Evolution of PC

I was reading yet another article on the relative merits of Mac vs PC. There were many comments that made the point that Macs lost a lot longer than PCs. That got me thinking of whether that was really the case. How long had my PC’s lasted? I realized that I didn’t really know and set out on a trip down memory lane to catalogue the various computers that me and my family have owned.

Siva PC: This was bought by my father in the 80s as an office computer. It cost almost 60,000 rupees (in 80’s money). I think it had a 8086 processor, 640KB of RAM, a 20 MB hard disk and a green screen monitor. Needless to say, it only ran DOS and software like Lotus 1-2-3, Wordstar etc. I don’t think we got too much of usage out of it while my father’s factory was operational, except for some financial accounting. After we closed the factory, we brought the computer home and I remember playing around with it for a few years before it died a natural death.

- Assembled PC #1: The next computer I bought was an assembled PC in 1996. I boasted a 100 Mhz Pentium processor, a massive 4 MB of RAM, a 1 GB hard disk, CD-ROM and a colour monitor. It cost me almost 40,000 rupees back then. I used it till around 2000 when I upgraded to Assembled PC #2. I don’t remember what I did with it, most likely we just gave it away.

- Computer in US : When I went onsite for the second time in late 1996, I bought a computer at Fry’s electronics. It was a slightly more powerful version of the one I had at home with a 133 Mhz processor. I sold it to my roommate when I returned for good. That was also the trip where I bought a 16 MB RAM stick for my PC in India for an unworldly price of 350 dollars.

As Built PC #1: In 2000, it was finally time to upgrade my PC and Vidya and I decided to build a PC together. I had bought a CPU and hard disk from the US and we went to SP Road to buy the remaining parts. We ended up with a Celeron 667, 128 MB of SDRAM (which I later upgraded to 384 MB), a 4.3 GB hard drive and a CDROM (later upgraded to a CD-writer). We retained the 15 inch monitor from the PC which we later upgraded to a second hand 17 inch in 2003. We used this PC till the end of 2004, but when we came back to Bangalore, we stopped using it. I used some of the parts (memory, hard drive) on PC#3, and to my surprise, managed to sell the remaining parts in 2006 for around 1000 rupees.

- Australia PC: When we went to Australia in 2002, we initially picked up a cheap second hand computer, a Pentium 2 model. A few months later, when it seemed like Vidya’s work from home plan would fructify, we invested in a proper model, a Pentium 3 – 700 Mhz monster with 512 MB of RAM, 20 GB hard disk, 17 inch monitor etc for 700 australian dollars. When we returned back to India in 2003, we sold it to my friend Venky.

- PC Build #2: After returning back to India in 2003, we moved to Mangalore. In Bangalore, my mother was left without a PC. In 2004, I built the third computer. Unlike the previous computer where I salvaged a lot of parts, this was a complete unit, with a Athlon XP 2000+, 512 MB of RAM, 40 GB hard disk, DVD drive and a 17 inch Samsung monitor. This computer survives till this day, though in a very different form. The guts of the machine (MB+CPU, RAM, HDD) are now in my father-in-law’s machine at Chennai.I’ve upgraded those to a 2.66 GHz Core2Duo E6700 with 2 GB of RAM and 570 GB of hard disk space. The monitor has been exchanged for a 19 inch Viewsonic LCD. The case, keyboard, mouse, speakers and UPS remain functional a full 5 years later. The OS has also evolved, I initially used a copy of Windows 2000, switched to a legal OEM copy of Windows XP in 2006 and when I upgraded the CPU in late 2007, bought a full version of Windows Vista Home Premium.

- Laptop #1: I’ve never been a fan of laptops, despite using a laptop as my primary work machine since 2002. In my view, they were slow and expensive. I finally bit the bullet in 2007 and bought a HP dv6516 tx as a birthday present for Vidya. It cost almost 60000 rupees and had a 1.5 GHz Core2Duo processor, 2 GB of RAM, 160 GB hard drive, 15.4 inch screen and a DVD drive. It came with Windows Vista Home Premium. Except for some reliability with wireless networking, it has performed flawlessly over the past 2 years. I upgraded the machine to the RC version of Windows 7 and intend to upgrade to the full version in October. At the same time, I'll probably upgrade the hard drive to a 500 GB one.

- The Future: Both of my computers are fast enough for anything that I throw at them, whether it is browsing or playing games or encoding movies (OK, the laptop is not, but I would not ever transcode a movie on a laptop when a desktop is available as an option). Another big change is the rise of portable computing through devices like the iphone and Nokia internet tablet. As they evolve, they make the case for a full sized desktop or laptop that much less compelling. So, I don’t see myself upgrading my current setup anytime soon, unless something breaks.

Looking back, I see that pretty much every computer has lasted me atleast 3-4 years, so much for PC’s being unreliable. I’ve also had a lot of good luck with components, very few of them have failed on me. Just listing them down has shown how much progress the PC industry has made in terms of speed and specifications. I remember encoding mp3 in 1997, it used to run at 1/3 speed (i.e. over 15 minutes for a 5 minute song). My current computer can transcode video at 5x speed (120 fps for H.264 compression).

