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Windows Operating Systems Software Hardware

Projected 'Average' Longhorn System Is A Whopper 1539

Posted by timothy from the save-your-cans-for-the-rebate dept.
greg_barton writes "At first I thought this was a joke, but this article from Microsoft Watch confirms it: 'Microsoft is expected to recommend that the 'average' Longhorn PC feature a dual-core CPU running at 4 to 6GHz; a minimum of 2 gigs of RAM; up to a terabyte of storage; a 1 Gbit, built-in, Ethernet-wired port and an 802.11g wireless link; and a graphics processor that runs three times faster than those on the market today.'"
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Projected 'Average' Longhorn System Is A Whopper More

Projected 'Average' Longhorn System Is A Whopper

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  • 640K was enough for anyone. Reckon not....

    We got to the moon on less computing power than a Commodore 64 and Longhorn needs 2 Gigs o RAM. Amazing.

  • And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Funny)

    by Neil Blender ( 555885 ) <neilblender@gmail.com> on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:02PM (#9057703)
    When longhorn comes out in 2008.

    • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Funny)

      by sTalking_Goat ( 670565 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:05PM (#9057741) Homepage
      When longhorn comes out in 2008.

      ROFL! Such optimism. Next you'll be telling me that Duke Nukem Forever just went into public beta...

    • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Funny)

      by pseudochaotic ( 548897 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:07PM (#9057778)
      Actually, Longhorn will include a time machine emulated in software, so that you can download your new computer from the future. That's why the requirements are so high.

    • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bee-yotch ( 323219 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:10PM (#9057816) Homepage
      This may be modded as funny. But even 2008 seems too early for these kind of specs. Give me a break, 2GB of RAM and 1 terabyte of disk space. It's rediculous. Computer retailer's are still shipping computers with 256MB of RAM and 40GB hard disks.

      It probably won't be uncommon for that much RAM to be in a machine by 2008, but 1 Terabyte disk space seems a little rediculous. And longhorn is suppose to by release like early 2006 isn't it?

      I'm not convinced that this article is for real.

      • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Funny)

        by moviepig.com ( 745183 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @08:32PM (#9058708)
        ...2GB of RAM and 1 terabyte of disk space...

        ...and your backup-storage will have parking lights.

      • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Informative)

        by LuxFX ( 220822 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @08:40PM (#9058770) Homepage Journal
        This may be modded as funny. But even 2008 seems too early for these kind of specs. Give me a break, 2GB of RAM and 1 terabyte of disk space.

        It's not that ridiculous.

        On the hard drive side, 250GB drives and even 300+GB are very easy to find in any computer store. I've also heard of 1TB external hard drives. It would be pretty simple to set up a system with more than 1TB of storage.

        On the RAM side, most motherboards these days support 3-4GB of RAM. Mine right now supports 4GB; I run 1GB in it for now, and will be buying a second GB fairly soon.

        And on the processor side, I hear of CPUs being overclocked past 4GHz and higher all the time.

        So, even though these are the specs for the "average" computer, it's possible to have it today. And bottom line, if it can be done today, then there is no reason to think it wouldn't be average in 2.5-3.0 years.

        • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Feanturi ( 99866 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @10:44PM (#9059672)
          So, even though these are the specs for the "average" computer, it's possible to have it today. And bottom line, if it can be done today, then there is no reason to think it wouldn't be average in 2.5-3.0 years.

          But to me, 'average' computer specs implies that I can have all of this for $2000 or less, including a decent monitor. When that happens for these specs I'll stop laughing. Oh it's inevitable sure, but for now it's rediculous.

    • Re:And that will be the standard computer (Score:5, Interesting)

      by ProgressiveCynic ( 624271 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:59PM (#9058417) Homepage
      I'm baffled as to why you insensitive clods modded this parent as funny - everything Neil says is deadpan true.

      This is actually a very common technique in the commercial software world, advocated at least as early as 95 by Alan Cooper in The Essentials of User Interface Design: look at your project schedule, try to project what kind of hardware will be common by the time you ship, and plan for it. It's not rocket science, just common sense. And as others have pointed out, the specs they are targeting should be standard by 2006, let alone by 2008 when the beta program will end.

      BTW, as an official Longhorn beta tester, I can confirm that this story is not a hoax: I was given these specs over a year ago at some of the early beta launch meetings, and while they've bumped the RAM up from 1 GB to 2, nothing else has changed.

