Hi Gene,
<If I were Intel, I'd raise the price on the P55C. Takes guts, but AMD and Cyrix aren't going to do much more harm than they already have.>
This is a very interesting suggestions. My guess is that Intel might be afraid to do this because it could stess their relationship with box makers many of which are still 100% loyal towards Intel.
<My point was that the majority of users, (existing, new, home, business), don't have a great need for the power of PII.>
Yes, but when we all had 486's and Pentiums came out the majority of users probably didn't real need more power either. Yet Pentiums sold very well. Intel's latest chip always seems to be ahead of the game but that has never stopped them from selling.
There is a notion that when people buy or upgrade they only get the minimum they need. Perhaps this is true for some. But many people/businesses think ahead and are willing to pay $200 more to delay their next upgrade by 6-12 months. As for future requirements; my understanding is that a main advantage of PII over P is that is runs significantly faster on true 64 bit O/S's. WIN 95 doesn't take advantage of this (since it is still largely a DOS/32bit O/S in drag). But WIN NT (which is becoming more popular, especially in corporations) is true 64 bit and future versions of WIN 95 will be.
The question in my mind is, if you are planning on buying a P200MX why wouldn't you spend $200 more to get a PII-200MX when you know better and more powerful and sophisticated software and operating systems are likely to be just around the corner.
Good luck to all,
FF |
