The Vojax Blog

As the result of another great Slick Deal, I am now the proud new owner of a Dell Mini 10v netbook and “ba ba ba ba ba, I’m loving it.”

Several things about it make me feel this way:

First, the price. I got it for about $230 shipped and taxed, which for a machine with a 160GB hard drive is a fricking steal. Even at full price of $299 + junk, netbooks are looking more and more the savvy choice for anyone who does not absolutely need a super powerful machine, which these days given the move to cloud computing is most of us.

Second, the seemingly vastly lower weight, noise and heat the thing puts out. I own two other Dell laptops, both of which are a pain to carry on long trips and both of which will be lucky to leave you with any skin on your thighs after an hour or so of using them. The netbook really is quiet/cool, even with the regular hard disk (they are available with solid state which should be even quieter/cooler).

My only dislike is to do with using it for extended periods. The not-great touchpad, which is fine for clicking between web-pages for a few minutes, but if you want any accuracy/consistency you need to use an external mouse. Also the keyboard is hard to use for heavy typing when perched on your lap due to lack of a large wrist-rest, which is pretty much unavoidable with a small device. However, sitting at a desk or table it is fine.

I’m a total convert and from this point on would really find it hard to justify the extra expense of a full-size laptop, and would really recommend others to consider doing the same.

Imagine a world where to see the new movie everyone is talking about you have to buy a new TV, which won’t play movies from rival studios…

This is how I feel about the games industry lately – as a PC and Xbox 360 owner I love to read about games online and in magazines and nothing is more frustrating than reading about the next great PS3 or Wii exclusive that I wont be able to play.  EVER.  Without dropping at least $300 dollars.  Now clearly that sucks for me, is great for Sony/Nintendo as the people that are convinced to buy their system because of exclusives will make them a bunch of money.  But I think its bad for the industry in the long-run.

For example, Super Mario Galaxy has been widely reviewed as one of the best games of this console generation.  But given the install bases of each of the consoles, the experience of actually playing it is restricted to 50% of the potential audience. I truly believe that for gaming to be mainstream it needs blockbuster games to enter the public consciousness in the same way that a new Transformers movie does. Restricting certain game licences/properties based on the console people own mean this will never happen – how can one game affect pop culture in the same way movies do when the gaming audience is fragmented in such a way.

Clearly, it will take technology to advance and the hardware companies to evolve before a consumers choice of games platform doesn’t restrict them from consuming the best that gaming has to offer.

Last week I read that the US Military has over 7000 remote-controlled drones worldwide. It’s a slightly scary thought but at least at the moment they have humans in the (virtual) driving seat.  Looks like that will change before too long, with the Air Force saying that intelligent drones are coming in the next 50 years.

At least by then I’ll be an old man and hopefully too old to fight in the ensuing man vs machine wars.

Reading a couple of articles recently about the growing netbook market and most people expecting this generation of consoles to stick around longer than usual got me to thinking about this as a trend. It seems people are happier with the current generation of hardware than ever before which means there is no great drive to get to the next generation.

Is processing power for home use now growing at a faster rate than we can find uses for?  PCs are getting faster but most people (outside of gamers and content creators) are now happy with their PC as long as it can get them online.  The 3 main reasons for PC upgrades are now obsolete: Speed, storage and resolution. If all a PC needs to do is go online why would you ever need to upgrade to a faster/bigger machine?  Storage of files online makes them more portable and safer from disaster.  Screen resolutions are higher than can be seen by the naked eye. How will manufacturers convince people to upgrade? What will be the driving force behind hardware innovation.

I see the future of processing moving, as was predicted in the 90s and failed to come true, server-side. With services in the pipeline such as OnLive videogame streaming, where all the processing is done remotely, we are moving ever closer to a world where the computer in the home is little more than a TV-like device used to access and interact with content from elsewhere.