      BTW2, at WinHEC this week the graphics vendors are complaining that Longhorn won't be using enough of the vast amounts of GPU power they will be providing by 2006...

  • The estimates are OK (Score:5, Insightful)

    by stecoop ( 759508 ) * on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:02PM (#9057706) Journal
    The first full-fledged beta isn't due out until sometime in 2005

    I don't see anything wrong with these specs. Next year well be in the 4 GHz range and my system today has 2 @ $150 gig memory which isn't a bunch either, Gigabit Ethernet is on ~2/3ds of the mommaboards today, Moore's law will take care of tripling the video processor over the next few years, AMD is kicking butt with their 64 bit chip so Intel will get it's 64bit ready for the masses, if you're not running 802.11g then great you can upgrade to wireless SuperG @108Mbps. When long horn comes out in ~2006 than I imagine this will be the average system. MS is making quite good estimates on the intended consumer. But then you read that a dual processor machine is on the horizon makes me wonder if LongHorn isn't targeted for desktops.

    • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Informative)

      by Cali Thalen ( 627449 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:07PM (#9057773) Homepage
      The article and the quote both say 'dual core processor' - not dual processors. Forgive me for not knowing off the top of my head, but I am assuming that they don't mean one of those hyperthreading things though, so...multi-processor chips maybe?

      • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Informative)

        by Hollinger ( 16202 ) <michael AT hollinger DOT net> on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:21PM (#9058005) Homepage Journal
        It's possible. IBM has been doing it for some time with the Power4+ chip, as seen here [top500.org]. It's a form of Multi-Chip Module. You can see a picture of one here [ibm.com].

      • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Informative)

        by pantherace ( 165052 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:27PM (#9058083)
        Yes, like the power4, and the ultrasparc IV (& another ultrasparc that's 2 US2 cores) These chips have are supposed to have 2 processor cores on a single die.

        Right now, that would help AMD a heck of a whole lot more than Intel, because AMD has a MUCH more scalable arch than Intel. (AMD licenced alpha for athlons (32-bit) (dedicated northbridge connection per processor) and copied them for the Opteron (on-chip memory controller, and very fast chip interconnects)) Intel by contrast has a shared memory bandwidth for all it's chips (assume that both Opteron and Itanium have the same base memory bandwidth, for a single chip call it 6.4GB/sec, Assuming it's in the Opteron's own memory (each can have it's own memory) on a dual processor board, each Opteron would have 6.4GB/sec to it's memory, and slighly slower access to the other processor's. Itanium on the other hand shares it's memory bandwidth so each processor has 3.2GB/sec. Scale this up to 4 processors and each Opteron has 6.4GB/sec bandwidth while the Itaniums have 1.6GB/sec bandwidth. Thus why people either cluster Itaniums (with usually a max of 2 processors per node) or have very custom chipsets that emulate what the Opteron does (SGI, and an HP chipset))

        Think of it as on chip SMP which is not some virtualization construct as Hyperthreading is.

    • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Naked Rayburn ( 776986 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:08PM (#9057795)
      A better question to ask is, what the fuck is an operating system doing with those resources? I understand wanting those specs to run simulations, data processing, or games... but what does longhorn do that no other OS offers which requires such specs? The memory and CPU expectations are particularly egregious. I can still run NetBSD on a Sun 3/60. Yeah, maybe I can't run and ssh2d, but the core OS runs just fine. Sheesh... 2GB of RAM and a 6ghz CPU with a high end 3D graphics processor -- for the OS??? Christ, give me a PDP-11 running RT-11. Guess I'm a luddite. PIP me baby!!!

      Naked Rayburn

    • CPU clock speed growth seems to be slowing (Score:4, Interesting)

      by jayveekay ( 735967 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:26PM (#9058076)
      My history of PC clone purchases (I tend to buy a near top of the line machine every 2 years):

      1995: 133 Mhz
      1998: 400 Mhz (300% faster)
      2000: 1500 Mhz (333% faster)
      2002: 2800 Mhz (90% faster)
      2004: 3400 Mhz (20% faster)

      If the present trend that I've observed continues, however, we won't see 6Ghz in 2006.

