Computers – Page 16 – Auxiliary Memory

Designing an Energy Efficient Green PC

If President Obama wants to reduce 2005 level greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent by 2020, and 83 percent by 2050 then we have to make some significant changes – and one major area to do that is with computers. Concurrent with the President’s news announcement is one at Computerworld that reported “Harvard study: Computers don’t save hospitals money.” If you combine the idea that IT isn’t paying its way, along with the need to use less resources, with the fact that all over the world IT budgets are being cut, forcing IT folks to look for far better ROIs, it’s really time to rethink the value of the computer.

If the President wants us to reduce our energy use by 83 percent before 2050, that means computers running at 200 watts today need to run at 34 watts by mid-century. It also means for every 100 watts used in manufacturing a computer now, should only take 17 watts in 2050. Or for every 100 pounds of building materials that go into making computers today, Dell and others will need to build the same number of machines with 17 pounds of materials.

One way to maximize the efficiency of manufacturing is by designing a machine that will last longer. If a machine with a lifetime of 5 years, lasts for 10, then you’ve created a 50% reduction in resources required to build the machine without changing the design.

There is no reason why computers can’t be designed to reach the 2050 goal well before 2020. Green computers that have come out since 2005 already save 50% or more over earlier designs. What’s needed is a tight focus on the problem by everyone, so when a home or office buyer is comparing computers to purchase they should see something like the EPA Mileage sticker numbers we see when buying a car.

The President and EPA should mandate that all energy using products come with a label stating how much energy the products uses and what percentage that use is from the industry average back in 2005. For example, on a computer system it might say Idle: 65 watts, Load: 95 watts, Percent 2005 Average: 47%. The figures I list are roughly possible from my general reading, so I’m pretty sure we could get to the magic 17% number far sooner than 2050. (I hope my math is correct, 83% reduction should mean we’re still using 17%.) With newly designed computers, the target could be achieved sometime between 2012-2020.

However, the energy a computer uses isn’t its only burden on the environment. The physical resources and energy that go into manufacturing a computer is a huge factor too, as is the resources it takes to manage and maintain the machine over it’s lifetime. Then there is the impact IT systems make on a business, the cost in dollars to buy and maintain equipment. IT costs should improve the bottom line, not bloat the budget and staffing, or burden the workforce with extra time consuming duties that don’t improve their overall productivity.

In designing a computer for the future we should consider all of this and more. For instance, how much manpower, time and carbon is wasted on viruses and other malware? Maybe the whole concept of an upgradable computer OS should be examined? Like televisions of old, which often had lifetimes of 10-20 years, they were sold intending to work the same, day in, and day out. They didn’t slow down over time, or quit working because TV shows had dangerous video elements. Our future energy efficient computer could have the operating system burned into motherboard and be instant on with the tiniest vampire electrical drain on the power grid. If machines were instant on, people are more likely to turn them off. If the main portion of the operating system is set in silicon, it shouldn’t be corruptible by malware.

Life Expectancy

Most PCs last 3-5 years before they are replaced, although some people push their machines to 6-7 years. We need to quickly expand the life expectancy of a PC to 10 years, and then work towards making them last to 15-20 years. Once they become a solid-state brick of a brain, that shouldn’t be hard to do. And today’s quad processing CPUs have the power to be useful for a very long time. Will an typical American worker ever need more then an Intel i5?

Size Matters

The average physical dimension and weight of computers have been shrinking for years because of laptops, but the average mini-tower desktop has not. Even though more than half of personal computers used now are laptops, office workers and some home users prefer a desktop. Designing a CPU box 1/5th the size of a standard mini-tower means reducing the resources needed to make it by 4/5ths. Our goal should be to jettison the optical drive and expansion slots, and design a desktop that is basically a CPU/GPU/memory circuit board with a few ports. Think of it as a silicon brain.

Laptops are quickly moving to slimmer designs, but they still can be improved. Laptops need to be design to last longer and withstand more wear so they can thoroughly enjoyed for 10 plus years.

LCD/LED screens need to stay large though, because large screens often mean more productivity, but future displays can be designed to use less power, need less resources to build and last longer. Like the powerful CPU, we want to maximize the benefit of the computer while reducing its environmental impact.

Components

We need to get rid of all moving parts, and any unneeded feature that requires physical resources, like ports, wires and cables. Of course we need to do studies to see which is more efficient: wires or wireless. The optical drive needs to go for sure, and so does the mechanical hard drive. And most users don’t need powerful discrete graphic cards. And how many people still use modems? The evolution towards single chip computers is moving ahead nicely. Today’s computers take far fewer chip sets then their ancestors. CPUs are getting smaller and smarter, requiring fewer watts to run, running cooler, and do more motherboard jobs.

