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Speed has played
a key role with computers since the inception of the digital age in the
1940s. The very raison d’être of electronic machines is their
ability to carry out computational procedures faster than humans. But
speed is not always what it’s cracked up to be.
On the other hand, speed is sometimes given short shrift. Understanding
the differences can help you make smart PC buying decisions and smart
Web site design decisions.
The central processing units of today’s run-of-the-mill personal
computers are faster than those of multimillion-dollar mainframe computers
that were leading us into the future in the 1960s and 1970s. PCs today
are 10 times more powerful than they were just five years ago.
This mind-boggling increase in processing speed was predicted and codified
in 1965 by Gordon Moore, who would become the co-founder of Intel, when
he said that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits
had been doubling and would continue to double every year.
Though this doubling would later slow from every year to every 18 months,
the increase in capacity has continued, and it’s emblematic of the
personal computer revolution. It’s an increase that’s unprecedented
in other spheres of human endeavor.
APPROPRIATE TECHNOLOGY
To those involved with personal computers, this is heady stuff, and it
has led to an infatuation, even an obsession, with speed. It taps into
the Western notion of progress, of ever-increasing efficiency, output
and standards of living.
The infatuation is misguided. “Speed is an artificial need,”
says Rob Enderle, an analyst for the Giga Information Group, a market
research firm in Santa Clara, CA. “It’s analogous to cars with
big engines. Bigger is not always better. Neither is faster.”
There’s a countervailing notion here, more Eastern in nature, of
appropriate technology. In practical terms, very few people today need
the very fastest PCs, those that run the Intel Pentium 4 2.0 GHz CPUs,
which have recently reached the market, or the equivalent chips from AMD
or Motorola.
For common tasks such as word processing, spreadsheets, business graphics,
Web surfing and e-mail, slower and less expensive central processing units
are more than adequate. On the other hand, if you’re engaged in CPU-intensive
tasks such as high-end image editing, video editing, digitizing music
or computer-aided design, the high-end can be cost-effective.
Other factors besides cost-effectiveness, however, can enter a buying
decision. A high even number such 2.0 GHz, or two billion cycles per second,
is psychologically compelling in the same way as a .400 batting average
or a Dow of 10,000. Still, on the whole, the importance of CPU speed is
the single most overrated aspect of personal computing today.
ON THE WEB, SPEED RULES
The single most underrated speed element today is the time it takes Web
pages to load.
Sure, it’s widely known that a high-speed cable or DSL modem can
dramatically improve the quality of your surfing experience. In fact,
the biggest PC speed bottleneck for the past several years hasn’t
been CPU speed but modem speed, a bottleneck that won’t disappear
until high-speed Internet access becomes universally available.
What’s not as widely known is that even with high-speed access, slow-loading
Web pages still can be a problem. The Web won’t be truly efficient
until browsing from one page to the next is as speedy as browsing pages
in a newspaper or magazine.
A recent study by market research firm Jupiter Media Metrix underscores
the importance of fast-loading Web pages. The study found that 40 percent
of people will visit a site more often if its pages load faster, while
only 20 percent are interested in multimedia or rich media features, which
load much slower than text and simple graphics.
Some Web page designers look at flashy technologies such as Shockwave
as a way to make their sites look hip and cutting edge. Yet many Web page
visitors look at these technologies as cloying eye candy that just slows
them down.
People on the Web have short attention spans. This is the age of VCRs
and microwave ovens. People don’t want to wait to get what they want.
If you force them to cool their heels at your Web site, gratification
elsewhere is just a click away.
That’s why the best Web sites are simple, and why simple Web sites
are more likely to be around in the future. “On the Web,” says
Jakob Nielsen, author of the new book Homepage Usability: 50 Websites
Deconstructed, “you have design Darwinism—survival of the easiest.”
The theme here is technology for people, not for technology.
Reid Goldsborough is a syndicated columnist and author of the book Straight Talk About the Information Superhighway. He can be reached at reidgold@netaxs.com or http://members.home.net/reidgold.
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