      However, CPU clock speed is only one factor as far as system performance goes, hence Intel's recent announcment about moving away from marketing Pentiums based on clock speed. So maybe we'll see a P5 "7500+" rated CPU...

    • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Carnildo ( 712617 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:47PM (#9058301) Homepage Journal
      The problem I see is heat. Intel's latest chip design, the Prescott, puts out ~80 watts of heat at 3.4GHz. A dual-core, 4GHz version would put out around 150 watts. No air cooling system in the world can handle that sort of heat density.

      Now, look at graphics cards. Triple the video power, and you can expect to double the heat output -- if the process shrink to 90nm reduces the power output. If, instead, they run into the problem Intel did, the heat output will increase five-fold. There's enough headroom on GPU cooling that you can still air-cool, but these really will be the "vacuum cleaners" that recent nVidia cards were accused of being.

      GigE and terabyte storage are reasonable expectations.

    • Re:The estimates are OK (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Too Much Noise ( 755847 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:53PM (#9058348) Journal
      How is this insightful? this is for the freakin' OS, not for gaming or anything!!! Remember, the average consumer does little more than web+mail+maybe movies/music. 3x faster video cards indeed!

      yes, hardware will improve, there will be faster CPUs, GPUs, faster and cheaper memory ... but these requirements for the OS are ridiculous. Besides, this is not going to be the average system very soon, as the 'average system' is still sold to businesses - and good luck trying to convince those they have to shell out so much money for useless hardware (3d? loads of ram for the secretary's freecell?) just to upgrade the OS! Heck, good luch trying to get a system to this spec from Dell for less than $1000! And if Dell won't sell it ...

      Also, if this spec turns out true, there will be a lot of noise from all the people who bought the last MS license plan - and it won't be cheering, either!

      The only good news is MS will lose a lot of corporate/gov customers with this spec. Maybe Longhorn is not such a threat to opensource as previously thought?

  • DRM Overhead (Score:5, Funny)

    by SWroclawski ( 95770 ) <serge@wrocLIONlawski.org minus cat> on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:02PM (#9057714) Homepage
    It takes a lot of resouces to keep people shackled.

  • Damn... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Molt ( 116343 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:03PM (#9057719)
    ..that'd better be one hell of a game of Solitaire.

  • news flash: (Score:5, Funny)

    by ice-nine ( 149145 ) <gentaro@nOSPAM.gmail.com> on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:03PM (#9057724)
    computers in the future will be better than the ones we have now.

    on a side note, i can't wait to get one of those.

  • Do you think... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Kjuib ( 584451 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:05PM (#9057739) Homepage Journal
    They will send me one of those machines if I offer to test Longhorn for them? - Please... I promise to keep Longhorn on the machine for at least a week.

  • not confirmed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by untermensch ( 227534 ) * on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:05PM (#9057747)
    but this article from Microsoft Watch confirms it

    According to the article it's not a confirmation at all. Microsoft has released no official statments about hardware requirements, these values are just estimates from developers, who may or may not have a clue.

    Of course if it is accurate, then wow.

    • Yup, this just more Timothy FUD (Score:5, Insightful)

      by malakai ( 136531 ) * on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:14PM (#9057900) Journal
      You are correct this article is pure speculation. People complain about FUD coming from MS, yet post like this are the worse kind of FUD. And this is slashdot perpetuated FUD.

      Slashdot is no better than Simone:
      My best friend's sister's boyfriend's brother's girlfriend heard from this guy who knows this kid who's going with a girl who saw Ferris pass-out at 31 Flavors last night. I guess it's pretty serious.


  • Moore better not die... (Score:5, Funny)

    by TastyWords ( 640141 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:07PM (#9057768)
    ...or he'll be spinning in his grave.

  • If So, Microsoft Is Screwing Itself (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WombatControl ( 74685 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:11PM (#9057844)

    If these specs are correct, Microsoft is making a major tactical mistake. The computer market is driven by early adopters, but the bread-and-butter is still in the business market. The average business still has P3s running around, or even older. Even with the average upgrade cycle, but 2006 what's cutting edge now will be the average. Even with Moore's law Longhorn will require far more resources than the average business machine.

    If Microsoft ships with those specs as a baseline, 2/3rds of their business customers will say now. If Microsoft demands they switch or lose support, they'll end up switching to Linux (which by then will have made significant inroads as a business desktop OS).