CPU

There are lots of CPU designs out there that use less than 20 watts, but they aren’t powerful enough for the average user. The more we use computers the more we find for them to do, and this won’t change in the future. The minimum computer CPU should at least be 2 cores, but probably 4 if we want the device to last 10-20 years. If fact, I’d recommend getting 4 cores now because if you get a machine with just 2 cores today, you’ll probably want to replace it within the next 5 years. The key is to buy the most efficient 4 core chip, like the Intel i5. AMD needs to follow suit with an even more energy efficient chip to challenge Intel.

Operating System

All operating systems have been evolving towards better energy use, but there are other factors to consider. As computers become smaller and more energy efficient they also become cheaper and much better deals for businesses, but operating systems like Windows and Max OS have not come down in price proportional to the price of machines. Should Windows 7 cost the same $125 for a machine that’s $1200, $600 or $400? What if we could build an energy efficient CPU brain for for $300? It hurts to shell out so much for the OS. That’s why many system builders switch to Linux, which is free.

What about the cost of support? Apple brags they provide a better deal in their I’m a Mac commercials, but buying from an OS vender who wants to maintain a monopoly on computer hardware is silly. Microsoft is more democratic, willing to sell to any hardware vender and has become the worldwide standard, but Microsoft still has a stranglehold over the industry that’s not efficient. If this current recession had been a long one, I bet many businesses would have eventually switched to Linux because free is hard to beat.

Linux has already proved that it can be widely distributed without packaging and install disks, although most users burn an .iso image to a CD to install it, but new techniques of copying install files to flash drives is eliminating that wasteful practice too. Think of all the packaging that goes into marketing Windows 7 and Snow Leopard, as well as the burden of shipping it around the world.

However, the best solution would be for operating systems to come on the motherboard where it can’t be altered by viruses and malware. The operating system needs to become invisible to the user, and not a religion. It doesn’t matter who’s a PC or Mac. Because like the Harvard study about computers in hospitals, if you can’t reduce IT costs and make everything cheaper, then computers are not a solution, but a problem. A truly Green PC should be a tool to eliminate waste in all areas of life.

Cloud Computing

As more computer applications move to the cloud it reduces the need for proprietary operating systems and hardware, which should reduce the overall cost of buying a machine. Cloud computing saves resources in other ways. Buyers no longer have to purchased boxed programs with DVDs and manuals, IT support staff don’t have to go around and install programs on client machines, and cloud computing apps are usually easier to use.

With cloud computing we should be able to hide the CPU brain inside the monitor and the user shouldn’t even have to worry about what OS runs it, or who makes it. The more IT hardware melts away from the desks of the users, the more energy efficient it will be, and the more cost effective IT will become.

Paradigm Shifts

What does all this mean? Well, computer sales should tank as computers become more energy efficient and we manage to make them IT efficient too. A 22” inch LED screen with high-powered but energy efficient quad processer hidden away inside running a rock solid stable OS at 20 watts of power using a near universal interface, and costs just $500 while lasting 12 years will have a tremendous impact on society, business and computer sales. The iMac is an elegant design showing the future of desktop computers, so when a competing product running a firmware version of Linux comes out built around cloud computing concepts then you might should pay attention. Ponder where Google Chrome OS going?

Take for instance my desire to buy a new computer. I’m looking at getting a 1-2 terabyte drive because of all the digital music and photos I have. I have 18,000 ripped songs from my CDs to maintain, but if I knew I could always play them from the cloud, through Rhapsody or Lala, I could think about getting a smaller drive. In fact, if I knew online storage was more reliable than hard disks I might even settle for a smallish solid-state disk drive. Since I hardly ever buy shrink wrap software anymore, I’m thinking of doing without a CD/DVD drive. Streaming Netflix and online video content also suggest a future without optical drives.

Once I get all my old photographs digitized I’m not sure if I’ll need my scanner anymore. And I print so seldom that I worry that the print-heads on my Canon inkjet are going to die. So if the CPU box and my all-in-one printer-copier-scanner disappear from my desk I’ll be overjoyed.

The Winning Design

The all-in-one desktop/monitor like the iMac, without an optical drive but with a SSD drive is the winning design for an energy efficient PC. It does away with the whole CPU box, a major savings in resources and energy, plus it gets rid of so many wires, which is another area of savings. And it has just one power supply. Finally, its a design without moving parts. This is a very elegant solution, and it’s a shame that Steve Jobs doesn’t allow other hardware makers to license the Mac OS – but the world economy can’t accept a system from a hardware monopoly. Besides, it’s really time to get serious about Linux on the desktop – since it has become a world OS.

