State of the Mac in 2020

[Mr. Anderson]

Ok, this will be interesting and anyone going to it in MWNY be sure to report back - far future speculation on the world of computing is totally crazy, but just the prospect of a highly parallel 100 GHz Apple makes me drool

Its under the Keynote info

Feature Presentation

D

 

[coolocity]

hmm

I remember reading a post about time travel, wouldn't mind bringing one of those puppies back with me. Of course, I could just go to 2025 and get it for really cheap 100 ghz...

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Re: hmm

Originally posted by coolocity
I remember reading a post about time travel, wouldn't mind bringing one of those puppies back with me. Of course, I could just go to 2025 and get it for really cheap 100 ghz...

You'd be assuming your money would be good? And with inflation a TiPB equivalent might run you 20k. But then again, if you had time travel, money would be a trivial matter......

 

[coolocity]

good point

Yeah, but knowing me I'd mess something up while I was there, forever altering the space/time continum (sp?) But hey, just realized I'll still be around in 2020. Weee.

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Re: good point

Originally posted by coolocity
But hey, just realized I'll still be around in 2020. Weee.

If you're not unlucky.....I'd like to be around as well, I'd be 56, well within reach

 

[coolocity]

well, now that I think about it

I hope this isn't like those really junky movies from the 70's and 80's where they had all these cool concepts that they thought we would have by 2000, and don't. My prediction - Proboblly 10ghz max, and NO PCs!

 

[Geert]

Re: well, now that I think about it

Originally posted by coolocity
I hope this isn't like those really junky movies from the 70's and 80's where they had all these cool concepts that they thought we would have by 2000, and don't. My prediction - Proboblly 10ghz max, and NO PCs!

Too good to be true.
No PC, no PC, no PC, ......
hehehe. Talking about an utopia

 

[McFreggle]

Re: Re: good point

Originally posted by dukestreet


If you're not unlucky.....I'd like to be around as well, I'd be 56, well within reach

Maybe I can start a poll... 'How old will you be in 2020?'

k.

 

[coolocity]

Re: Re: well, now that I think about it

Originally posted by Geert


Too good to be true.
No PC, no PC, no PC, ......
hehehe. Talking about an utopia

But.. if do away with the PC, what will macs compete with? People will start saying there is a monopoly just because it's the only thing around. Maybe PCs will max out in performance in 2010 and we can compete with a sick dying PC from then on.

An ignorant PC user with a sick dying PC running Windodw 2k5 : "My computer is 15 years old, and I can't switch to a mac.. nobody makes software for those damn things!"

Some things will never change

 

[King Cobra]

Originally posted by coolocity
My prediction - Proboblly 10ghz max, and NO PCs!

I think you may be right. And I made a graph, basing Macintosh computers with the slowest processor going from 1984 at x=0 to 2020 at x=26.

The x-coordinate at the top left is set for MacWorld San Fransisco 2020, and the y is the slowest processor speed in MHz. That means that if the iBooks or such have this speed, the PowerMacs may just have 10GHz. Have a look.

Edit: The graph shows processor speeds for 2010. 2020 coming shortly.

 

[King Cobra]

I revived the graph for 2020.

You'll be surprised how fast processors might be by then; it may be more than twice as fast as 100GHz!

For those of you who can't tell what the coordinate is, it's (36, 255116).

 

[coolocity]

Nice graph, but you should label the X axis "PC"

 

[King Cobra]

Originally posted by coolocity
Nice graph, but you should label the X axis "PC"

LMGDAO! I used the function y=1.4^(x+1). I could lie and say that it was the peecee function, then I would make a Mac function that booms after x=18.

 

[cb911]

theres no doubt that clock speeds will be crazy in another 20 years.

and King Cobra, what does LMGDAO mean? i've seen lots of abbreviations like that around here and i still can't figure out what it means. it isn't some sort of secret code is it?

 

[coolocity]

Originally posted by cb911
theres no doubt that clock speeds will be crazy in another 20 years.

and King Cobra, what does LMGDAO mean? i've seen lots of abbreviations like that around here and i still can't figure out what it means. it isn't some sort of secret code is it?

Pretty sure it's "Laughing my God damn ass off"

 

[AlphaTech]

Hmmmmm, in 2020 windows will be dead (and buried with billy-bob gates ), all peecee companies will be using the Mac OS (OS XX by then ) and people will barely remember the 'dark ages' where windows ruled the world. With the Mac OS being on most computers (except for those that are still using linux) society will finally 'all just get along'.

People will no longer have 'processor envy'.

Storage will be via high density crystals (and measured in the hundreds of TB).

Apple will be using displays that cover the keyboard, but are only 2mm thin with 1mm of that being a stiffening plate. The rest of the laptop will be about 1/2" thin, made from carbon fibre and able to withstand a 9mm round (easily) . The ultimate executive protection.

Networking will be via either a Gb wireless connection, or 100Gb wired.