    I can't imagine this story being true. As much as I dislike Microsoft, they're not that foolish to release an OS that most businesses can't afford to buy. Even XP can run (albeit slowly) on a two or three year old machine. If Longhorn can't run on today's machines it needs to be streamlined until it does.

  • Free internet (Score:5, Funny)

    by ttys00 ( 235472 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:14PM (#9057890)
    If the current state of Windows security is anything to go by, and if Joe Average has an 802.11g card in his machine in the future, we'll all have free internet via our neighbours poorly secured wireless link. Go Microsoft! :)

  • lifecycle (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sir_cello ( 634395 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:16PM (#9057936)

    This is probably about right: just remember that even though Longhorn may arrive in 2005/2006, it is likely to have an expected product lifetime of (say) 5-10 years (think Windows NT/2000/XP). This means that the average is planted somewhere midway into the envelope, say 2-3 years. I'm guessing that by 2008, these technology characteristics are properly not too far off base.

    I'm sure someone could sit down and do the numbers for us by extrapolating on CPU and hard drive rates and moore's law as it has occurred over the past couple of years.

    I mean, design is all about tradeoffs: we don't design in assembler any more because the playing field has moved on. We don't design UI's from scratch, we use UI 'builders'. In the same manner, we don't design for todays technology when we expect our design to work with tomorrows.

    If Linux didn't design for MP and scalability now, then it would be hosed by the time MP became "default" for the desktop (well, in fact, with HT, it already is!). Yet, designing for MP now causes some performance and related loss even though the technology is not here.

    Who am I trying to lecture Engineering and Economics 101 to the /. masses.

  • This is to process MSPS (Score:5, Funny)

    by amichalo ( 132545 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:20PM (#9057983)
    What the artcile [microsoft-watch.com] didn't say was that this computing power was needed primarily for a new feature of Longhorn - the Microsoft Streaming Patch System or MSPS.

    If one graphs Microsoft's patch releases over time, it is clear that the time between patches approaches zero. No one likes to patch a aysstem, just to see the next day a new patch or twelve have been released over night!

    So the MSPS will stream patches to all servers in a continuous feed. Of course, to install these patches takes bandwidth (1 GB Either), to download, both CPU power (dual 4GHz) and ram (2 GB) to install and a lot of room (1 TB to be exact) to store them all.

    +1 Sarcastic

  • Spare a thought for the testers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Michael Woodhams ( 112247 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:21PM (#9057996) Journal
    There must be people who are, today, trying to run the pre-alpha Longhorn for testing etc. Not only are they doing it on sub-standard hardware (by Longhorn standards), but much of the code will not yet have been optimised*, and would run unacceptably slowly even on that dual 5GHz/2Gb machine.

    I'm glad I don't have that job.

    * No, I don't have inside information, just experience at the software development cycle. For anything this complicated, the early development versions run too slowly.

  • News update... (Score:5, Funny)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:23PM (#9058028) Journal
    In a response to Microsofts recommendations, Windows users today recommended that "For that hardware, Longhorn better have an average uptime of 200 years, a no-virus lifetime guarantee and a paper clip with a 180 IQ AI system that can actually tell that you really want to write a letter by reading your mind and can write your 50 page report for you."

  • The fatal flaw in this reasoning (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ValourX ( 677178 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:23PM (#9058029) Homepage

    If Microsoft really thinks that this will be an average system in two years then I doubt we will ever actually see Longhorn. Microsoft will be finished by then.

    The vast majority of people today are more than happy with their computer systems as they are, and a significant number of people have too much machine for what they're doing. For many years into the future you will be seeing people with P3 and P4 machines still doing then what they do now.

    There's a reason why processor sales are slipping for Intel, and it has little to do with AMD: no one's upgrading because the last upgrade they did made no real improvement. How much faster can you get a program to start? How much faster can you do what you already do (excluding those who are in scientific or graphics fields).

    Hardware speed and power has accelerated so quickly up until now because software development could keep up with it. Now that proprietary software has stagnated (the last two software packages released by Microsoft, Corel, Macromedia and Adobe are exactly the same with one or two completely useless features thrown in and a new splash screen and icons) there is no reason to increase the capabilities of the hardware. Nothing you can do to a word processor will require more processing power than a current "average" machine offers. Same with web browsers and email clients. Even games -- game development has slowed to a crawl because it takes so long to make them now. Then there's the fact that game graphics can't get that much more realistic (and really, they don't need to be -- the Doom 3 demo already makes my stomach turn).