Here’s a review of four all-in-one machines that use 66-75% less now. I don’t think it would take too much innovation to design machines with a 23″ 1920×1020 LED screen and have the power of today’s quad processors and reach 90% less power. The machines reviewed are on the wimpy side for power users, so my point is I think its possible to design muscle machines for power users that are 2050 green too.

By the Year 2050

With the regard to computers, I’m not sure if the President even needs to mandate that they use 83 percent less energy by 2050 because computers are already evolving in that direction anyway. Laptops are getting lighter, and to make them last longer on a batter charge, they have to be designed to use far less power. Desktop all-in-one monitor/CPU designs also use less power and take less resources to make, and they take up far less desk space. I’d be surprise if the average computer doesn’t use 83% less power by 2015.

At the beginning of the essay I said if the average machine today used 200 watts we’d have to design machines to run on 34 watts by the year 2050 to meet the President’s goal. Well, here’s a machine reviewed at Tom’s Hardware that runs at 35 watts. It uses a powerful E8600 Intel chip, and for 37 watts, you can get a motherboard with GeForce 9300 graphics. How hard will it be for engineers to get such a system down to 15 watts?

If only we could change everything else so fast. And maybe we can. It might be a far less scary job than we think. I got a new energy efficient HVAC last year and my utility bills are 30-50% less. If I remodeled my house with better insulation I’d save even more. The next time I have to buy a car I’ll probably cut my gas usage by 50%. I think we’ll see change far faster in all areas before 2050.

Sites that review CPU Power Consumption

JWH – 12/5/9

MAGIX Music Maker 15

Do you secretly dream of creating a hit song, but lack musical talent or singing ability, well MAGIX Music Maker 15 is for you. Just watch the video to see what I mean:

I was impressed with this sales pitch so I downloaded the free trial version. I’ve always wanted a Mac to play with GarageBand, but never wanted spend that much money on a computer. This program looked like a good substitute for GarageBand on the PC.

WARNING: This trial version has couple annoying obstacles keeping it from being a total breeze of a demo. I’m going to pass on some tips that should reduce the frustration. Shame on MAGIX for making such a clunky trial to such a fun program. My first recommendation is to watch the above video because it’s a good tutorial for getting started.

The trial version of Music Maker 15 installs the shell of the program without any synths or soundpackets, but pay attention to the opening welcome screen and click on “Download soundpackets.” Install this second download and restart the program. It’s disappointed that MAGIX just didn’t include the second download in the original download, because this is a stumbling block that will confuse many trial users. The other buttons on the welcome screen don’t work right unless you have this download installed, and the program itself will be empty of music to arrange.

When you get to the Welcome screen the second time, I suggest loading and play the two demo songs, especially the Chillout demo. Once a song is loaded, hit the play button icon in the middle of the screen. These standard cassette style control button icons are how you play, pause, stop, rewind, record, etc. Listen to the song and watch what’s happening in the various tracks. This is a lesson in music by itself. Songs are composed of tracks, each of which has an instrument or vocal. Notice how the Chillout song has tracks with blank spaces. That’s a key to composing with this program. Your drummer doesn’t need to play all the time, nor does your singer need to sing all the time.

After you have played the songs, it’s time to hit Start new arrangement. This is were the fun and work begins. I started with the Chillout style. You’ll see the trial version now has two styles to play with, Chillout vol. 3, and Techno Trance Vol. 11. When you buy the full version of the program you get a whole lot more. But these two are enough to get an idea of how the program works. By the way, if you click on the View option in the top menu, you’ll see we’re in EasyMode. You’ll want to stay in that mode, but if you turn it off, you’ll see a lot more options.

In the Soundpools section of your screen, you’ll see Styles, Instruments and a selector box showing all the instruments. Notice the little speaker icon by the Name of the instrument. If you click on it you’ll hear the instrument. Clicking the icon again stops it. The top part of the screen is your blank canvas where you edit your song. Just click on an instrument and drag it to a track location. Like I said before, study the video above for visual clues on how to do things.

I started with drums to imagine my first song. I figure the standard method is to lay down rhythm tracks first, and then solo instruments and finally vocal tracks. Basically I followed what the guy was doing in the video tutorial above. It’s easy to create 2, 4 and 8 bar segments of sounds, and combine other instruments on other track locations.

