, 8Gb SDRAM, floppy drive (probably dual capacity such as 1.44Mb and 720Mb), a 19" wireless flat panel 2560 x 2560 resolution SVGA monitor, keyboard, mouse, speakers, sound card, 512 bit video card with 1Gb SDRAM memory, ADSL modem, 75X read/write CD drive with DVD, microphone, and full voice control interactive operating system requiring a minimum 1000Gb hard drive, and it might sell for $2000.

(Any unauthorized use of any names or product descriptions, past, present, or future, is entirely unintentional.)

What are the choices in compuers?
 
 

jv