    The described system will not be anywhere near "average" for the "average" computer user in two years. Bookmark this post and flame me in 2006 if I'm wrong.

    -Jem

  • Windows size? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Nexum ( 516661 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:28PM (#9058094)
    Win 3.1 Windows folder approx 40MB

    Win95 approx 100MB - 150MB (4x increase)

    Win 98 approx 450MB (4x increase)

    Win XP approx 2.5GB (5x increase)

    Longhorn? Around 12GB???

    Well, seems to be the trend.

    • Re:Windows size? (Score:5, Informative)

      by RedWizzard ( 192002 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @10:50PM (#9059707)
      Win 3.1 Windows folder approx 40MB
      Win95 approx 100MB - 150MB (4x increase)
      Win 98 approx 450MB (4x increase)
      Win XP approx 2.5GB (5x increase)
      Can you provide references that these are accurate average installation sizes? I'm running XP here and the Windows folder is 1.5GB, which happens to be the Microsoft suggested system requirement. And where are WinNT and 2000? XP didn't follow 98 so the alleged 5x increase between them doesn't mean anything.

      According to microsoft.com (KB 304297) the requirements I've found are:
      Win95: 50MB
      Win98SE: 195MB
      WinME: 320MB

      WinNT Workstation: 110MB
      Win2K Workstation: 650MB
      WinXP Pro: 1.5GB

      Clearly there is an upward trend but your 4-500% increase is bullshit.

  • Two points (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cereal Box ( 4286 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:28PM (#9058101)
    First, I'm going to take this "scoop" with a grain of salt. It's being brought to us by the same biased nerds who continually try to slam Longhorn with as much unsubstantiated FUD as they possibly can. My favorite involves the Longhorn release date. All over Slashdot all I see are cries of "2008" for the release. I seem to remeber it being 2006 for a release, 2007 at latest. My memory might be slighly fuzzy in that regard, but if someone can provide me with a definitive link stating "Longhorn no earlier than 2008", I'll be happy. Otherwise, I'm convinced that in 2005 Slashdot geeks will be yelling "no Longhorn until 2009", etc. At any rate, I'm not buying these specs. They are quite ridiculous, and it seems unlikely that the Longhorn developers could be getting any work accomplished with modern-era PCs if Longhorn is expected to be such a hog.

    Now the second point: does anyone remember all the big flap over the story that Windows 98 was going to require (gasp) 200MB of hard drive space? Who could forget... "200MB for an OS! That's ridiculous", etc. Of course, everyone forgets that at around the same time, Linux had similar HD requirements. And when XP was set to be released, bitching and moaning about the expected 1GB install (or thereabouts), when modern Linux distros installed to roughly the same size. Time marches on, and OS requirements will climb because modern OS's will be expected to do more and more hardware-taxing things. The minimum recommended specs for a modern version of Redhat would look downright bloated to just about any computer user of 3 or 4 years ago, so keep that in mind. Windows will require beefier hardware, and so will Linux. This sort of behavior is not limited strictly to Windows.

    Nothing to see here, just more geek hypocrisy...

  • Looks like... (Score:5, Funny)

    by heyitsme ( 472683 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:32PM (#9058147) Homepage
    my dual proc G5 makes the spec.... oh wait

  • That's nice (Score:5, Insightful)

    by AdamHaun ( 43173 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:36PM (#9058193) Journal
    As long as I can tweak it so the "upgraded" interface looks as much like a bare bones Win95 system as possible, and I can turn off all the "friendly" background tasks to make it actually responsive, I'm happy. I like my processor working on my tasks, not needless graphical widgets, thanks.

  • Mac on the other hand... (Score:5, Funny)

    by moosesocks ( 264553 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:42PM (#9058239) Homepage
    On the other hand, by the time longhorn comes around...

    Mac OS will still be more technically advanced than Longhorn.
    The new apple PCs will only run at 3ghz or so, but will continue to completely school anything from Intel/Microsoft.
    The OS will still comfortably run on an 800mhz G4
    Steve jobs will manage to create a pointing device with no buttons at all. Mac users will claim this to be a revolutionary feature.