Before long I had a 30 second song with 6 tracks that sounded pretty good. After that, I just became addicted to rearranging the sound of my song. I bet a kid who has the ability to play a video game for hours could really work and enjoy this program, and develop a talent for music. This program makes creating songs easy enough that anyone can start, but educational enough to let users who have sticking power learn a lot about music, both composing and arranging.

Each time I added a new instrument segment I played the whole of my song so far. Just listening gave me inspiration of what to try next. I was now at a place where I was arranging a song with immediate results. I bet whenever I listen to a real song, I’m going to be mentally breaking it down into tracks of instruments and vocals. The basic version of Music Maker 15 has 64 tracks of workspace. At one time, studios had to record songs live, with all musicians and singers performing together. Then came 2 and 4 track recorders, and the concept has been expanding ever since. All the egos of a rock band no longer have to work together in the same studio room.

As a user of a computer song arranger, you can assemble songs from a library of sound loops, record your own performances and vocals, or get arrangements from other computer composers and create digital collaborations. This makes me want GarageBand all the more, because v. 5 allows you to buy music tutorials from famous musicians. I hope the same concept will come to Music Maker.

Back to the program. If you can get this far, where you can assemble sound loops and begin building a song, you’ll discover if you have the addiction or not. Learn to use the scissors icon to cut off segments you don’t like. It’s pretty easy to make a wall of sound that works, but it won’t be like real songs. At this point you are composing.

Just playing with this program for an hour quickly taught me a lot about musical composition, and already I feel the blanks in the tracks are the key to making the song sound more like real music. It’s extremely easy to experiment, and if you persist, the program does pay off fast. The demo is good for 7 days, with the option for a 30 day extension. I get the feeling I’m going to buy the full package though, which is $59.99 at the MAGIX site, but $48.99 at Amazon with free shipping.

If you go to YouTube and search on “Magix Music Maker,” you’ll find many songs budding composers have uploaded. Most aren’t that sophisticated, but I think this one shows real promise:

JWH – 7/26/9

Kindle DX versus Netbook as Textbook

The holy grail of ebook visionaries is the electronic textbook. Textbooks are huge, heavy and expensive and some poor school kids carry more weight on their backs than soldiers on a march. It’s as common to see backpack humps on college kids backs as seeing cell phones in their hands. Ebook promoters see dollar signs whenever they spot one of those humpback students lugging around all that printed matter.

And those ebook promoters are right. Why carry forty pounds of paper when you can carry 1 pound of electronics? But is the Kindle DX the answer? I don’t think so. First, let me give you a little story. Years ago, before audio books were even common on cassette tape, I took a two semester Shakespeare course. We covered almost 20 plays, each tested with a very detailed 10 question quiz. I remember how I faithfully read and studied the first play and was shocked when I only got six of the ten questions. The professor had a pattern. Half of the questions could be easily answered with a fair reading of the play. One question was always about a very obscure detail that kept most people from getting a perfect 10, and the other four questions divided the class between those who really got into the play and those who didn’t.

I realized a quick reading the night before class wasn’t going to cut it, so I went to the library and got each play on LP. They came in boxed sets of 3-4 discs. The records were old and scratchy, but usable. This was in the early 1980s. I’d play the records while reading the play – it took hours. After that I always got perfect 10s on those quizzes. Now my magic retention rate only worked if I faithfully followed the words on the page while listening to the same words spoken. Reading or listening by itself didn’t work. Other than these two Shakespeare courses I never used this learning technique again in school.

However, when I started using my ears as my main sensory input for reading back in 2002, I started playing around, experimenting with each form of input. I paid attention to what I noticed when just reading with my eyes. Then I paid attention to what I noticed, just from listening with my ears. I would then read something I had just listened to, or vice versa. Each time I’d found details I had missed with the opposite method. I discovered what the eyes learned was different from what the ears remembered.

One book I did this experiment on was Emma by Jane Austen, a book I was reading for a book club. I listened for an hour. Then I reread that hour with my eyes. Listening was great for getting a sense of character and dramatic action, but it was poor on retaining words. Austen immediately introduced too many characters – that made the story confusing. Each character live in a house with a name, often set in a different village, with another name to remember, so I was overwhelmed by people and place names. Seeing all those names in print helped clear up many issues.

Again, I concluded that to study a piece of writing for academic purposes, I needed to see it with my eyes if I wanted to memorize words and spellings. However, by listening, I experienced the nuances of conflict, characterization and plot better. Hearing stories helped me to to imagine 3D action and settings. I saw color and details better when I heard the words rather than read them.