YSR Chopper crash

There is such a big fuss being made about the reason behind the chopper crash that killed the Andhra CM, YS Rajashekar Reddy with calls to book all those who have not done their job properly. Is it really news that our government servants are incompetent and least interested in their jobs? Every single day, there are umpteen deaths of common people caused by some babu who decided to take it easy on the job. Like the RTO inspector who takes bribes and allows people without basic driving skills to become killing machines on the road. Or the PWD engineer who screws up our pipelines that mix sewage with our water supply. Why is there no outrage at that? Why are there no demands to chop their heads off?

It isn’t nice to speak ill of the dead, but the reality is that YSR has reaped the fruits of what he has sown. It is he and others of his ilk that have tolerated (and even encouraged) incompetence and substandard delivery of services to the public. Why should we be surprised that he has paid the ultimate price for that?

Another post on ethics in Indian IT

We’re currently transitioning some work from a subcontractor back into our company. Through the transition, it is disturbing to see some of the lack of ethics that are being displayed by people at various levels in the subcontracting company. Some specific examples are

- People accepting our offers in writing and use that as a negotiating tool with a third company. Once they get a job, they turn down the offer throwing our entire planning out of gear

- - People in the higher management of the subcontracting company trying to convince people who have accepted our offers to reject them by offering onsite opportunities and other perks. While this is not a violation of the contract, it clearly goes against the spirit of the contract

The first case is not very surprising because the Indian IT professional’s lack of ethics and pursuit of Mammon is well known. But, it is very frustrating to see Indian IT companies trip each other in this manner. It also causes a project that has been planned over many months to suddenly shift into a constant fire-fighting mode.

A fallout of the situation is that I have to shuttle between Bangalore and Chennai to take control of the transition. I will be getting very familiar with Indian railways over the next few weeks.

Rebooting blogging

It has been a while since I updated the blog. I would blame it on Twitter and Facebook, which encourage a quick blast of words at the cost of a longer post that needs to be thought through. I've resolved to be a little more regular from now on.

To start off, a few snippets from the last couple of weeks. Of course, it was a huge moment in our lives with the arrival of a baby boy on August 13th. It happened on Gokulashtami day, so we have decided to name him Mukund, one of the names of Lord Krishna. I believe it also means One who bestows/gives Moksha/Nirvana.

Nisha was hugely excited by the event. Though she had been wanting a baby sister, it all changed once she saw her brother. Her happiness has been tinged by disappointment, she had made grand plans to call all her friends and show off her baby brother, but we have tried to avoid too much of contact in light of the swine flu scare. She'll get over it, kids have a way of dealing with these disappointments and focussing on positives.

We were a little disappointed with Divakar hospital. Firstly, we got a room facing the main road that had traffic through the day and night. Our bad luck, the hospital was full, so we could not even get a change of room. They also had no catering facilities. Typically, hospitals provide nutritious, dietician approved meals for the patient, but here, we were forced to bring everything from home. There was also the issue of differing charges, we got a bill for 40K, but my friend Krishna got a bill for 85K for similar treatment. The main thing was the medical staff and attention was good.

We came home on 17th Aug and since then it has been an endless cycle of nappy changing and disturbed sleep. But it is all worthwhile when you see Mukund reacting to his environment.

What real estate slump?

I have been calling various real estate developers and private sellers over the past few days to get an idea of the real estate market. Here are some of the quotations that I got

Mantri Espana : A super-duper-ultra-luxurious-out-of-this-world-exclusive apartment complex off the ORR with 5 swimming pools, 9 hole mini golf and flats ranging from 2600 to 100000 sq ft. The prices start at 1.2 crores. I said thank you very much and left.

Mantri Flora: At the junction of ORR and Sarjapur Road, 3 bhk apartments for second sale at around 75 lakhs for 1700 sq ft. This works out to over 4000 per sq ft

Sobha : They had an ad for a 3 bhk @ 50 lakhs. This is for their project on Kanakpura Road. For their projects in this part of town, they have a super luxury project starting at over 1.2 cr. Their luxury projects are “only” 77 lakhs for a 3 BHK

Ozone Evergreens@Haralur Road: Touted as the first “affordable” housing complex in Bangalore, this has a 900 sq ft 2 BHK for 28 lakhs all inclusive. This works out to around 3000 per sq ft. Unbelievably, as the sales woman told me, these don’t feature a balcony as they are “affordable housing”.

SJR Eastwood@Haralur Road: A person was selling a 40x80 plot @2800 per sq feet.

Ferns Habitat@ORR: A 2800 sqft plot quoting at 3300 per sq feet

Lakedew Residency@Haralur Road: A 1500 sqft plot quoting at 2600 per sq ft

I didn't pursue any of these opportunities. If these are the prices post the real estate slump, I am stunned.