  • I know we can expect hardware performance to improve substantially in the next three years, but COME ON! what are they trying to achieve here? What problems do I have with my computer that this solution is going to fix?

    Ten years ago (pre-win95), if you asked me what my 5 major computing problems were, I'd have said:

    1. Memory management - need a flat model with real 32 bit support
    2. Standardized driver and hardware support, especially for printers.
    3. Long File Names.
    4. Standardized install/uninstall support.
    5. Performance - hardware needs to be faster.


    Well, a year or two years later, we've got all of them.

    So, what are my top five today?
    1. Spam
    2. Viruses and Spyware
    3. Every software vendor on the planet wants me to send them money every year even though I'm happy with what I've got. (See: license keys and forced registration/activiation.)
    4. Tech IP (Patents).
    5. Vendor lock-in.

    ONE... **ONE** of those (#2) is a problem software can fix. and FOUR of them are *CAUSED* *INTENTIONALLY* by Microsoft and companies just like them.

    I am not the only one who's soured on MS just because I'm tired of putting up with the crap. The corp world is moving, too.

    I also think MS is in more trouble than they let on. They feel their grip on the monopoly rope slipping and rather than letting go and trusting that they can compete in an open world, they are forcing themselves to be the only player in a smaller and smaller box.

    BTW, Knoppix 3.5(?) came out today. It now supports my NForce2 audio and net card correctly in the default configuration, and it makes NO demands of me beyond making me look at pictures of penguins.

    ...just something to think about.

  • undisclosed specs (Score:5, Funny)

    by Fuzzums ( 250400 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:47PM (#9058296) Homepage
    but it is a public secret that such a system should also have:

    - a USB microwave installed
    - a deflector shield
    - 2 plasma coils
    - a fusion reactor a power supply
    - seatbelts
    - BIO-DRM-authentication
    and so on ;)

  • At first I thought .... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Snoopy77 ( 229731 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @07:49PM (#9058313) Homepage
    Why 1 terabyte of hard drive space?

    Then I remembered that the dafault is for the OS to handle the pagefile size.
  • If Longhorn ran on current "mainstream" PCs, Microsoft would be in trouble. Assuming that current PCs cost $600, in a couple of years, this will drop to $250. This would make Longhorn >50% of the price of the PC. The only way to keep the OS price hidden is to push the total hardware price up. Otherwise, people will realize that the Microsoft tax actually exists.
  • Those specs will still be for your more expensive PCs (i.e. $1500+ in 2004 dollars), but it seems Bill is pursuing his vision of making Windows be everything to everyone. For any of you classic SNL fans... Longhorn is supposed to be a floor wax AND a dessert topping.

    Longhorn will be your media server (replacing the cable box, VCR, Tivo, and DVD player), play games via your television (replacing game consoles), interface with any networkable appliance in your home (refrigerator, heating and cooling system, alarm system) and provide a centralized control panel...

    That high-end PC will sit in a closet and be accessed via 5.8ghz wi-fi through a set-top box attached to your HD capable TV, thin client portables, and touch screens on your "Longhorn Enabled" appliances.

    Your Longhorn PC will be on the net and everything connected to it will be accessible (i.e. check your refrigerator inventory via a personalized web-based panel so you can prep a grocery list to pick up on the way home). Eventually, you'll walk into your house on a 48 degree (farenheit) winter day, and your home will be a sweltering 95 degrees (farenheit) inside, courtesy of the W64.HVACdemon virus, written by some pointy-headed 15 year old in Holland.

    That's Bill's ultimate goal: to squeeze Microsoft "technology" into every nook and cranny of your life until everything you do has some Microsoft code enabling it or making it inaccessible unless you pay Bill. And that's why such huge specs are needed.

    -- Greg

  • In response to MS's claim (Score:5, Funny)

    by Unregistered ( 584479 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @08:35PM (#9058732)
    the guys at NetBSD have decided that Longhorn will not be the only OS to run on a Whopper and have ported NetBSd to run on various burgers including the Whopper, Big Mac, and all of Wendy's architectures.

  • What I want. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by teamhasnoi ( 554944 ) <teamhasnoi AT yahoo DOT com> on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @09:13PM (#9059046) Journal
    I want to not have to ever see an hourglass, spinning beachball, or any blue bar of waiting. I want instant reaction to anything I do.