Listening, which is far slower than reading, forced me to concentrate on the subject, and that was especially reinforced when I watched the words while also listening to them. Seeing a word and hearing it made me think about it’s pronunciation and spelling more than when I just read it with my eyes. But listening alone is terrible for learning spelling. There are many books I’ve only heard that I have no idea how to spell the character’s names.

I think these observations are key to the success of future etextbooks. Strangely enough, the Kindle now offers to read books to their owners, but they also allow Kindle users to play MP3 or Audible.com audio books while reading, although I think few people take advantage of this feature. I sold my Kindle 1.0 to my friend who prefers to read with her eyes and loves to travel, but I do have the Kindle reader software on my iPod touch and do some reading with it. However, iPods can’t multitask, so I have to play the audio book on my Zune and read it on the iPod touch.

From this one anecdote you might surmise that the Kindle DX will make a great etextbook, but I’m not so sure. I found the e-ink technology clumsy for random reading, which is often what people do when they study. Also, kids studying will be taking notes for writing papers or passing tests, so I think the future of etextbooks will be on netbooks, and those little devices are great at multitasking, allow reading and note taking and even cutting and pasting of quotes.

To really memorize details for a studied subject, I think you need to see it, hear it, and then write about it. iPhones and Kindles don’t help here. When I write this blog I keep a browser window open, with tabs to Google, Wikipedia and OneLook (a dictionary gateway site).

The computer literacy movement of the 1980s promised so much but delivered so damn little. I’ve always wondered why programmers couldn’t write programs that taught math. Kids will play video games for hours, games that mesmerize them into deep rapt attention, tricking them into learning a myriad of details from game play. Teaching mathematics via interactive computer animation should be a no brainer, but most software that attempted the job came up with dull drills and tedious flash cards. That doesn’t mean the concept of computer aided learning is a bust. Anyone who has played with Mathematica should shout they’ve seen the light.

What’s needed is a synthesis of many learning techniques and technologies. First, I think etextbooks won’t be ebooks. That’s way too lame. Etextbooks should combine video lectures, film clips, audio, computer CGI, and photos to go with old fashion black on white text, plus add tests, quizzes, puzzles, word problems, virtual worlds, games and any other interactive method to get kids to practice math.

If I had the money and resources to create etextbook on mathematics I would build my course around the history of math. I’d take it from anthropological ancient history to theoretical here and now. But I’d build it as a suite of components, usable on different platforms in different study environments. So if the user only wanted voice, in iPod mode, they could spin through the centuries to find MP3 podcasts about the history of math. If they were in a mood to play with their Nintendo DS, they could load up a mathematical game, or install a challenging game app on their iPhone. If they were in the mood for a documentary, I’d let them stream video to their television sets. Hell, I’d even offer to print puzzles for when they have to sit on the pot.

I’d also find some way to create a scoring system, especially one that could be tied to a Elo type rating system, like they use in chess, so students would feel challenged to compete. It would be great if the American Mathematical Society had a way to rank people’s knowledge of the various Mathematics Subject Classifications. Kids love video games because they enjoy beating friends with a specialized skill, and they also love competing against a computer too. Traditional schooling is so boring and passive. Etextbooks need the challenge of competition, but it would be so tired if all they did was offer time competitions on who could finish solving ten equations first.

What if a Civilization type game required various mathematical skills to play, so if a student wanted to build a pyramid in the game he’d need to know geometry, or if she wanted her little Sims to sail across an ocean, she’d have to use celestial navigation to advance the game.

In other words, if publishers are only going to take the text from their printed books and put it in an ebook, that’s not going to work. Even if the Kindle had full color and resolution to match the printed page, so a Kindle book could contain all the photos and illustrations of the real textbook, I still don’t think it will be equal to using paper volumes. Modern textbooks are gorgeous compared to what I remember I had to use as a kid. If I had the choice between 5 books, weighing 40 pounds, and 1 Kindle weighing less than a single pound, I’m afraid I’d shoulder the burden, because real textbooks are far easier to use, and much more spectacular to look at. I kid you not. If you haven’t seen a text in forty years, go find a kid and look at theirs.

When I owned my Kindle and subscribed to Time magazine, I found it easiest to read from page one to page last, and endure the time it took to page past articles I didn’t want to read. There were navigation links, but between flipping back to the table of contents and to an article to see if I wanted to read it, it was just easier to stay in linear mode of page, page, page, page….

Etextbooks will only be better if they offer a variety of ways to study. Ultimately, I don’t think individual etextbooks will be the answer. I think students will subscribe to an online textbook service, and pay $4.99-$19.99 a month per course, and access a myriad of multimedia features, paying about the same as buying a textbook for a one semester course.