That's all I can come up with for now... more to follow as I can think of things that Apple could make work.

 

[Mac o' sex]

no more desktop computers by 2020 ?

Don't you guys think that by 2020 we will have moved beyond having a "desktop" computer? Maybe something more efficient...maybe it won't even have a processor ? or ghz? maybe it will be a quantum computer or a biological one?

 

[AlphaTech]

Re: no more desktop computers by 2020 ?

Originally posted by Mac o' sex
Don't you guys think that by 2020 we will have moved beyond having a "desktop" computer? Maybe something more efficient...maybe it won't even have a processor ? or ghz? maybe it will be a quantum computer or a biological one?

I think it will take more then 18 years for that to happen.

 

[krossfyter]

Re: Re: no more desktop computers by 2020 ?

Originally posted by AlphaTech


I think it will take more then 18 years for that to happen.

how you figure alpha?

since technology progresses faster than sh*t now a days. moorse(sp?) law pretty much says that the processor will die eventually...no? yes? whatya think?

 

[Beej]

Re: Re: Re: no more desktop computers by 2020 ?

Originally posted by krossfyter
how you figure alpha?

since technology progresses faster than sh*t now a days. moorse(sp?) law pretty much says that the processor will die eventually...no? yes? whatya think?

Moore's Law is what you're after. It says that every 18 months chip densities (and hence proc speed) will double. I don't think it said anything about processord dying...

OK, re Alpha's 'more than 18 years' thing... I agree. Think about it. A '90s desktop was as powerful as a '60s supercomputer. That took 30 years. It's going to take less and less time for that to happen, but I doubt that in 18 years time we'll all be using desktops equivalent to todays fastest Crays.

I also doubt that the desktop computer will have been replaced by bio/quantum computers. They are only just starting to make sthe simplest of gates with those types of technologies right now. Maybe by 2020 they will be useful in some respect, but it's highly unlikely they will replaced chips as we know them now (although the chips will have become much more advanced by that stage, obviously).

But technology is going full pelt at the moment, and I'm sure the future - even as close as 2020 - holds many interesting things...

 

[krossfyter]

yeah beej but what im saying is that this whole proccessor power is going to reach a plateua where there can be no more? its going to reach a point to where it cant reach any higher from the bases of a chip .... thats what i meant by dying. so in comes quatum computing or whatevers next. thats what i meant. am i wrong or right?

 

[Beej]

Originally posted by krossfyter
yeah beej but what im saying is that this whole proccessor power is going to reach a plateua where there can be no more? its going to reach a point to where it cant reach any higher from the bases of a chip .... thats what i meant by dying. so in comes quatum computing or whatevers next. thats what i meant. am i wrong or right?

Ahh, ok, you're right. Moore's Law doesn't say that though.

You're right that eventually the size of the atom will limit how fast chips (as we know them today) can go. They can only get so small before physics kicks in. Then quantum computing will become very important. They have properties which defy classic physics... things like a particle being in more than one place at a time. A particle is actually at an infinite number of points at any given point in time, so theoretically, it can be performing an infinite number of calculations.

Crazy stuff, but that's where quantum mechanics is pointing us.

 

[awulf]

Re: hmm

Originally posted by coolocity
I remember reading a post about time travel, wouldn't mind bringing one of those puppies back with me. Of course, I could just go to 2025 and get it for really cheap 100 ghz...

Whant to Time Travel? These links might have smething useful but I dought it, I once downloaded schematics for a time machine, it was simple but never could be bothered making it (probably because I know it won't work):

http://members.tripod.com/~jtooker/index-2.html

http://paranormal.about.com/library/weekly/aa110998.htm

The wierd things about these websites is that, how to build a time machine are dead, maybe a secret government kills them

 

[AlphaTech]

Re: Re: Re: no more desktop computers by 2020 ?

Originally posted by krossfyter
how you figure alpha?

since technology progresses faster than sh*t now a days. moorse(sp?) law pretty much says that the processor will die eventually...no? yes? whatya think?

My take on this is that biological computing is going to be harder to construct than you think. Even if they start R&D on it now, it could be decades before even a working prototype is available. It could be even longer before they hit the home user.

Unless someone has a 'breakthrough' for the quantum computer, that could take even longer.

There are too many variables to say that either WILL [or will not] be in use in 2020. Apple could announce either in 2021 for all we know.

 

[Mr. Anderson]

One of the key things to remember here is that we don't know what new technologies will evolve over the next decade and a half. You talked to someone in the 80s and told them what we are using now and they'd sort of believe it, see it as possible, but most likely not been able to give you exact predictions. I'm thinking we'll see a larger integration of more than just computers that will fundamentally change the way we use them, take the internet for example, 18 years ago it was still a bunch of nerds using chat, transfering files and reading news boards. With Bluetooth and other wireless devices just starting out now, in 18 years we'll either all have cancer from the excessive amounts of RF or a better/faster/cleaner system will have been developed.

I'm looking forward to it.....