    If I go nuts and decide to open every program on my machine, or listen to my whole mp3 collection at the same time, while lens flaring every photo I've ever taken, I don't want to wait. Ever.

    I may be using extreme examples, but the OS should be instant. I'm still amazed at what BeOS can do on 233 pentium. Why can't today's Windows do that? Why won't tomorrow's? Why does it take 20 minutes to copy a 14 meg file on my OS X machine.

    Instant. Now. I want it now, and I want it yesterday. Specs be dammed.

  • Windows will always boot slow (Score:5, Funny)

    by imnoteddy ( 568836 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @09:21PM (#9059100)
    Back around 1990 I went to a party given by this computer guy who had just bought a 58 inch (or so) projection TV and had rented the movie "Aliens" to show off his new toy. Most of the guests were computer people. After we got appropriately wasted we gathered in his living room and started watching it.

    There's an early scene where the crew is coming out of hibernation and a computer screen is slowly scrolling text. One of the partygores said, "One hundred years from now and they still haven't done anything about how slow Windows boots up?"

    Someone piped up, "Of course they've done something - they're shipping a hibernation unit with each copy!"

  • Not affordable for businesses (Score:5, Interesting)

    by phorm ( 591458 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @09:48PM (#9059293) Journal
    One of the major reasons we are moving towards a transition to linux from windows is:

    a) XP is expensive, even by volume licensing an organization with 1000+ machines is a costly thing to licence

    b) Most of our machines won't run XP. They won't run win2k very well

    c) Upgrading/replacing all our machines to run a new OS is more expensive than the OS. Moreover, with the MS track record, by the time it was done there would be a new OS.

    Cue in Longhorn, I think this will be even moreso. It's not just the cost of the OS businesses can't afford, it's the hardware required to run the damn thing... not to mention the dependability/security issues. If not for our linux servers offering protection from the outside world, we'd be sasser'ed nicely too if we ran a lot of winXP machines.

  • "Forced" Hardware upgrade? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MP3Chuck ( 652277 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @10:08PM (#9059416) Homepage Journal
    Basically, they're saying that no current consumer PC will be able to run Longhorn. Given recent trends, it's not unreasonable to expect that most/all consumer hardware will ship with embedded DRM capabilities. Is this not exactly what MS wants?

  • What amazes me most is (Score:5, Informative)

    by Boarder2 ( 185337 ) on Tuesday May 04, 2004 @11:31PM (#9060023) Homepage
    Slashdoters inability to read. Even in the description of the article it says that this is what Microsoft projects a common computer will be about the time Longhorn is released. These are NOT system requirements of Longhorn.

    A common new computer when XP came out was about a 1.4GHz If I recall correctly, but the system requirements are 400MHz...

    Just some food for thought.

  • The beginning of the end? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mrbcs ( 737902 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @12:01AM (#9060188)
    I sell computers. My business has dropped 80% this year from last year.(Yes I'm exploring other options). Most of my customers have pII's to surf the web or write letters.

    Everybody has 3 or 4 machines already and a game box. We simply don't need a 6 ghz processor. We certainly don't need another bloated M$ product to surf the web. We (I believe) will soundly reject this upcoming drm and new word/excel format. This cycle needs to stop, and will.

    These companies make this stuff because that's what they do. The ultimate proof will be when the consumers actually buy this stuff or not. There have been many "great ideas" that the unwashed masses have already rejected. Anybody remember "PUSH"?

    Microsoft also backtracked this year on their intention to end support for win98. Guess they checked and found that 28% of the web was still using win98... probably with no intention to upgrade. Our dollars will decide where the computer industry goes. There is no new Internet to drive sales so I can't really see it getting stronger. BTW, here in Canada, an AMD 2400+ with most goodies is about $475 American.

  • AFAIK (Score:5, Informative)

    by melted ( 227442 ) on Wednesday May 05, 2004 @02:12AM (#9060836) Homepage
    Longhorn will have several "tiers" of user experience, so it'll still work on low-end hardware and run all the apps even, but the support for Avalon/Aero will be scaled back to what the actual machine can support.

    That's why these projections seem so incredibly high. And I'd say they aren't that high either. I'll be surprised as hell if 4GHz processors and faster graphic accelerators don't come out next year.

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