The old way to going to college involved scheduling a class with a professor and studying a book together in a room with other students for a few months. Online instruction means studying on your own with a professor you might never meet who shepherds unseen students through a system of requirements. Wouldn’t you prefer a textbook service that gave you podcasts to listen to at the gym or grocery store or while doing the dishes, and video lectures to watch before bedtime, and online games to play against your classmates, and ebooks to read on your iPhone at break at work. Local college professors may stop lecturing, and end up becoming educational gurus who help their students find their way to enlightenment in the subjects they paid to master.

The textbook of the future will have to be very flexible. I don’t even go to school, but I study all the time. I just finished the audio book The First Three Minutes by Steven Weinberg about cosmology of the early universe just after the big bang. I’m about to read the hardback and listen to the audio book of The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene, which will go deeper into many documentaries I’ve been watching lately on The Science Channel and PBS, but I also want something more systematic, so I’m going to get a DVD set or two from The Teaching Company. Their great DVD courses would be fantastic to keep on a netbook.

The more I study cosmology and physics, the more I feel the need to study mathematics. I wish I could find something like the RosettaStone language courses to help me. I also wish I had something that tested and rated my knowledge. I don’t feel the need to go back to college and major in physics, but if an astronomical association offered online testing, with amateur rankings, I might be tempted by their challenge. Our K-12 upbringing made most of us to hate learning, mainly because they made gaining knowledge all about passing crappy tests. Video games are a form of test taking, a fun kind, that addict kids.

It’s a shame that most adults study new subjects like snacking on potato chips. We constantly nibble on information but are never challenged to do anything with our empty data calories. People will spend 60 hours a week playing online video games that require an amazing amount of study just to slay imaginary dragons or build pretend lives in Second Life. Why not set up servers and let players build an historically accurate virtual Tudor England, so they could apply their hobby history scholarship to a challenge. What if teachers told their students, “Your homework for this week is to create a virtual Mayflower, and show why the Puritans came to America. Each of you must flesh out one historical character and show that person in twenty scenes from their life interacting with the characters your classmates create. Please tell you’re parents they aren’t allowed to play this week.”

See why I think existing invention of the textbook shouldn’t be converted into a gadget that only displays electronic words and images on an electronic page because it’s lighter than a bulky book? Modern textbooks are already bursting their bindings trying to become multimedia experiences. E-ink would be a huge step backwards. Go find a 2009 textbook, and flip through it. What I’m saying will be obvious. It will also be obvious that the weight of all the knowledge within that tome won’t be easily consumed by your darling rug rat. Today’s kids chow down on HD video and 1080p Xbox games. The Sirens of virtual worlds call to kids and the printed black letter on white paper, or gray e-ink, just won’t charm them.

JWH – 7/3/9

Predicting Technological Change

In the last few days I’ve helped many people set up their new iPhones with the campus Exchange server and wireless registration. I can’t even count how many people I know now that have an iPhone, but they tend to be young, but not always. I don’t own an iPhone myself, but I do have an iPod touch. I’m too cheap to own a smart phone, even though I would love to own an iPhone, I won’t allow myself to pay another big monthly communication’s bill.

I’ve been working with computers since 1971, and have always been gadget crazy, but I’ve yet to join the craze over expensive cell phones. That will change when I see the right netbook.

When people come to me for help with their iPhone, they like to show off all their favorite iPhone apps, and there are an amazing variety of these little programs. Some apps, like games, are built on concepts that developed on the desktop computer. Other apps, like those that help find restaurants or tell you what song is playing have evolved from needs of people on-the-go.

I used to tell people that the way to predict technological innovation was to forecast tech growth in gadgets that were jettison components with moving parts. For example, the floppy disk. It’s been replaced by the flash drive. Soon the CD/DVD optical drive will disappear because of high speed networking. And finally the hard drive will disappear because of solid state devices. Looking at the phenomenon of netbooks shows off this trend. They don’t have optical drives. And many users try to ditch their spinning hard drives for SSD drives.

I should have taken my own advice, and not bought a Blu-Ray player because I have only played one Blu-Ray disc so far, and instead watched 14-15 downloads from Netflix. The no moving parts of the Netflix feature on the LD BD390 is far more appealing than the Blu-Ray player with moving parts.

Now, besides telling people to watch for gadgets that have no moving parts, I tell friends, to keep an eye out for tech with programming geared for on-the-go tech users. That’s part of what I was getting at with my last post “My Life on a Hard Drive.” It appears that netbooks should kindle the same excitement as iPhones.

