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[O. Sharp]

Quoth Chuck Guzis, in part:

> I'm sometimes puzzled about this when I consider that most PC owners simply
> want to interact with a web browser and send email--and perhaps do the
> occasional word processing document and spreadsheet.  With the current crop
> of operating systems, a staggering amount of hardware is being thrown at
> relatively few applications for the most part.

For me, at least, the push to upgrade usually comes from either wanting a 
new media-handling capability (DVD burning, f'rinstance) or from finding 
a new game that has some requirement my old system won't meet. If it 
weren't for those two incentives to upgrade, I'd probably continue to 
use an old 386 machine - like Strong Bad. * I suspect a lot of people 
upgrade for the same reasons, and there may be a vicious circle of 
development working: chip designers create faster chips, programmers make 
neater toys using the new capabilities, people get excited over the toys 
and buy them, it becomes the standard, the OS bloats a little more, there 
becomes a push to create faster chips to run the resulting bloatware 
faster, return to start.

There's probably a lot of people, too, who upgrade to the Biggest And 
Fastest simply because it _is_ the Biggest And Fastest and they have to 
have it. I was guilty of that attitude myself at an earlier point in my 
life, and almost bought a NeXT when it was brand-spanking-new just because 
I was so impressed at the time with the hardware. (Yes, I am embarassed 
to admit this <g>, though I am still fond of the 68040.) Luckily I was 
able to give myself a fairly hefty reality check of what the hell I was 
going to _use_ it for, and talked myself out of it. ** But most people in 
that get-the-very-fastest-whether-they-need-it-or-not category probably 
_don't_ talk themselves out of it, which explains things like how the 
"Cross Fire Gaming Computer" can possibly even exist. ***

(Though maybe this is a poor example. "Gold Channel Gamer RAM"?!)

                     -O.-

* - http://homestarrunner.com/sbemail94.html

** - http://flyingmoose.org/me/hamlet.htm

*** - http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260015469715