Is Indian IT too insecure

Every time we hear Obama's political rhetoric, there is an outcry against the so-called "protectionism" by Nasscom. Frankly, this is making them seem like crybaby's. 

Obama is a politician. Whether in India or US, a politician's primary focus is his constituents and his comments are geared towards them. Right now, the US is hurting with massive job losses, and as their elected leader, it is his duty to address that.

Indian companies too have their own set of favourable circumstances vis a vis American firms, they pay almost no tax on their profits due to the STPI scheme. They have a huge wage advantage, as most of their employees are in India. If these are not sufficicient for them to compete and thrive, then they deserve to fail. after all this is the Capitalism that they so praise in action.

As for Nasscom, what happens to their grand pronouncements on the strength of Indian IT (1 million + employees, 60 Billion revenues)? Surely, an industry of this size should be able to innovate to handle any bouncers of this nature? Or deep within their hearts, do they know that Indian IT is nothing but a bunch of low skilled code coolies whose only advantage is the cost and the minute you take that away, the entire thing will unravel?

Taking Internet video to the TV

Internet video has really hit the mainstream in the last couple of years. Whether it is the regular “legal” avenues like Youtube (www.youtube.com) or P2P networks like bittorrent, there is a vast plethora of content to be found. The challenge has always been on how to bring it into the living room, as most people are not that comfortable watching long form video on their computers. They would much rather sit on their sofas or lie on their beds to watch the latest blockbuster.

Over the years, a lot of effort has gone in to solve this “last-metre” problem. A few notable attempts at solving this are

Apple TV : is a small book sized device that connects to your TV. It can also connect to your network and download movies from your Itunes library on your computer. It provides the ability to purchase movies and TV shows from the Itunes store. As with all Apple products, the process works flawlessly. The catch as always is in the lack of flexibility. It can only play the type of content that Apple allows, which limits its utility. The vast majority of Internet video is encoded in the AVI/XVID format which the Apple TV cannot play. In addition, since the Apple TV lacks a DVD drive, you will need a separate DVD player. The Apple TV is also expensive at over 200 dollars, and is not available in India.

Game Consoles (PS3/XBOX 360) : In addition to being awesome game consoles, both the PS3 and XBOX 360 can also serve as media players. They can play quite a range of video files including most of the common formats found on the Internet. In addition, they have their own video stores where you can pay and download movies and TV shows. If you’re a gamer and already have these consoles, this is the way to go, especially as you get the ability to play games and watch DVD’s on the same device (in the case of PS3, you also get a Blueray drive). However, they are limited in their ability to browse sites like youtube.

Media center extenders: A number of companies (Linksys, D-Link) have launched media center extender products. These connect to your home network (wired or wireless) and can play the video files stored on your computer. Typically this requires some software to be installed on your computer, though Vista has the media sharing feature built in. These have received mixed reviews, the most common complaint is the slow response time.

WD TV: This is a product that was launched in late 2008 and has got very positive reviews. It works like a media center extender without the network capability. You copy the video files to a USB device (pen drive or hard disk) and plug it into the device. The device will scan and play back the file. This approach removes the weakest link of the media center extenders which is the network. The other reason why this has been very successful is the support for virtually every kind of video file (except the copy-protected ones). The downside is that you need to buy an additional USB device and have to spend the effort to copy the files that you want to watch to the device. So, it is not that great for impulse viewing. The lack of any kind of network access is also a negative, as you cannot watch video from any of the online sites like youtube.

Despite all these choices, the best option still remains the Personal Computer. It provides the widest compatibility and support, playing back virtually every form of media. The challenge is to bring the personal computer to the TV and remove the parts that don’t fit in the living room space. Microsoft has done a lot of work on their Media Center software, to the point where the computer can be controlled using just the remote, but until now the hardware has lagged. The average desktop PC is too clunky and noisy to fit in the living room. However, many companies are introducing Home Theater PC’s (HTPC), which are very sleek and do not look out of place in the living room.

The human interface challenge still remains. Though the Media Centre functions can be controlled with a remote, there will still be occasions where you will need to go back to a keyboard and mouse. Having a regular keyboard + mouse in the living room is a no-no for most people. Logitech has the excellent diNovo, but it is an extremely expensive solution. A more elegant solution may be a software based, running on a smartphone that connects to the PC using Bluetooth. 

The company that can package all of this together into an integrated solution can make a lot of money. I’ve seen some movement towards this by companies like Acer (Acer Revo) and Asus (EEE Box)

This has been an area of much interest for me, mainly because my TV viewing mostly consists of downloaded TV shows (though these are available on some channels, they are aired much later and not in a widescreen ratio). I’ve hesitated in adopting any of the solutions because the area is very immature and the products are not available in India. I do employ a variant of the PC solution, sometimes connecting my laptop to the TV via HDMI. I also use a program called BlueMaemo on my N800 to control the laptop remotely. It’s not the most elegant solution but works for now.