I was watching Brink, a show on the Science Channel the other night, and they were showing off a wearable video projector that allowed people to use their hands to interact and play with computer screens projected onto almost any kind of surface. This gadget has no moving parts, and it’s designed for on-the-go computing. I can easily imagine future netbooks or iPhones with a built in video projector.

One class of apps that my young iPhone acquaintances are showing me are those that help find places to eat. None of the people I hang out with have an iPhone, we’re all too old and cheap, but one of us needs to get one, because we always argue so much about where to eat that’s new and not boring. The idea of every nearby eatery and their menu popping up on a screen based on location is just too cool, even for us old farts.

Now think about where tech wizards could take this concept. Last weekend I wanted a copy of The Kings of Leon’s latest album, and the only nearby place I could think to shop was Target. I drove over only to be disappointed. What if I had an app that told me ahead of time all the places that were selling the CD and its price. Won’t this trump Amazon.com? Or what if I was in my local Borders and wanted to know where a book was shelved, so instead of asking a clerk, my phone could just tell me. I’m sure you can think of several good apps now, related to being somewhere and wanting instant information.

Of course, this leads to another prediction. Future tech seems to put people out of work. I’m getting very close to not wanting to buy music CDs, DVDs, Blu-Ray discs, magazines or books because of technological alternatives. If I can listen to music, watch movies, read books and magazine articles all on a netbook or iPhone, why would I want to acquire all the physical crap required to store media I can get easier via the net?

Notice something? My habits are changing and they just invalidated the suggested ideas I had for new on-the-go apps. Any shopping app I predict shouldn’t involve buying things like CDs, DVDs, and other physical storage tech that’s being outdated by digital tech. We’ll want apps not to buy stuff, but to get services like food, movies, plays, tourist sites, concerts, etc. Again, on-the-go over the impulse to acquire.

Some stuff, like clothes, I don’t think will be replaced by tech. Who really wants to wear a computer? Unless the fabric design is computerized. But I predict we’ll want smaller wardrobes because of our rolling stone natures.

But the same predictions about computer tech can be applied to automobile tech. Electric cars have fewer parts. They promote on-the-go lifestyles. The goal is to get to a point where you don’t buy physical fuel. By the same token, mass transit does away with owning something with moving parts.

Look at computer games. The trend is away from buying discs to getting games off the net, and to carry around devices where you can play games anywhere. Also, the trend is to combine devices. Why have a phone and a portable game unit when you can have an iPhone? Why have a GPS and travel books, when an iPhone can replace them? Why have a camera and voice recorder when you can have an iPhone?

The question becomes: Will the iPhone become the super gadget, or will it be the netbook? The flip phone was too small, and the laptop too big. What will meet in the middle?

As a society become more mobile, all of us get tired of carry around so much junk. Every time I moved in my life, I always had more junk than the previous move, more boxes of books, LPs, CDs and other stuff. The next time I move, I’m going to have less. I’ve already gotten rid of my LPs. I’m thinning out CDs. I’m switching from buying DVDs to Netflix. I’ve stopped buying CDs because of Rhapsody, Zune, Lala and Pandora. I keep my photos on my computer. And my dream retirement would be to travel light and live in a different city every six months. See the trends? You don’t need a crystal ball and a turban on your head to play tech swami.

But here’s a prediction that might not be so obvious. I think programming should be nearing a breakthrough where educational computing makes a comeback. Back in the 1980s and early 1990s, personal computing and educational software were all the rage. People felt obligated to buy their kids computers. Everyone talked about computer literacy. But programs that taught never panned out.

Online courses and degrees are a huge growth industry in the education business. Notice the connection to on-the-go people. Eventually the market for apps that help us get more services will saturate. Sooner or later, I think we’ll see iPhone and netbook apps that help us learn and study. We have portable music, portable TV shows, and portable audio books, why not portable lectures? It’s like having a school without teachers. The Teaching Company’s Great Courses would be fantastic on the netbook screen. And see, this educational angle may turn the tide against the iPhone to the netbook as the on-the-go device of just the right size.

JWH – 7/1/9

Further Adventures with eReader on the iPod touch

For some reason I’m getting more hits on the iPod touch eReader eBook post than anything else I’ve written lately, so I must assume that the iPod touch and eReader are a hit combination. Since I wrote that post, eReader has come out with version 1.2 that offers many nifty new features and they’re promising 1.3 real soon now. Also, the eReader.com site, a spin-off from fictionwise.com, seems to be expanding daily, which implies another kind of success. eReader software isn’t just for the iPod, there’s also versions for Palm, PocketPC, Windows Mobile, Symbian, Windows, Macintosh and OQO systems.

When the Kindle came out stories about it on the blogosphere were more common than stories about Sarah Palin today. Using the iPod touch and iPhone for an ebook reader hasn’t garnered that much notice. I prefer the larger screen of the Kindle, but never wanted to carry it around. The touch/iPhone is designed to commute wherever you go, and wherever you go you can now read your book when you get there. That’s pretty cool.

The screen of the touch/iPhone is better than PDAs and most other smart phones, so for a portable reading device it does very well in the visual department. The screen is physically about one fourth to one third the size of a paperback book page, but the number of words varies because you have several font size settings. Even though the screen is smaller than the Kindle, it’s brighter and sharper. Overall though, the Kindle’s screen is much nicer to read from because of it’s perfect size.

Flipping pages is much nicer with eReader on the touch/iPhone than with the Kindle or the eBookman I used to have. You can set eReader to swipe or tap for page turning. I set mine to tap, so I just touch the right side of the screen to page forward, and the left to go back. Having a touch screen greatly reduces the need for buttons.

My 1st generation touch has 2 buttons, and the newly released 2nd generation touch has three, adding a volume control and tiny speaker, something I wanted. I’m quite anxious for another button though, an on/off switch for the Wi-Fi for the iPod touch. The wireless system drains the battery fast. My touch will drain in 1-2 days even doing nothing if the wireless is on. I now have to go through several taps to turn the wireless on or off. An even more sophisticated solution would be software that turned the wireless on when I sent a request out on the Internet and turned it off after a set period of time.

The iPod touch is about four times heavier than a Nano, and much bigger, so it’s more of an effort to carry around, but still just 4 ounces, or 120 grams. It fits in my shirt pocket like the Nano, but its very noticeable there, whereas the Nano is unfelt. I’ve started carrying my touch some, but I’ve got to admit I’d rather carry the Nano. Whether I carry the touch all the time will depend if I get completely hooked on it. 99% of my use is for listening to audio books, so unless I start using the touch more, I might go back to my Nano. I think I’ll need several months to grow into the iPod touch, to know if I regularly need all of its features.

The frequent low battery message is what keeps me switching back to the Nano. I can get a lot more time if I shut off the Wi-Fi, but that’s annoying to keep up with. Another way to improve battery life is shut off the screen. This is only good for listening to music and audio books, but eReader does have a feature for showing white text on a black background. I wonder if that saves energy. The claimed battery life improvements in the 2nd Generation iPod touch makes me wished I had waited a month to buy a new iPod. I certainly wouldn’t buy a 1st generation touch now unless it was very cheap.

One way to adapt to the touch’s battery weakness is to buy a cradle and leave it on it whenever I’m not using it, but with the battery supposedly only good for 400-500 full cycles of charging, would that be good for it? The iPod touch loses it’s charge so fast when the Wi-Fi is on that I’m thinking mine is either defective or it has a serious flaw. The Kindle, even with the broadband on lasts four or five days.

The iPod touch also does not seem as robust as the Nano. Upgrading to iTunes 8.0 crashed it completely and I had to do a restore, which took a bit of fiddling to get done. I kept wondering why the touch was always backing itself up, well now I’m glad it had. The restore loaded my upgrades, settings, eReader books, and extra applications, but not my music and audio books.

I bought the iPod touch because I wanted walk-around access to the Internet. I was also thinking of buying the Asus Eee PC for the same reason. After a few weeks of ownership I’ve learned that I don’t actually need to access the Internet that often when I’m away from my work or home computer. It is fun to play with the touch while reclining in my La-Z-Boy, but weirdly the best function I’ve found for those idle moments is cleaning out old email. Browsing the web on the touch’s 3.5″ screen is the coolest I’ve seen on a small device, but it’s not any fun in practicality. Good for emergency searches.

When it comes down to it, the real use I have for an iPod is audio books. I spend hours and hours every week listening to audio books, and the Nano is far superior for that task. The best thing I love about eReader is getting free classic books, but not to read. When you listen to books you never know how many names and words are spelled. Having the text on eReader makes a great supplement to audio books. It’s not something I use often, but it’s very nice.

Audio books have ruined me for reading printed books, so when I do read with my eyes it’s mainly email, RSS feeds and the web pages. That makes the touch good for email and RSS feeds if they are nearly all text. HTML email is better read on a big screen.

The iPod touch is a novelty that I may or may not get addicted to carrying around. Buying it made me glad I didn’t rush out and buy the iPhone. I love the Internet as seen through my 22″ Samsung LCD. But anyone who grew up carrying a Gameboy around will probably find the touch a fantastic device.

Jim